Life would be simplified and made safe if men, like spiders, would
always allow their life plans to be dominated by the clue that comes
from above.
A great principle never forgotten by the spider is that she
must always spin behind her a thread that will enable her to
find again the points that she has left; this serves at once
as her guiding thread for return, and as the road on which she
travels. A consequence of this rule is that the starting-point,
the center of the first operations, must be at the top of the
web, and often higher still, so as to dominate the whole. From
this point the explorer lets herself down, suspended from her
inseparable thread, balances herself, and if she does not find
the sought-for point, climbs back along the thread which she
absorbs in ascending. (Text.)--MAURICE KOECHLIN, _La
Nature_.
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