Mr. W.S.Macrzay on Laws regulating Insects and Fungi. 47 
animals must evidently be inferior to that experienced by the 
comparative anatomist, who understands their respective struc- 
tures. And again, the anatomist himself, on viewing a museum, 
can scarcely be so much gratified by the sight, as that naturalist 
who, not content with a bare and in some degree insulated know- 
ledge of particular organizations, endeavours to comprehend how 
these harmonize with the rest of the creation. It is in this 
last mode alone, if I may so express myself, that the human 
mind can take, as far as its imperfect nature will permit, a 
view of the universe as it was originally designed. Nor ought 
any person to be deterred from commencing so delightful a pur- 
suit, either by the supposed difficulty of the investigation, or by 
the extent of preparatory information which it necessarily re- 
quires: for truly has it been said, that he who questions his 
abilities to arrange the dissimilar parts of an extensive plan, or 
fears to be lost in a complicated system, may yet hope to adjust 
a few pages without perplexity. ` 
Having such ideas both of the dignity of natural history and 
of the importance and feasibility of a more extended research 
into the natural system than has yet been made, we can scarcely 
fail to be interested by a late work*, of which the perusal has 
induced me to address this learned body. Although this work is 
confined to a department of botany not very generally studied, its 
author has evidently not been satisfied with the specific discrimi- 
nation of the imperfectly organized subjects of his research, but 
has earnestly sought to discover the relations which they bear to 
each other. Keeping this object steadily in view, M. Fries has 
been able to give so connected and symmetrical an outline of 
what he considers to be the natural distribution of Fungi, as, at 
* Systema Mycologicum sistens Fungorum Ordines, Genera, Species, &c. quos ad 
Normam Methodi Naturalis determinavit, disposuit atque descripsit Elias Fries, &c. 
vol.i. Gryphiswaldie, 1821. 
least 
