O STUDY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 



.ntimations in ancient history, whether sacred or 

 profane, must not be interpreted too literally, or be 

 supposed to imply more than that the knowledge of 

 natural history, possessed by the early inhabitants of 

 the earth, was commensurate with what was known 

 of astronomy or other of the physical sciences. 



(6.) Passing over, therefore, those obscure ages, 

 when all human learning was in its infancy, we may 

 date the rise of zoology, as a study, from the time 

 when the immortal Aristotle directed the powers 

 of his mind to the animal world ; and in his famous 

 book, Uspi. ZuZv 'la-roptaq, first sought to define, by 

 the precision of language, those more prominent and 

 comprehensive groups of the animal kingdom, which, 

 being founded on nature, are exempt from the in- 

 fluence of time and the mutability of learning. Had 

 this extraordinary man left us no other memorial of 

 his talents than his researches in zoology, he would 

 still be looked upon as one of the greatest philo- 

 sophers of ancient Greece, even in its highest and 

 brightest age. But when it is considered that his 

 eloquence, and his depth of thought, gave laws to 

 orators and poets, — that he was almost equally 

 great in moral as in physical science, and that no 

 department of human learning escaped his research, 

 or was left unilluminated by his genius, — we might 

 be almost tempted to think that the powers of the 

 human mind, in these latter clays, had retrograded ; 

 and that originality of thought, and of philosophic 

 combination, existed in a far higher degree among 

 the heathen philosophers than in those who followed 

 tbem. A moment's reflection, however, will show 



