1859.] CHAPTERS ON BRITISH BOTANY. 363 



If the most eminent philosopher of Greece^ who embraced in"^ 

 his works both the great domains of science, — that of matter, or 

 physics, and that of mind, metaphysics, — ^had condescended to 

 write on plants, we should have had something important and 

 definite on the subject. 



The little information to be gleaned from Aristotle on botany 

 has been collected by Athenseus, q. v. 



There is a treatise on plants by a pseudo- Aristotle, a work now 

 universally ignored ; both the learned and the unlearned con- 

 demn it as a spurious production. 



Although the genuine Aristotle performed little in this depart- 

 ment of natural science, he laid the foundation for all the sub- 

 sequent investigations into the vegetable kingdom, by which 

 Greece and Grecian writers were distinguished. His disciples 

 were stirred up by his example and encouraged by his success in 

 the classification and description of the animal kingdom. The 

 zeal of the Peripatetics in this branch of learning is sarcasti- 

 cally described by Lucian, who amused himself with the ami- 

 able weaknesses of the fraternity, just as the conductors of a 

 celebrated periodical laugh at the labours of modern natural- 

 ists. 



The first prose author of Greece still extant, after Herodotus, 

 is Hippocrates, a native of Coos (Cos, an island in the Grecian 

 Archipelago). A great many books or treatises have been col- 

 lected under his name, or attributed to him. From the time of 

 Miltiades to that of Ptolemy Philadelphus, or during a period of 

 250 years, medical books in the Greek language were composed 

 and compiled, all of which are comprehended under the term, 

 ' Works of Hippocrates, the Son of Heraclides.^ See Sprengel, 

 Hist. Med. i. p. 366. 



In this ancient collection of medicinal remedies, most of 

 which are procured from the vegetable kingdom, there are no 

 botanical descriptions like those that abound in our times. 



The names are sometimes omitted, and the plants are merely 

 noticed or designated as having certain parts resembling parts of 

 other plants. Hence we have the terms, " myrtle-leaved,^^ and 

 other usual botanical characteristics. 



In Hippocrates, Galen, and other medical authors, the medici- 

 nal qualities only are given. To these we are indebted for most 

 of our knowledge of ancient botany. The ancients were utili- 



