This man was much
less liable to the influence of superstition than most of his
people; but he was very far from being altogether above it. This is
the fact with very few civilized men; perhaps with no man whatever,
let his philosophy and knowledge be what they may; and least of all,
is it true with the ignorant. There is too much of the uncertain, of
the conjectural in our condition as human beings, to raise us
altogether above the distrusts, doubts, wonder, and other weaknesses
of our present condition. To these simple savages, the manner in
which the bees flew, seemingly at le Bourdon's bidding, to this or
that thicket, was quite as much a matter of astonishment, as any of
our most elaborate deceptions are wonders to our own ignorant and
vulgar. Ignorant! And where is the line to be drawn that is to place
men beyond the pale of ignorance? Each of us fails in some one, if
not in very many of the important branches of the knowledge that is
even reduced to rules Among us. Here is seen the man of books, so
ignorant of the application of his own beloved theories, as to be a
mere child in practice; and there, again, can be seen the expert in
practice, who is totally unacquainted with a single principle of the
many that lie at the root of his very handicraft.
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