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In the opening chapter of one of his great biological works Aristotle sets forth in detail his motives for the study of living things. The passage is in itself noteworthy as one of the few instances in which he rises to real eloquence.

‘Of things constituted by nature some are ungenerated, imperishable, and eternal, while others are subject to generation and decay. The former are excellent beyond compare and divine, but less accessible to knowledge. The evidence that might throw light on them, and on the problems which we long to solve respecting them, is furnished but scantily by sensation; whereas respecting perishable plants and animals we have abundant information, living as we do in their midst, and ample data may be collected concerning all their various kinds, if only we are willing to take sufficient pains. Both departments, however, have their special charm. The scanty conceptions to which we can attain of celestial things give us, from their excellence, more pleasure than all our knowledge of the world in which we live; just as a half glimpse of persons we love is more delightful than a leisurely view of other things, whatever their number and dimensions. On the other hand, in certitude and in completeness our knowledge of terrestrial things has the advantage. Moreover, their greater nearness and affinity to us balances somewhat the loftier interest of the heavenly things that are the objects of the higher philosophy.... For if some [creatures] have no graces to charm the sense, yet even these, by disclosing to intellectual perception the artistic spirit that designed them, give immense pleasure to all who can trace links of causation, and are inclined to philosophy. We therefore must not recoil with childish aversion from the examination of the humbler animals. Every realm of nature is marvellous. It is told of Heraclitus that when strangers found him warming himself at the kitchen fire and hesitated to go in, he bade them enter since even in the kitchen divinities were present. So should we venture on the study of every kind of animal without distaste, for each and all will reveal to us something natural and something beautiful.[21] Absence of haphazard and conduciveness of everything to an end are to be found in Nature’s works in the highest degree, and the resultant end of her generations and combinations is a form of the beautiful.