MEMOIR OF PLINY. 79 



cal writers have said relative to the virtues of these 

 plants, is almost totally and completely valueless to 

 us, from the impossibility of distinguishing the indi- 

 vidual plants to which they refer. Our regret, how- 

 ever, on this account, will he greatly diminished, if 

 we call to mind with how little care the ancients, 

 and Pliny in particular, have indicated the medicinal 

 virtues of plants. They attribute so many fabulous 

 and even absurd properties to those which we do 

 know, that we are warranted in being very sceptical 

 as to the virtues of those that are unknown. If we 

 are to credit all that Pliny has recorded in that part 

 of his work which treats of the materia medica, there 

 is no human ailment for which nature has not pro- 

 vided twenty remedies ; and these absurdities were 

 confidently repeated by physicians for nearly two 

 centuries after the revival of letters. 



As regards the scientific facts detailed in his work, 

 it is obvious that Pliny possesses no real interest at 

 the present day, except as respects certain manners 

 and usages of the ancients certain processes fol- 

 lowed by their operatives and artizans and certain 

 particulars of a geographical and historical nature, of 

 which we should have been ignorant without his aid. 

 He traces their progress, he describes their products, 

 he names the most celebrated artists, he points out 

 the manner in which their labours were conducted ; 

 and it cannot be doubted but that, if rightly under- 

 stood, he would make us acquainted with some of 

 those secrets by means of which the ancients exe- 



