PREJUDICES OF SYSTEMATISTS. 157 



recently promulgated, and which their discoverers 

 designate as natural, have, as yet, been but imper- 

 fectly explained ; that, at present, they are crude 

 and ill-defined, and consequently, that they are too 

 imperfectly developed and too partially verified, to 

 merit general confidence. Yet to whom is this 

 latter fault to be attributed, but to those who 

 urge it? If the advocates of arbitrary classification 

 contend that it will be time enough to dismiss our 

 present systems when these new theories have been 

 extensively proved in every department of zoology, 

 and yet refuse, themselves, to join in the Herculean 

 task, and to try how far these new views can be 

 verified in unarranged groups, they contribute to 

 augment that evil of which they complain : and if 

 they thus determine to evade this labour, we can 

 scarcely hope that any thing effectual will be ac- 

 complished in the present century. How much 

 better would it be for science, if, instead of urging 

 such querulous complaints, these advocates for what 

 is old would overcome prejudice of opinion, and 

 resolve to try every theory that professes to develope 

 general laws by the surest of all tests — their 

 universality. At all events, even if we allow the 

 full force of their objection, the only just inference 

 to be drawn is, that our prejudices in favour of 

 arbitrary systems should be shaken, if not overcome. 

 He who considers that natural history is to be 

 studied by rules different from those by which all 

 other physical sciences are prosecuted, is totally 

 unfit to meddle with it. 



(96.) Prejudices of opinion, also, in regard to 

 natural history, are to be combated by another 



