THE ENTOMOLOGISTS 
WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER. 
No. 120.] SATUKDAY, JANUARY 15, 1859. 
E E F 0 R M. 
We called attention last week to the 
subject of reforms, — at least the 
young call them by that name, the 
old look upon them as innovations. 
It is astonishing what power a single 
energetic individual has in promoting 
a reform : from the time of Luther 
downwards every great progress will 
be found, as it were, crystallized round 
a central nucleus. 
The reform to which we alluded 
last week was the reform of the no- 
menclature of our Macro-Lepidoptera, 
effected by Mr. Henry Doubleday, in 
the years 184/' — 1850. We know this 
reform was highly unpalatable to many 
of the older entomologists, who were 
surprised and pained at its extent and 
thoroughness; but, if we are not mis- 
taken, the greater number of the rising 
generation have accepted this reform as 
f 
a vast improvement on the previously 
existing system ; and, to the credit of 
the late James Francis Stephens be it 
said, that, advanced in life as he then 
was, he accepted all the new improve- 
ments, which were not themselves 
errors, as sinning against the well- 
known and generally respected law of 
priority. 
That Mr. Stephens did not concur in 
Mr. Doubleday’s arrangement was only 
natural ; as arrangement is to so great 
an extent a matter of taste, and as 
tastes differ, so even the taste of an 
individual will vary at different times; 
hence probably Mr. Doubleday would 
not himself reproduce in 1859 the ar- 
rangement of 1849, and that of 1869 
will probably again differ from its pre- 
decessors. 
We hear some moody grumbler ob- 
jecting to these incessant changes; but 
you cannot have a settled fixity unless 
you persuade the Science to stand 
still. We are just as certain that any 
arrangement proposed in the coming 
season cannot be a final one, as we 
are that the Reform Bill to be passed 
in the ensuing session will itself ere 
long undergo modifications. 
Movements may be awkward to some 
people, but they are fiir better than 
stagnation. 
We often hear silly, unthinking 
people say, “ Why cannot you all 
agree to adopt the same arrangement 
of your insects?” It needs no great 
depth of thought to see, — 1st, the 
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