218 Notice of British Naturalists. 
nature, are exempt from the influence of time and the immuta- 
bility 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 philosophers of ancient 
Greece, even in its highest and brightest age. 
“With peculiar tact he brought the rules of philosophic reason- 
ing to bear upon a subject to that time neglected; upon the ex- 
tent and depth of his personal researches; upon the clearness 
with which he arranged his results; and above all, upon those 
obscure perceptions which he acquired while so employed, of hid- 
den truths which were to be developed only in subsequent ages. 
“He discarded from his work all those popular tales, and fan- 
cies, and beliefs, which were received by the mass of his coun- 
trymen as religious truths sanctioned by antiquity, interwoven in 
their history and consecrated in their poetry. The death of this 
great father of the science, was the death of natural history in 
the Grecian era. he splendor of his discoveries passed like a 
comet. He left no luminary behind to follow his wake, still less, 
to throw additional light upon realms which he had but glanced 
” 
After nearly four hundred years, Pliny appeared and strove 0 
emulate Aristotle, but without his erudition or genius; his vo- 
luminous works are chiefly compilations; they abound in fables 
and prodigies evincing credulity rather than a disposition to i- 
vestigate truth; and this is the more surprising, as Rome po* 
sessed the most wonderful menagerie that has ever been col- 
lected, containing not only lions and other ferocious beasts des- 
tined for the circus; but probably all that was rare and curious 
in more peaceable tribes, since these were often exhibited in # 
umphal processions. Pliny informs us that Sylla exhibited the 
terrific spectacle of a combat of one hundred male lions. C#s# 
had four hundred, and Pompey had six hundred lions at one time. 
Natural history now declined in Rome, and with the fables and 
absurdities of Alian and one or two others, all records of science 
expired for nearly fourteen hundred years. Nor was there, A. 
1500, much more sound knowledge, as regarded the works of 
the Creator, and the wonders of the earth and of the heaves; 
than there had been in past ages.* 
some, calling 
we 
Ry- 
* As an instance of the ridiculous extravagancies into which 
themselves Philosophers, rushed, even as late as the seventeenth century, 
copy the following actual Patents, of the period of 1634, as recorded 1 
f 
