Derham's Physico and Astro Theology (Volume 2); Or, a Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAP. V. THE SAGACITY OF INSECTS TO SECURE SELVES AGAINST WINTER. IT is an extraordinary aft of inftinct and fagacity, obfervable in the generality of the infect-tribe, that they all take care to fecure themlelves, and provide againft the neceffities of winter: that when the diftrefles of told and wet force them, they fhould retire to warm and dry places of fafety, is not ftrangc; but it is a prodigious act of the infinite Confervator's care, to enable fome to live in a different kind of in- fect-ftate; others to live, as without action, fo without food; and others that act and eat, to Jay up in fummer fufficient provifions againft the approaching winter. - Some, I fay, live in a different (late; for having fufficiently fed, nourifh- ed, and bred up themfelves to the perfection of their vermicular nympha-flate, in the fummer- months, i;ionths, they then retire to places of fhfety, and there throw oft' their nympha, and put on their aurelia, or chryfalis-ftate, for all the winter, in which there are no occafions for food. This 'is the conftant method of many families of the infect-tribe ." But there are others, and fome of them in their moft perfect ftate too, that are able to fubfift in a kind of torpitude, or fleeping ftafe, without any food at all; by realbn, as there is no action, fo no wafte of body, no expence of fpirits, and therefore no need of foodb. It would be endlefb to enter into paniculars here, becaufe all the papilionaceous, fic-m and ichneumon-fly tribes, and all others that undergo the nympha and aurelia-ftate, between that of the egg and the mature-ftate, .which are very numerous, appertain to this note. For a fample thereof only, I fhall iukc what ioinc "may think a mean one, but if confidered, deferves our admiration, and that i, the dgaciry o...