Of the Metamorphoses of ANIMALS, and the several Changes observable in ANIMAL LIFE.
THERE scarcely ever perhaps was any system, doctrine, or opinion broach’d with more assurance, or that, for the time of its vogue, met with a greater and more universal approbation, than that which urg’d the idea of a metempsychosis, or transmigration of the soul, the spring or source of action, into various organized bodies, in which it had opportunities of exerting itself in different manners, and of producing different effects. Pythagoras, who was perhaps the wisest as well as the most humane of all the heathen philosophers, was, if not the first, at least the most considerable amongst all those who gave any sanction to a principle, which, however productive of the most desirable effects, has nevertheless appeared extremely absurd; and, consequently, in ages more enlightend in philosophical, tho’ perhaps less so in the more advantageous branches of real knowledge, has been rejected as entirely dissonant to experimental conviction; and therefore, without trial, judge, or jury, deserving to be cast aside by those who think they can know nothing unless they are masters of every thing; and would almost renounce an intercourse with the Lord of nature, unless they thought themselves able to dive into every motive of his actions.
Notwithstanding, however, this universal rejection of a system once was universally received, some of the more calm and rational devotees of philosophy have with great justice imagined, that an opinion advanced with so much positiveness, and accepted with so much zeal; inculcated by a man who could not impose on himself, and followed by a set of people who scarcely could be imposed upon, must have more in it than at first sight it appears to convey. Some of these, therefore, have endeavoured to solve it, by supposing a hidden meaning, and others by imagining a conceal’d intention to be veiled under a principle which, in its literal sense, was so repugnant both to the innate conviction of the learned, and the hourly observation of the vulgar. The first class of these rationalists imagined the impulse of a benevolent mind to have been the only motive that urg’d that great philosopher to advance a doctrine, which would terrify mankind from the destruction of animals, either in general or in particular, by the supposition of a possibility that, in taking away the life of any animal, however indifferent or even hurtful it might be to them for other reasons, the animated part, perhaps, of some dear relation, or renowned ancestor, might not only be disturbed, but even be exil’d from the spot of its immediate residence, and not improbably transplanted into some state more painful and opposite to its natural biass and inclination, and still more contrary to our own ideas of happiness and satisfaction.
Another set again, calling to their assistance the mysterious investigations of the cabala, have endeavoured to prove that Pythagoras having study’d very closely the Egyptian mythology, which perpetually dealt in mystery and hieroglyphics, some conceal’d meaning was still conveyed in every part of his philosophy: and that, like the parables and fables of the eastern teachers, every thing he preach’d was merely allegorical, only to be understood by those whom he chose peculiarly to enlighten, that is to say, by the disciples of his own school; whilst to the vulgar an external shew of somewhat was set forth, which, from his ipse dixit alone, they were bound implicitly to obey.
Now it is by no means impossible that both of these suppositions may in some measure be right: that is to say, that the amiable sage we have mentioned might, from a perfect knowledge of the power of superstition on the mind of uninstructed men, make use of a maxim so well adapted for the purpose, to put a check to that unlimited destruction of animal life, which luxury and sportive cruelty had introduced into the world; and also that he might at the same time, under the veil of a like fable, convey to those, who were his more immediate pupils, the idea of that incorruptibility of the human soul, which, from a want of those advantages that revelation has bestowed on us, he might imagine necessary to find some employment and distinction for; and by ordaining such distinction in one period of its existence, to be pointed out and determined by the inclination shewn by it in the preceding one, he might suppose, and no doubt his supposition met with confirmation from experience, that his disciples would be likely to model their actions according as they were influenced by the hope of rereward or dread of punishment,
Thus far, therefore, may the suggestions which have been advanced in the Pythagorean philosophy be well grounded. Yet there seems to be one most palpable observation, which has slipp’d all the commentators on, and solvers of this doctrine I have hitherto met with; and that is, from whence the first idea of such an opinion derived its original idea? No remembrance, no conception of a pre-existent state, continued in the mind of man to give it credit, and the assurance of the perfect corruptibility of all animals after death, concurred in some measure to contradict it: whereon, then, should these great men found the basis of a doctrine which, however aided forwards, and adorned by fable to confirm its power, must have needed at least the appearance of probability, something more than mere ipse dixit, to establish its first belief in the minds of the vulgar, which, little capable of philosophical reasonings, or theoretical investigations, must have their ideas fixt by some connection and analogy between what their senses are capable of discerning, and what their minds are to be taught to believe?
This being premised, from whence could be derived the doctrine of the Metempsychosis, or transmigration of the soul; but from a similar transmigration of the more visible soul; that is to say, of animal life, distinguishable from the slightest observation of Nature’s works, and hourly performed under our very eyes? Of these changes there are many varieties; of which it is impossible that the ancient philosophers, who were perhaps closer and more accurate observers than the moderns, could have been ignorant of in their fullest extent: and as even the very husbandman and labourer must also be well informed of several of them, it is not in the least improbable that an advantageous use might be made of these so well-known circumstances, for the illustrating and enforcing opinions, which it was necessary to inculcate the most forcibly in those minds which were the least capable of speculative or hypothetical theology.
Here, however, let us drop this conjecture, which I have rather introduced with a view of corroborating the principle which I first set out with in defence of the study of philosophy, viz. that the observations we cannot avoid making in the course of it, may be employed with great propriety towards humanizing the heart, and producing the most amiable effects in the general oeconomy of life and government. Was I to expatiate farther on the very subject before us, it might not perhaps be difficult to evince that these changes, even of the very lowest class of animals, that is to say, of the insect tribe, might be rendered not unserviceable even in the present more enlightened period, when christianity and revelation have drawn us out of the labyrinths of doubt and suggestion into the plainer and unwinding paths of more assured truth; yet still, I say, these changes might form to us, by analogy, the idea of a future and more exalted state; and convince us, that whilst we see the very minutest animals undergoing amazing alterations and metamorphoses, rising from the grovelling state of a grub or water-worm, to range the wide expanse of air, before they submit to the universal law of annihilation, it must be impossible that the Lord of them all, for whose use, amusement, or instruction, they have all been created, should only pass through a series of years, for the most part miserable ones, even with those who possess the happiest lot on earth, in little more than meer animal existence, and then sink down into the grave in common with them all, without enjoying some more exalted privilege; and, in proportion to the rank he here possess’d, becoming less encumber’d and fit to travel through and fully relish those other works of the Creator, of which even now, before ‘We have shaken off this mortal coil,’ The very idea dazzles our imagination, and confounds our faculties; and of which we see just enough of to admire his power, but know not sufficiently to comprehend his wisdom.
From these reflections, however, let us proceed to relate to our fair readers what these changes are, of which we have here been speaking, and of which these reflectional uses may be made.
They are of many different kinds, and proceed, as all nature’s works do, in a regular gradation; forming an ascent, the steps of which are scarcely visible; and yet the height, when we have reached it, most obvious and amazing.
Those kinds of animals which are viviparous, or produce their young alive, and apparently in a complete state, undergo the slightest alterations of any; yet some even they have. Growth itself, the distension of parts, and increase of bulk, may be looked on as the lowest steps of this ladder, and these all animals have in common, man not excepted; who, lordly as he is, when in his more perfect growth, is not only the most helpless and imperfect at his birth, but longer continues in that situation, than any other member of the animal world.—Excepting this incrementive change, however, he undergoes no other alteration in this life, but the addition of some excremental parts, such as teeth, hair, &c.
Next to him, in stability of condition, we must place the quadrupeds, who, beside these additions, seem to be annually changed by the loss and renovation of their external covering, which almost all of them suffer, by what we call casting their coats. This change however is very gradual, and almost invisible, the same substances, and bearing the very same marks and colours, succeeding to their predecessors, so as to leave the animal in appearance the very same he was at first. One exception however there is to this, in those which undergo this alteration twice within the course of the year, as do the bears, foxes, hares, &c. in Greenland and other cold countries, whose furs in the winter season intirely drop those colours which would render them more conspicuous to their respective enemies, by standing contrasted to the whiteness of the snow with which the whole ground is covered, and assume a pure white; which again quits them as the warmth of summer, by restoring the rest of nature to its original appearance, renders such a refuge unnecessary to them.
One class however of the viviparous animals undergo a more immediate and visible alteration, and that is the serpent kind, who, having no hair or furr to lose more gradually, cast their whole covering at once in certain periods; and are so dexterous in the doing this, although devoid of the assistance of feet or claws, that the whole skins of them will frequently be found entire, without even so much as the cornea, or outward case of the eyes, which is affixed to the rest of the exuvium, being at all broken. From this renovation, which was well known to the ancients, and which is even attended by an additional brilliancy of colouring, a fresh glow of beauty, and a renewal of that strength and vigour which is constantly abated some little time before the change is brought about, it was that the antient writers considered the snake as an emblem of health; as may be seen in its being made the symbol of Esculapius, the God of physic, and a representation of time and eternity, ever destroyed and ever renewing, as we find from many of their coins; in which this animal, holding his tail in his mouth, is constantly attended with some legend or device expressive of duration.
Next to these are the oviparous animals, or those who make their first appearance in a state of intire inaction, and devoid of any sign of life, but that of some kind of vital warmth; but yet afterwards, either by the natural heat of the tender parent, by the warmth of the surrounding atmosphere, or by the more intense rays of the sun, are, as it were, ripened by degrees; and being secured, through the period of infantile inactivity, in a cell wherein food, raiment, and lodging are dispensed within themselves, they at length burst forth, some in their fully complete state, as the lizards, spiders, crabs, lobsters, &c. and in general all the species of fish; and others, amongst which are all the bird-class, requiring the same degree of perfecting that the viviparous ones do, by the addiction of their excrementitious parts, such as feathers, &c.—And of these creatures almost every species that we are acquainted with stands in need besides of those additional alterations we have mentioned in the viviparous classes. The birds of all sorts moult their feathers at certain periods, and even change the colour of them in the winter seasons of the cold countries, as we have described the quadrupeds to do by their furs. The lizard kind drop their skins like the snakes, (which they the nearest resemble in substance, and even in figure, excepting the addition of four very short feet) and some of them, particularly the water-newt, so frequently as once in every fortnight or three weeks; and all the spider, crab, and lobster kind, whose outward coverings are crustaceous, and therefore incapable of distention, and so connected as not to be gradually dropt like hair or feathers, cast their shells entire at certain times of the year, when nature kindly provides them with such supplimentary juices as, by a sort of exudation from their pores, form a new shell beneath.
Now, however, let us proceed to those whose metamorphoses are more complete and distinct; and which, being first allodged by the parent in one element, or appearing fully possessed of animal life under one figure, do afterwards assume another and very different form, and find their food, their business, and their pleasure in another and very different element.
Of these some live their first period in the earth, others in the water. The inhabitants of this last named element content themselves with making earth their residence in their completer state; whilst those who first creep on the earth, when become more perfect, usually find the air the region where their more improved form is enabled to exert its abilites.
As we do not propose to enter here into a particular natural history, but only to treat of a general property, we need only mention a single example of each kind. The frog is the most universally known instance of the first sort; the egg of which, being laid and nourished in the water, produces a small, but lively animal, which we call a tadpole. Its body is almost globular, and seems furnished with no other limbs but a thin filmy tail, which serves to steer and move its body very briskly in the water, to which its residence is entirely confined, during its continuance in this form; yet, after a certain space of time, small legs and feet begin to be discernible under the loosened skin of this little creature, which gradually bursting their way thro’ it, first one, then a second, and so to the number of four, and lastly, dropping the finney tail which had hitherto been so very useful and necessary to it, it now, as if it disdained the element it had first been bred in, leaps on shore, and springing over large tracts of land, becomes changed from a fish to a perfect terrestrial quadruped, and ranges at large over that very ground on which during its former state it would have been death for it to have been cast.
Of the other part of metamorphosis of these states, viz. from the earth to the air, we shall mention at present only the beetle class, and more particularly the cock-chaffer, or jeffry-cock, as an insect universally known. The female of this animal lays her eggs in the earth, where, by means of an instrument, which nature has purposely provided her with, she is able to deposit them at some depth below the surface. Each of these, after a due time, is hatched into a soft white jointed grub, with six short clawed feet, and armed about the head, which is of a dark-brown colour, with a shelly coat, and two or three pair of very strong fangs or forcipes, by which means it is most amply furnished with the means of forcing its way in the mold where it was lodged, and of cutting and tearing to pieces for its nourishment the roots not only of the tenderer herbage, but even those fibres which the stronger roots of trees push forth to form a surer hold in the ground, to both which these voracious animals frequently do very great mischief. After continuing however in this situation, with no difference but increase of bulk, for two whole years, a shelly covering forms over its soft body; a pair of fine and filmy wings grow from the top of his back, to preserve which from danger, when unnecessary for use, a pair of crustaceous coverings are provided, and now forcing his way thro’ the surface of the ground, he comes forth a lively inhabitant of the air; and soaring at will wherever he pleases, seems, by a buzzing song, to proclaim his satisfaction at being able now with equal greediness to devour the leaves and fruits, as he had before done the roots and fibres of whatever plant or tree he chuses to fix upon.
[To be continued.]
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