On the Impediments to the Study of Natural History. S23 



not surely be denied that any system, however unnatural, 

 however fanciful, arbitrary, or artificial it may be, provided 

 it enables an unassisted and uninstructed inquirer to arrange 

 and class and name in conformity with certain rules, any speci- 

 men he may happen to meet with, confers no trivial boon on 

 the scientific world ; and were I inclined to probe this part of 

 the subject very deeply, I think it would be found that in 

 some departments, at least, of science, an artificial arrangement 

 has an advantage over a natural system, for these reasons : 



1st. That the very term Natural arrangement implies a pre- 

 vious and thorough knowledge of the very subject with which 

 the inquirer is desirous of acquainting himself. 



2dly. That the very term Artificial arrangement implies a cer- 

 tain latitude in the adoption of certain means to definite ends. 

 That this is a correct view of the case, the remarks of one of 

 our greatest supporters of natural to the exclusion of artificial 

 systems will tend to prove. "An artificial system (says Mr. 

 MacLeay)* depends solely on observation, and may be said 

 even to require the exercise of no other faculty than that of 

 vision, having no other merit than the readiness and facility 

 with which it may enable an object to be named ; whereas 

 the discovery of a natural system, being the work of an all- 

 wise, all-powerful Deity f, can only be hoped for from a cau- 

 tious process of inductive and analogical reasoning applied to 

 facts gathered from observation." " The former," he observes, 

 " is the miserable resource of the feeble mind of man." But 

 surely in making so severe a remark he ought injustice to have 

 added, that, as the latter is the plan of the creation itself, it 

 required the ken of Omnipotence itself to fathom and apply 

 it, and must assuredly operate as no small impediment in the 

 way of those whose cause 1 am now pleading. For one more 

 instance of the difficulties he will have to encounter, let an in- 

 quirer be referred to the new natural system, known by the 

 name of the quinary, which this eminent naturalist claims as 

 his own; the bases of which are: 1. That all natural groups, 

 whether kingdoms or any subdivision of them, return into 

 themselves ; a distribution which is expressed by a diagram 

 of five circles impinging on each other, forming, if I may so 



HortB Entom. Pref. xii., xiii. 



j- Is it not a fallacy to say, that a Natural system is the work of the 

 Deity, whereas an Artificial one is only the work of man ? The appellation 

 Natural System, if used synonymously with the Plan of Creation itself, i* 

 indeed the work of the Deity j but when employed to designate any at- 

 tempt to unravel that plan by fallible mortals, it is evident that in reality 

 quite a different thing is implied. EDIT. 



2 T 2 express 



