423 
nists. This is one of the signs of the times ; a de- 
sire to grasp at general results and conclusions 
without a previous study in detail. The error in 
this case is putting the natural and artificial me- 
thods in opposition to each other; whereas it ap- 
pears to be the object of the artificial system to 
collect materials to form a natural one. But it has 
been of late spoken of rather as something quite 
superseded, as something to give way to a new and 
a nobler structure, built upon a foundation entirely 
different.” 
Sir James moreover informs us, that “the illus- 
trious Frenchman, Bernard de Jussieu, the early and 
confidential friend of Linnzeus, conceived a philoso- 
phical idea of natural orders of plants, and conferred 
on the subject with the on/y man whom he found 
capable of appreciating or understanding them.” In 
his letters to Linnzus* he even gives him the ho- 
nour of having fist formed a scheme of natural 
orders of plants; but it seems as if the science of 
botany were no sooner destined to emerge from 
obscurity and confusion by a just perception on 
* Bernard de Jussieu writes to Linnzeus, 15th Feb. 1742: “I 
learn with the sincerest pleasure of your being appointed Pro- 
fessor of Botany at Upsal. You may now devote yourself entirely 
to the service of Flora, and lay open more completely the path you 
have pointed out, so as at length to bring to perfection a natural 
method of classification, which is what all lovers of botany wish 
and expect.” 
“In the face of this testimony,” observes Sir James Smith, “ we 
trust it will hardly be asserted in future, that Linnzeus owed his 
ideas of natural orders to the excellent writer of the above letter.” 
—WNelection of the Correspondence of Linneus, vol. ii. p. 212. 
