704 
ON THE STUDY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 
progress in attainments to which according to our limited ideas 
bounds can scarcely be assigned. When the anatomist considers 
how many muscles must be put in motion, before any animal exer¬ 
tion can be effected: when he views them one by one, and tries to 
ascertain the precise degree to which each individual muscle must 
be constricted, or relaxed, before the particular motion which is in¬ 
dicated can be effected, he finds himself bewildered in the labyrinth 
of calculations in which this involves him. He is still more con¬ 
founded when he reflects, that it is not the human body only, that is 
endowed with the faculty of calling forth these incomprehensible 
energies, but that the most insignificant insect is vested with similar 
powers. A skilful naturalist has been able to ascertain, that in the 
body of the minutest caterpillar, there are upwards of two thousand 
muscles, all of which can be brought into action with as much facili¬ 
ty at the will of that insect, and perform their several offices with as 
much accuracy, promptitude, and precision, as that with which the 
similar voluntary actions of man are effected. The most minute in¬ 
sect, whose whole life consists of but a few days, is in all its parts as 
perfect as the elephant that treads the forest of India for a century. 
Unlike the productions of men, all the minute parts of the works of 
God appear in greater perfection, and excite in us greater admira¬ 
tion, the more minutely and more accurately they are examined. If 
we turn our attention from the consideration of the complicated 
structure of animal bodies, and direct our observations to the econo¬ 
my by which the all-wise Creator regulates their existence, we have 
then abundant cause for admiration. We see that all the smaller 
creatures which serve as food for man, are particularly fruitful, and 
that they increase in a much greater proportion than others. Noxi¬ 
ous animals in general multiply slowly, and whenever we find an 
unusual increase of such, w r e generally discover that something has 
been given by providence for the purpose of destroying, and coun¬ 
terbalancing them. Many species devour each other, and multitudes 
which might otherwise by their number become of serious injury to 
mankind, afford food for other creatures. The insect tribe increase 
with astonishing rapidity, and were these not destroyed by innumer¬ 
able enemies, they would soon fill the air, and in the end would oc¬ 
casion the destruction of the whole animal and vegetable creation. 
The offspring of every animal with regard to number, bears a certain 
proportion to the duration of its life. The elephant lives to the age 
of an hundred years or upwards, the female consequentlv produces 
but a single young one at a birth, and that does not arrive at maturity 
till it is sixteen or eighteen years old. Nearly the same may be re- 
