tuations. This is the cafe with infecs; they have not always five fenfes like man. Some are deprived of fight, fome of fmell, others of hearing; but never except when the manner of life they lead renders thefe unneceffary or useless.

Feeling or touch is common to all animals as Pliny obferves: The fenfe depends on the motion of the nervous fluid communicated to the brain, and affecting the foul. This motion is excited under the skin by the impulfe of fome external body; it communicates itself to the nerves, is by them inftantaneoufly carried to the brain, and there causes a sensation of pleasure or of pain. The nerves which have all an immediate connection with the head, are affected in the fame manner as a cord well stretched: the smallest motion made in it is communicated at once to the two extremities. It is remarkable of this fenfe that it refides in all parts of the body whereas the others have each a particular organ feated in the head. By this means animals are informed of all the derangements, exterior as well as interior, which can happen to them.

What I have faid, in the laft Chapter, evidently thews that infects are endowed with the sense of touch. It must have been remarked how careful they are to secure themselves agaist wind, rain, heat, cold &c. which certainly they would not do were they deprived of this fenfe. The delieacy of the organs of touch, is not the fame in all. There are fome which are fenfible to the fmalleft impreffion, while others do not feem to feel even a pretty fmart ftroke, as if endowed with an almoft ftoical infenfibility. There is reafon to believe that fome infects are to be found, deftitute of all other fenfes but that of feeling.

S 2

Sight

Sight is a fpecies of touch: the rays that come from an object falling on the eye affect the retina: the motions they occafion there are communicated to the optic nerve, and produce the fenfe of feeing. Although many infects are endowed with this fenfe it is not common to them all. Some of thofe which enjoy it, have it in greater perfection than man. Their fight is fo quick, that it comprehends, if we may fo fpeak, even an atom. We cannot view objects behind us, without turning round our head; but there are many infects which, without fuch motion, can see all the objects which furround them. Men in general cannot fee in the dark, but many infects feebetter in the night than in the day.

God has not beftowed the fenfe of hearing on all infects; and I know none that have ears; we cannot however doubt, that there are many which are endowed with this fenfe. As the lovers of mufic affemble at the found of the inftruments they like, we fee many infects collecting together at certain founds they are pleafed with. A difagreable noise difturbs and frightens others. This is more furprising if, as I have faid they have no ears to ferve as the organ of hearing. When a noife is made, a tremulous motion is communicated to the air, which ftriking on the tympanum of our ears, is by the animal fpirits conveyed to the brain, and produces in us the fenfe of hearing this is fimple, and can be eafily conceived. But how can this happen without ears?

Infects have nothing like a nofe, but we cannot for that reafon deny that they poffefs the fenfe of fmelling. We obferve that they often diftinguifh fmells; and that they are fenfible of the perfume that exhales from odorous fubftances. Their inclinations in this refpect differ very much; fome give the preference to thofe fmells which we think agreeable, others are at tracted by the odour of fubftances which they gree

dily feek after, while others more delicate avoid them and fly from them with the greatest averfion. The fense of hearing in infects is more acute than in man of which I know two inftances. The first is, that they discover their food by this fenfe, and can dif tinguish by it the qualities of vegetables; the second is that they can fmell the food that is agreeable to them at a much greater distance than man can. But we are more than recompenced for our inferiority in this refpect to infects: the reafon we are endowed with, enables us to difpenfe with fach exquifite delicacy of fmell, and is preferable to any advantages which infects have over us.

Taste is a motion of the animal fpirits excited by particles acting on the nerves of the tongue which communicate that motion to the brain, and thus af fect the foul. Infects have no tongue like other ani mals, but their trunk and their palpi, of which we fhall speak in the fequel, ferve them inftead of it and are the organs of their tafte. This fenfe is of great use to them; by it they diftinguish between food that is falutary, and food that would be noxious to them. What I have remarked, in fome of the former Chapters with regard to the food of infects, fhews clearly, that the fenfe of taste in these creatures is very various. What fome love, is abominated by others; fome live on fluids, others on folids; fome live on the green blade, others on the dried grain. Some delight only in the juice of flowers; others fuck the blood of animals. To thefe laft, every fpecies of blood is not equally agreeable; fome preferring that of man, others that of quadrupeds, no do they attack every quadruped indifferently. Laftly there are infects which devour animal fubftances, fome when it is fresh, others not till it becomes putrid.

Infects though deftitute of the organs of fome of

the

the fenfes are not however deprived of the feelings they occafion. Hitherto the ears have not been difcovered in any infects; the greater part have nevertheless the sense of hearing in a very eminent degree; they have no nose, and yet their sense of smell is exceedingly delicate. What greater instance can be defired of the infinite wifdom of the Creator, which is not confined to a single mode of producing the effect? If the greater part of animals have ears, as the organ of hearing, and a nofe, as that of fmell, this is not a proof that the ears and the nose are abfolutely neceffary to produce thefe fenfations. God can when he pleases form creatures capable of experiencing the fame fenfations by means of other organs. Should it be objected that infects, which are sensible to fmells and to founds, muft have a nofe and ears, but that the ftructure of them is fo fine and so delicate that we cannot difcern them even with the affistance of a good microscope, the wifdom of the Deity would not on that account be lefs the fubject of admiration Would we not have reason to be aftonifhed at the extent of the power and wifdom of a being who has given fenfations to organs fo minute as to have hitherto escaped the moft diligent ferutiny of the curious? How delicate must be the nerves which tremble at the smallest impreffions made by external objects! How fubtile must be the animal fpirits, which can produce in the foul of these creatures, thofe motions which lead them to provide for their prefervation.

The ufe which infects make of their fenfes corref ponds exactly to the views which the wife author of nature from whom they derive them, propofed when he formed them. Far from employing them in procuring to themselves extravagant pleasures or exceffes of any kind, they never ufe them but to answer their neceffities, or as the means of their prefervation. How great is the difference in this refpect be

tween

tween them and man! who allows himself to be led aftray by voluptuousnefs, and by all the pleasures of the fenfes, as if the faculty of reafon had not been bestowed on him, and as if he had not the power to refift his inclinations. Let us learn from thefe defpiled animals to mortify our paffions, to indulge in no exceffes, and to confine our fenfes to those uses for which they were given us. How difgraceful is it for a rational being to confefs himself in this refpect inferior to the brutes! Let us fly from luxury, let us fhun pride, and the vanities of life, and let us employ all our fenfes in contemplating the works of God, as well thofe of nature as thofe of grace. Let our ears be shut against whatever is wicked or indecent, and open only to the important found of the word of God. Let us not abase the organ of our taste by excefs in eating or drinking, but let us ufe it for our preservation, by living foberly and frugally. It is our duty to take care of our bodily frame; but it is a crime to idolize it, to attend only to its pleasures, and to fatisfy all its inordinate appetites.

Man enjoys five fenfes, while infects want fometimes one fometimes another. The Deity has alfo bestowed on him a rational foul which indemnifies him for the fuperiority that infects have over him with regard to the fenfibility of their organs. What thanks ought we not to render him for gifts fo valuable ! To form a juft estimate of the importance of thofe gifts, let us fuppofe for a moment that we have loft the use of one or more of our fenfes ; we fhall then be convinced how indifpenfible they are to our pleafures and convenience. Blind, deaf, without feeling, without taste or fmell, what would become of us! Our body would be nothing but a lump of clay, and our foul incapable of providing for its fecurity and prefervation. Let us then praife and exalt the author

Cur