NATURAL CLASSIFICATION. 49 



others founded upon the position and other 

 characters of the stamens. These classes 

 are divided into orders founded upon the 

 number of styles or stigmas. Using the 

 Greek gynia^ woman, the ordinal names are 

 made after the same manner: Monogynia, 

 Digynia, etc. Linnaeus observed the dis- 

 tinction between flowering and flowerless 

 plants, and originated the names Phenoga- 

 mia (or Phenerogamia) and Cryptogamia. 

 His beautiful scheme of classification was 

 used until within the last half century. 



The Natural System attempts to bring to- 

 gether those plants which most nearly re- 

 semble each other in all essential particulars. 

 It does not attempt to make a system ; it ac- 

 cepts the system wrought out by the Creator, 

 and endeavors to follow it closely ; the more 

 closely it follows nature the more nearly it 

 approaches perfection. Although we can- 

 not hope to have attained perfection in this 

 system, it is a beautiful and scientific struc- 

 ture, and so far as it rests upon natural 

 resemblances and differences must remain 

 essentially undisturbed. If the order of re- 

 lationship between plants lay in a line, one 

 plant giving rise to another of higher order, 

 and that one to but one other of still higher 



