■OF INSECTS IN GENERAE. 
3 1 ? 
obfervaticns with which it prefents the reader, bear but 
a fmall proportion to thofe whofe object is merely to gra- 
tify curiofity. But in what fcience is there nothing to 
be found but what is immediately ufeful? and are not 
objects of curiofity often nearly allied to thofe of utility ? 
Is it not while we arnufe ourfelves with the former, that we 
are molt frequently led to the difcovery of the latter? To 
thefe circumftances, we may add another for the encou- 
ragement of thofe who undertake to write upon this fub- 
je& ; that works the moll ufeful are not always the moll 
favourably received : The number of thofe who read for 
amufement, is at lead equal to thofe who read for in- 
ftru&ion, A taffe for the marvellous, in a greater or 
lefs degree, is univerfal among men ; It is this which 
leads them to prefer romances, novels, Perjian and Ara - 
bian tales, to the incidents of real hiftory. The genera- 
tion, the metamorphofes of infecks, their means of rear- 
ing their young, and of procuring food, prefent to the 
reader wonders, perhaps not inferior to thofe that are fa- 
bricated by the mod licentious imagination ; with this 
difference, that the latter are true. The entymolo- 
gid therefore, has himfelf rather than his fubjecl to 
blame, if his works are not read by the public with 
avidity. 
