16 ■ PREF\nH 



ny for its own sake. I have often alluded to its benefits 

 as a mental exercise, nor can any study exceed it in 

 raising curiosity, gratifyins^ a taste for beauty and inge- 

 nuity of contrivance, or sharpening the powers of dis- 

 crimination. What then can be better adapted for 

 young persons ? The chief use of a great part of our 

 education is no other than what I have just mentioned. 

 The languages and the mathematics, however valuable 

 in themselves when acquired, are even more so as they 

 train the youthful mind to thought and observation. In 

 Sweden, Natural History is the study of the schools, by 

 which men rise to preferment ; and there are no people 

 with more acute or better regulated minds than the 

 Swedes. 



To those whose minds and understandings are already 

 formed, this study may be recommended, indepen- 

 dently of all other considerations, as a rich source of 

 innocent pleasure. Some people are ever inquiring 

 " what is the use" of any particular plant, by which 

 they mean " what food or physic, or what materials for 

 the painter or dyer does it afford ?" They look on a 

 beautiful flowery meadow with admiration, only in pro- 

 portion as it affords nauseous drugs or salves. Others 

 consider a botanist with respect only as he may be able 

 to teach them some profitable improvement in tanning, 

 or dyeing, by which they may quickly grow rich, and 



