HISTORY OF BOTANY. 303 



The history of the progress of a science makes a part of 

 the science itself; we are interested in the various efforts of 

 philosophers, their experience and observations, and the trains 

 of reasoning by which they have arrived at those conclusions 

 which are the basis of science. 



In botany as in the other sciences, physical wants were the 

 first guides ; man at first sought to find in vegetables, food, 

 then remedies for diseases, and lastly amusement and instruc- 

 tion. x 



The first account of plants may be traced to the history of 

 the creation, by Moses. It was on the third day of this great 

 work that God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the 

 herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his 

 kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth : and it was so ; and 

 the earth brought forth grass, and the herb yielding seed after 

 his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself 

 after his kind ; and God saw that it was good." After this, it 

 is recorded that God gave to Adam every herb and every tree 

 bearing fruit ; the latter was for him exclusively, but to the 

 beasts of the earth, and the fowls of the air, and to every 

 thing wherein there is life, he also gave the green herb for 

 meat. 



It is recorded that Adam gave names to all the beasts of the 

 field and the fowls of the air ; and Milton imagines that to 

 Eve was assigned the pleasant task of giving names to flowers, 

 and numbering the tribes of plants. When our first parents, 

 after* their wicked disobedience of the Divine command, are 

 about to leave their" delightful Eden, Eve, in the language of 

 the Poet, with bitter regret exclaims : 



" Must I thus leave th.ee, Paradise ? thus leave 



Thee, native soil, these happy walks and shades, 



Fit haunt of Gods, where I had hope to spend, 



Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day, 



That must be mortal to us both ? Oh flowers 



That never will in other climate grow, 



My early visitation, and my last 



At even ; which I bred up with tender hand, 



From the first opening bud, and gave ye names ; 



Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank 



Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount ?" 



The Bible, and the poems of Homer, afford us the only 

 vestiges of the botanical knowledge of the earliest ages of the 

 world. 



Great advantages were afforded to the Jews for obtaining a 

 knowledge of plants, in their long wanderings over the face 



First account of plants traced to the history of the creation Milton ima- 

 gines that Eve gave names to the plants and numbered their tribes The 

 Bible and the poems of Homer afford the only botanical facts known in the 

 earliest ages of the world. 



