422 Memorial of George Brouni Goodc. 



is that shown forth in the pubHcations of Jefferson's fierce poUtical oppo- 

 nents in 1790, paraphrased, as follows, by McMaster in his History of 

 the People of the United States: 



Why, it was asked, should a philosopher be made President? Is not the active, 

 anxious, and responsible station of Executive illy suited to the calm, retired, and 

 exploring tastes of a natural philosopher? Ability to impale butterflies and contrive 

 turn-about chairs may entitle one to a college professorship, Imt it no more consti- 

 tutes a claim to the Presidency than the genius of Cox, the great bridge-builder, or 

 the feats of Ricketts, the famous equestrian. Do not the pages of history teem with 

 evidences of the ignorance and mismanagement of philosophical politicians? John 

 Locke was a philosopher, and framed a constitution for the colony of Georgia; but 

 so full was it of whimsies that it had to be thrown aside. Condorcet, in 1793, made a 

 constitution for France; but it contained more absurdities than were ever before 

 piled up in a system of government, and was not even tried. Rittenhouse was 

 another philosopher; but the only proof he gave of political talents was suffering 

 himself to be wheedled into the presidency of the Democratic Society of Philadel- 

 phia. But, suppose that the title of philosopher is a good claim to the Presidency, 

 what claim has Thomas Jefferson to the title of philosopher? Why, forsooth ! 



He has refuted Moses, disproved the story of the Deluge, made a penal code, 

 drawn up a report on weights and measures, and speculated profoundly on the pri- 

 mary causes of the difference between the whites and blacks. Think of such a man 

 as President ! Think of a foreign minister surprising him in the act of anatomizing 

 the kidneys and glands of an African to find out why the negro is black and odor- 

 iferous ! 



He has denied that shells found on the mountain tops are parts of the great flood. 

 He has declared that if the contents of the whole atmosphere were water, the land 

 would only be overflowed to the depth of fifty-two and one-half feet. He does not 

 believe the Indians emigrated from Asia. 



Every mail from the vSouth brought accounts of rumblings and quakes in the Alle- 

 ghanies and strange lights and blazing meteors in the sky. These disturbances in 

 the natural world might have no connection with the troubles in the political world; 

 nevertheless it was impossible not to compare them with the prodigies all writers of 

 the day declare preceded the fatal Ides of March. 



X 



In New York, although a flourishing medical .school had been in 

 existence from 1769, there was an astonishing dearth of naturalists 

 until about 1790. Governor Colden, the botanist and ethnologist, had 

 died in 1776, and the principal medical men of the city, the Bards, Glossy, 

 Jones, Middleton, Dyckman, and others confined their attention entirely to 

 professional studies. A philosophical society was born in 1787, but died 

 before it could speak. A society for the promotion of agriculture, arts, 

 and manufactures, organized in 1791, was more successful, but not in the 

 least scientific. Up to the end of the century New York State had but 

 six men chosen to membership in the American Philosophical Society, 

 and up to 1809 but five in the American Academy. Leaders, however, 

 soon arose in Mitchill, Clinton, and Hosack. 



Samuel Latham Mitchill, the son of a Quaker farmer [b. 1764, d. 183 1] , 

 was educated in the medical schools of New York and Edinburgh, and in 



