Entomologist Quotes

Jean Henri Fabre

Jan Swammerdam

William Kirby (entomologist)

William Beebe

William Morton Wheeler

Agostino Bassi

James Francis Stephens

The only definition that can be given of Heterocera is the practical one that all Lepidoptera that are not butterflies are Heterocera.

David Sharp (entomologist)

If man were really descended from a prehistoric ancestor, common to him and to the apes of the present day, there must surely be some fossil trace left of his branch of the genealogical tree, and not only traces of the branch leading to apes!

No other insects can compete with the mosquitoes as persistent annoyers of man, and none, with the possible exception of the rat-flea, hold over him such power for evil.

Charles Thomas Brues

Birds are the fluctuating check on insect life, the safety valve as it were; they congregate where they find insects, regardless of their species or habits, and constantly consume the superfluous and the superabundant insect life.

Harold Maxwell-Lefroy

The corridors of power have a strong attraction for even the most devoted investigator, and these corridors seldom lead back to the laboratory.

Kenneth Mellanby

In the minds of most men... an Entomologist is synonymous with everything futile and childish. [Involved in a] science which, in nine companies out of ten companies with which he may associate, promises to signalise him as an object of pity or contempt.

William Kirby (entomologist)

People think entomologists have small minds because they interest themselves in small animals.

Leland Ossian Howard

One's appreciation of nature is never more acute than when a bit of nature is injected into one's flesh.

Howard Ensign Evans

Since no two events are identical, every atom, molecule, organism, personality, and society is an emergent and, at least to some extent, a novelty.

William Morton Wheeler

From red-bugs and bed-bugs, from sand-flies and landflies, Mosquitoes, gallnippers and fleas, From hog-ticks and dog-ticks, from hen-lice and men-lice, We pray thee, good Lord, give us ease.

To the scientific mind the living and the non-living form one continuous series of systems of differing degrees of complexity., while to the philosophic mind the whole universe, itself perhaps an organism, is composed of a vast number of interlacing organisms of all sizes.

James George Needham

The sphinx atropos squeakes when hurt, nearly as loud as a mouse, which, when uttered in the most plaintive tone, naturally shocks the human heart, and makes it shudder at the thought of destroying inoffensive animals merely for the sake of curiosity. I cannot help reflecting on this tyranny, this wanton cruelty, exercised by thoughtless man, on many animals but especially in insects: 'tis certain, that every animal possessing life, has feeling; and, therefore, is as capable of suffering pain, as of enjoying pleasure; and, as Shakespeare humanely expresses The poor beetle crushed beneath the foot, feels the pangs of death as great as when a monarch falls. Gentle reader, pardon this digression, my feelings commanded my pen.

The biologist seems unable to escape from the use of a terminology that is to be found in the larger dictionaries — and these dictionaries are at home, while the public is in the lecture-hall.

Vernon Lyman Kellogg

If and when the day comes when pure science is once again generally appreciated as a self-justifying intellectual adventure of mankind, then the coleopterists should be able to step forward and claim their share of its glory.

Fill your note-book with descriptions, but digest them carefully, sifting out for publication only those that exhaustive study and repeated observations prove to be valuable.

John Henry Comstock

Herewith I offer you the Omnipotent Finger of God in the anatomy of a louse: wherein you will find miracles heaped on miracles and will see the wisdom of God clearly manifested in a minute point.

All infections, of whatever type, with no exceptions, are products of parasitic beings; that is, by living organisms that enter in other living organisms, in which they find nourishment, that is, food that suits them, here they hatch, grow and reproduce themselves.

The Entomologist who broadens the horizon of his observations becomes better able to grasp and comprehend the great problems presented to him.

Charles H. Fernald

In his soul, as in a mirror, were concentrated all the lights radiating from every point of observation — whether human or Divine — and from his soul as from a mirror, these lights were reflected back in every possible combination of beauty and sublimity.

James Francis Stephens

True, it [geometry] does not bestow imagination, a delicate flower blossoming none knows how and unable to thrive on every soil; but it arranges what is confused, thins out the dense, calms the tumultuous, filters the muddy and gives lucidity, a superior product to all the tropes of rhetoric.

Jean Henri Fabre

When once it has been seen, it will remain forever the most vivid memory in life, solely because of its cosmic chill and isolation, the eternal and absolute darkness and the indescribable beauty of its inhabitants.

Most technical names still have a queer, foreign, pedantic sound, and if we see very many of them in a stretch of print we get frightened off and hastily look for something else to read.