man, profeffor at Frankfort on the Oder. In the month of July, 1665, being at Ochfenfurt, he remarked, that many butterflies difcharged fimilar red drops when they were merely touched with the hand. Mr Linke of Leipfig informs me he has observed the fame thing. Infects make war on one another, and fome, even on individuals of their own fpecies. The large reddifh yellow fpiders eat one another, wen put together under a glafs. Grafshoppers are mortal enemies. The male lives apart from the female, except at pairing time if the female meets the male by chance, the maims him, breaks his legs, or kills him outright. There is open and declared war among fome fpecies the ichneumons, for instance, and fpiders maffacṛe each other reciprocally, with mercilefs fury. If grafshoppers are put in the fame place with the house cricket, the former eagerly pursue the latter and kill them. Befides natural antipathy, other reafons may be fuggefted for this barbarity. Infects, for whom the Creator has destined others as their food, lay fnares for them, in order to fatisfy their appetite. They therefore behave like a hunter, who endeavours to entrap the game he is in queft of; and, when they have feized their prey, they kill and devour it. Wafps, for inftance, make war upon bees, by the fame inflinct which induces the wolf to attack the lamb, the cat the mouse, or the ftork the frog. The want of other food in duces infects to make war on one another, and puts them under the difmal nceflìty of devouring their own fpecies. I have often made the experiment with certain caterpillars; they never attacked others, till they were entirely deprived of every fort of food. The horrors of famine drove them to do what men have fometimes done in fimilar cafes, devoured one another. Jealoufy is often the caufe of their fatal contentions; the male grasshoppers, and those of most other infects, fight together for the poffeffion of a female. The ichneumons, which depofite their eggs in the bodies of caterpillars, and which, for this purpose, pierce them deeply with their stings, excite them by the pain to defend themselves. It is faid, that fome infects have an averfion, and natural antipathy to certain animals, and many examples of this kind are related. No fly, it is faid, ever enters into a house, where the head or tail of a wolf is fufpended. Scorpions have an averfion at crocodiles, fpiders at toads, and when thefe animals appear, they dart upon, and kill them. Some infects are fubject to the ftone. It is not doubted, but that this is the cafe with fome fpiders; but the question is, whether the ftones can be found, and in what manner. Doctor Sennertus fays, that the infect must be put into a glass, full of Valerian root bruised. Others fay, that it will be fufficicient to put that root under their webs. However this may be, Doctor Simon Pauli being at Wittemberg, found a fpider, as large as a nutmeg, which he put into a glass with the above mentioned preparation; but, contrary to his expectation, the animal yielded no ftone. From this experiment he concludes, with too much precipitation, that what has been faid of the ftone in fpiders, is a fable: for Doctor John Franck inclofed fifteen fpiders in a glafs, with the prescribed precautions; they left there a ftone of an afh colour, with fmall black fpecks. This experiment fhews, that though all thefe infects are not affected with the ftone, fome are. Lastly, it appears from the mufæum of Olaus Wormius, that a Brazilian infect, called the sea louse, which fucks the the fifh called Acarambitamba, is fubject to the fame disease. Wormius himself had one of the ftones. The regularity obfervable in the different members of infects, gave me an opportunity, in the last chapter, of remarking the infinite power, the wifdom, and the liberty of the Creator. The fubject treated of in the prefent, is a no lefs fruitful fource of reflection. Man, accuftomed to fee the fame objects every day, beholds them without regard; the moft ftriking proofs of the unlimited power and wifdom of the Deity, make no impreffion on his mind, when they become familiar to it. To draw hin from his lethargy, he must be roused by some appearance extraordinary, fingular or important. All Nature teems with inftances of the power, the.wifdom, the goodness of God, which bear alfo a character of novelty: it is neceffary, only to develope them, and to prefent them to the understanding. The fingular qualities of many animals, and of diverfe infects in particular, are of this number. It would appear, that the divine wifdom has endowed them with thefe perfections, folely with the view of exciting our attention, and of elevating our minds to the contemplation of the wonders of Nature. The duty of a true Chriftian is to conform to those invitations, and to acknowledge, in those fingular productions, the power and wisdom of a divine Author. Let us fix our attention, in the first place, on the wonderful and almost infinite minutenefs of many infects. Because they do not approach to the fize of an elephant or a whale, or fome other animal of great bulk, are they lefs the production of a divine. hand? I own that these large animals are Colof fufes, and deserve a marked attention; but infects, thofe minute inhabitants of the world, bear ftill more admirable admirable marks of power and wisdom. Is there not more art discoverable in the ftructure of the teeth of a Dermestes than in that of the tufks of a boar? Is there not more beauty in the wings of fome butterflies, than in those of the peacock? How does the little excell the great, when we compare the head of a grafshopper with that of a horfe, the trunk of a flea, with the probofcis of an elephant! Whoever fhall reflect ferioufly on all this, will find that the powerful hand of the Creator is in every thing worthy of the highest admiration; that it is no lefs confpicuous, to fay no more, in the ftructure of a mite than in the formation of a Behemoth. We admire the fkill of a workman who can execute a piece of mechanism so minute as to be hardly difcernible by the eye, and with juftice. It is more difficult to make a chain fo fmall hat a flea may be bound by it, than one fit to drag along a waggon; there is more dexterity required in moulding the figure of a fmall fly than in carving the image of an elephant. Let us therefore admire with deep humiliation the wisdom of God which is grand in great things, but which is no lefs fo in fmall. How great is the difference between his works and those of the most skilful artists! We have already had occafion to make the remark. Can they give to the masterpieces of their hands thofe internal organs by which the works of nature execute all their motions? Can they polish the external furface of their productions fo as to make them any way comparable to those of the Creator? However polished theirs may be, in comparison with his they will always appear rough and rugged. Let us likewife compare the fmallness of the things moft artificially conftructed by human hands, with those small machines endowed with life and motion. Let us compare them with the bodies of thofe minute animals of which Leeuenhoeck discovered many millions in a fingle drop drop of water; and his difcovery we cannot difcre· dit, for many learned men after him have made the fame experiments. Robert Hook, and many others affure us, that in one drop of water, of the fize of a grain of millet, there have been discovered fometimes ten, fometimes thirty, and fometimes five and forty thoufand of these animalculæ. Do these owe their existence to chance? It would be ridiculous to fuppofe it; for chance cannot beftow a regular figure, nor arrange members in just proportion, nor confer the faculty of propagation. Shall it be faid that they have been formed by other creatures? But have these that infinite power which is neceffary for creation? Let it be our dutyto acknowledge that no caufe for their exiftence can be affigned but God alone. He who hath given the Sun its light to fhine by day; he who hath commanded the Moon and Stars to enlighten the night, is the fame who hath beftowed on certain infects, for certain purposes, the faculty of appearing luminous in the dark. The fame Creator who hath given to man the power of fpeech, to quadrupeds and birds their different voices, has given to infects the power of producing certain founds. He who hath given to mufk its flavour, and to the animal we mentioned above, the power of diffeminating its offenfive effluvia, is alfo the caufe of the different fmells which exhale from the bodies of infects. In fhort, the same hand that hath impreffed upon minerals, on fishes and on plants, the quality of yielding different colours. for dying, is the fame who hath beflowed the same qualities on different infects. And as we fee that there is not one of thofe particular qualities but what is bestowed for fome purpofe, and a certain end, we cannot but acknowledge that the whole is directed by a wife being, who has formed one plan and purfued one defign, and who hath executed the whole with perfect precision, |