CHAP. XXII - Functions and Instincts. Reptiles

Summary

In the whole sphere of animals, there are none, that, from the earliest ages, have been more abhorred and abominated, and more repudiated as unclean and hateful creatures, than the majority of the Class we are next to enter upon,—that of Reptiles. One Order of them, indeed, consisting of the turtles and tortoises, and some individuals belonging to another, are exempted from this sentence, and are regarded with more favourable eyes; but the rest either disgust us by their aspect, or terrify us by their supposed or real power of injury.

In Scripture, the serpent; the larger Saurians, under the names of the dragon and leviathan; and frogs are employed as symbols of the evil spirit, of tyrants and persecutors, and of the false prophets that incite them.

Yet these animals exhibit several extraordinary characters and qualities. They are endued with a degree of vivaciousness that no others possess: they can endure dismemberments and privations which would expel the vital principle from any creature in existence except themselves. Their life is not so concentrated in the brain, which with them is extremely minute, but seems more expanded over the whole of their nervous system: take out their brain or their heart, and cut off their head, yet they can still move, and the heart will even beat many hours after extraction; it is also stated that they can live without food for months, and even years.