110 HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



special disquisitions on parts of the Natural System ; as on Jussieti's 

 Proteacece : 1 " on the Asdepiadeae, a natural family of plants which 

 must be separated from Jussieu's Apocynece : 17 and other similar labors. 



We have, I think, been led, by our survey of the history of Botany, 

 to this point ; that a Natural Method directs us to the study of Phy- 

 siology, as the only means by which we can reach the object. This 

 conviction, which in botany comes at the end of a long series of at- 

 tempts at classification, offers itself at once in the natural history of 

 animals, where the physiological signification of the resemblances and 

 differences is so much more obvious. I shall not, therefore, consider 

 any of these branches of natural history in detail as examples of mere 

 classification. They will come before us, if at all, more properly when 

 we consider the classifications which depend on the functions of or- 

 gans, and on the corresponding modifications which they necessarily 

 undergo ; that is, when we trace the results of Physiology. But be- 

 fore we proceed to sketch the history of that part of our knowledge, 

 there are a few points in the progress of Zoology, understood as a 

 mere classificatory science, which appear to me sufficiently instructive 

 to make it worth our while to dwell upon them. 



[2nd Ed.] [Mr. Lindley's recent work, The Vegetable Kingdom 

 (1846), may be looked upon as containing the best view of the recent 

 history of Systematic Botany. In the Introduction to this work, Mr. 

 Lindley has given an account of various recent works on the subject ; 

 as Agardh's Classes Plantarum (1826) ; Perleb's Lehrbuch der Natur 

 f/eschichte der Pflanzenreich (1826); Dumortier's Florula Belgica. 

 (1827) ; Bartling's Ordines Naturales Plantarum (1830) ; Hess's 

 Uebersicht der Phanerogenischen Natiirlichen Pflanzenfamilien (1832); 

 Schulz's Naturliches System des Pflanzenreicli 's (1832); Horaninow's 

 Primce Linece Systematis Naturae (1834) ; Fries's Corpus Florarum 

 provincialium Suecice (1835) ; Martins's Conspectus Regni Vegetabilis 

 secundum Characteres Morphologicos (1835) ; Sir Edward F. Brom- 

 head's System, as published in the Edinburgh Journal and other 

 Journals (1836-1840) ; Endlicher's Genera Plantarum secundum Or- 

 dines Naturales disposita (1836-1840); PerleVs Clavis Classicum 

 Ordinum et Familiarum (1838) ; Adolphe Brongniart's Enumeration 

 des Genres de Plantes (1843); Meisner's Plantarum vascularium Ge~ 

 nera secundum Ordines Naturales digesta (] 843) ; Horaninow's 

 Tetractys Naturae, sen Systema quinquemembre omnium Naturalium 



16 Linn. Tr. vol. x 1809. " Mem. of Wernerian N. H. Soc. vol. i. 1809. 



