Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/305

 such Accounts as might, perhaps, refresh the Memories of those who knew them before, but which could signifie very little to those who had never seen them. But of their Generation or Anatomy they could know nothing considerable, since those Things are, in a great Measure, owing to Observations made by Microscopes; and having observed few Sub-divisions, they could say little to the Ranging of those Insects which they knew already by distinct Characteristicks, under several Heads. For want of observing the several Steps of Nature in all their Mutations, and taking notice of the Sagacity of many sorts of Insects, in providing convenient Lodgings for themselves, and fit Harbours for their young ones, both for Shelter and Food, they often took those to be different, which were only the same Species at different Seasons; and those to be near of Kin, which only Chance, not an Identity of Nature, brought together.

The Clearing of all these Things is owing to Modern Industry, since the Time that Sir William Temple has set as a Period of the Advancement of Modern Knowledge; even within these last Forty Years. It lies, for the most part, in a very few Hands; and so is the more ea-