Note 6 — Chapter XX · FABRE’S WRITINGS (CONTINUED)

“Let us assemble facts in order to obtain ideas,” said Buffon. In this process may be summed up the whole of the great Provençal naturalist’s scientific work. If he notes the least circumstances of the little lives that unfold themselves before his eyes, he does so not merely as an observer and an artist who would not miss the smallest element of knowledge or beauty, but also as a philosopher who wishes to understand all that he sees, and for that reason neglects nothing. In entomology the smallest facts are not only the most curious and picturesque, they are often the most significant: maxima in minimis. Those minute details which are in danger of being regarded as “puerilities are connected with the most solemn questions which it is possible for man to consider.”6