82 MEMOIR OF 



which their distribution is regulated over the 

 different portions of the globe.* 



It is farther to be observed, that a system must 

 either be artificial or natural. The foregoing 

 remarks relate to the formation of an artificial 

 system. It may now be allowed to add a state- 

 ment of what is to be understood by a natural 

 system, or rather the natural system ; for it is 

 pleaded, that the true system of nature can be 

 but one. The natural system is supposed to be 

 that which will consist, when discovered and 

 verified for it is still a desideratum of a develop- 

 ment of the true scale of universal being, or that 

 plan on which every object was created, and 

 upon which animals and plants, by the interven- 

 tion of an infinity of intermediate forms, blend 

 into each other, and are finally so united as that 

 it cannot be known where to draw the line of 

 demarcation. This natural series of beings is 

 complex, forming in its progress certain devia- 

 tions which resemble a series of circles. A 

 system can only be natural which attempts to 

 explain the analogies or resemblances between 

 the individuals or divisions of one circular series 

 when they are compared with those of another 

 circular series. The relationship between all 

 natural objects is twofold immediate and remote. 

 The first of these is called an affinity, the second 

 an analogy. Thus there is an affinity between 

 tne swallow and the goatsucker. These genera 

 * Macgillivray. 



