I had the pleasure to see the paws or feet of this
nettle move, and having placed the vase full of water in which the coral
was, near the fire, at a moderate heat, all the little insects expanded,
the nettle stretched out its feet and formed what M. de Marsigli and
I had taken for the petals of the flower. The calyx of this so-called
flower is the very body of the animal issued from its cell."]
[Footnote 115: Reaumur (1683-1757): a French physiologist and
naturalist, best known as the inventor of the Reaumur thermometer. He
was a member of the French Academy of Science.]
[Footnote 116: Bishop Wilson: Thomas Wilson (1663-1755), bishop of the
Isle of Man. Details of his life are given in the folio edition of his
works (1782). An appreciation of his religious writings is given by
Matthew Arnold in Culture and Anarchy. Bishop Wilson's words, "To make
reason and the will of God prevail," are the theme of Arnold's essay,
Sweetness and Light.]
[Footnote 117: An eminent modern writer: Matthew Arnold (1822-1888),
eldest son of Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby; a distinguished critic
and poet, and professor of poetry at Oxford. The allusion is to Arnold's
essay, Sweetness and Light. The phrase, "sweetness and light," is
one which Aesop uses in Swift's Battle of the Books to sum up the
superiority of the ancients over the moderns.
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