INTRODUCTORY LETTER. IS 



clearly developed, and that these minims of nature should be 

 endowed with instincts in many cases superior to all our 

 boasted powers of intellect — truly these wonders and 

 miracles declare to every one who attends to the subject. 



The hand that made us is divine.'''' We are the work of a 

 Being infinite in power, in wisdom, and in goodness. 



But no religious doctrine is more strongly established by 

 the history of insects than that of a superintending Pro- 

 vidence. That of the innumerable species of these beings, 

 many of them beyond conception fragile and exposed to 

 dangers and enemies without end, no link should be lost 

 from the chain, but all be maintained in those relative 

 proportions necessary for the general good of the system , 

 that if one species for a while preponderate, and instead of 

 preserving seem to destroy, yet counter-checks should at the 

 same time be provided to reduce it within its due limits ; and 

 further, that the operations of insects should be so directed 

 and overruled as to effect the purposes for which they were 

 created and never exceed their commission : nothing can 

 furnish a stronger proof than this, that an unseen hand holds 

 the reins, now permitting one to prevail and now another, 

 as shall best promote certain wise ends ; and saying to each, 

 ^'Hitherto shalt thou come and no further J'^ 



So complex is this mundane system, and so incessant 

 the conflict between its component parts, an observation 

 which holds good particularly with regard to insects, that if 

 instead of being under such control it were left to the 

 agency of blind chance, the whole must inevitably soon be 

 deranged and go to ruin. Insects, in truth, are a book in 

 which whoever reads under proper impressions cannot avoid 

 looking from the eflect to the Cause, and acknowledging his 

 eternal power and godhead thus wonderfully displayed and 

 irrefragably demonstrated : and whoever beholds these works 

 with the eyes of the body must be blind indeed if he cannot, 

 and perverse indeed if he will not, with the eye of the soul, 

 behold in all his glory the Almighty Workman, and feel 

 disposed, with every power of his nature, to praise and 

 magnify 



Hira first, Him last, Him midst, Him without end. 



