194 STUDY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 
pable, should be suffered to interfere or stand in 
sae way of this primary object. We would almost say, 
that for-amateurs, or for those who merely seek to 
know sciéntific names, a thoroughly good artificial 
system is the best for use. To judge from present 
appearances, natural history, as a science, is fast 
approaching to that state when its cultivation will 
be confined to the man of leisure and of learning ; to 
those who are installed in the precincts of a public 
museum; or who are possessed of a library and 
collections which would cost a fortune to purchase, 
or a lifetime to acquire. That the science should 
be daily becoming more difficult, is not to be won- 
dered at, or to be regretted, because an accession of 
new objects calls for greater labour of investigation; 
and no one can lament the extension of knowledge, 
however he may be thereby prevented from acquiring 
it himself. If there is any ground, therefore, upon 
which we can advocate the expediency of a good 
artificial system, even in these days, it is that of 
enticing over to the admiration of nature, those 
persons who, in the present state of the science, are 
frightened at its difficulties, or turn away in disgust 
at the dry uninviting manner in which nature has 
been enshrouded with scientific technicalities. Such 
persons, it is true, would not themselves, by adhering 
to an artificial system, do any thing to develope the 
philosophy of the science. but they might enrich its 
records with innumerable facts, which might be 
stored for future use; and even they themselves 
might in time be converts to a more just mode of 
pursuing the study. Perhaps the best artificial 
systems of modern times, are those proposed bv 
~ ewe 
