46 Review of Cleaveland’s Mineralogy. 
we say of the Abbé Haiiy, of whom, whether we speak of his _ 
genius, his learning, his acuteness, his discoveries, his candour 
and love of truth, or his universally amiable and venerable 
eharacter, we can never think without sentiments of the high- 
est respect and admiration? More than any modern writer 
he has added to the list of synonymes, often exchanging a very 
good name, derived perhaps from the locality or discoverer of a 
mineral, for one professedly significant, but connected with 
its subject by a chain of thought so slight, that considerable 
knowledge of Greek etymology, and still more explanation, is 
necessary to comprehend the connexion; and thus, after all, 
it amounts, with respect to most readers, only to the exchange 
of one arbitrary name for another. What advantage, for in- 
stance, has grammatite, alluding to a line often obscure, and 
still oftener wholly invisible, over the good old name tremohite, 
which always: reminds us of an interesting locality ; how is 
pyroxene better than augite, amphibole than hornblende, amphi- 
gene than leucite, or disthene than sappar. Some of the Abbé 
Haiiy’s names are, however, very happily chosen, especially 
where new discriminations were to be established, or errors 
corrected, or even a redundant crop of synonymes to be su- 
perseded by a better name. Epidote is an instance of the lat- 
ter, and the new divisions of the old zeolite family into four 
species, mesotype, stilbite, analcime, and chabasie, afford a hap- 
py instance of the former. It were much to be wished, that by 
the common consent of mineralogists, one nomenclature should 
be universally adopted : for its uniformity is of much more im- 
portance than its nature. 
In expressing our approbation of the principles of arrange- 
ment adopted by. Professor Cleaveland, we have of course 
espoused those of his TABULAR VIEW, Which is perhaps as near- 
ly as the state of science will admit, erected upon a chemical 
basis, like that of Brongniart, to which it bears a close resem- 
blance. Some of the subordinate parts, we could have wished 
had been arranged in a manner somewhat different. In the 
genus lime, it appears to us better to describe the species 
carbonat first; because, being very abundant, and its charac- 
ters very clear, it forms a very convenient point ef departure 
re 
