564 



JUSSIEU. 



the classes except those of the Monocotyledunes 

 and Dicotyledones. In his notes on the cards we 

 find iome generic characters accompanied with 

 sketches of the section of the seed; but these 

 cards, carefully preserved by his family, are far from 

 numerous. This method of description on cards j 

 was followed by his nephew ; they are frequently | 

 dated, and amount to a great number in 1774. 

 Finally, the oldest notes used in his demonstrations 

 by Autoine-Laurent, bear the characters of the 

 families, which are not found in any of those be- 

 longing to Bernard. Thus the first principles of 

 the classification are due to Bernard de Jussieu, 

 but the profound and sagacious application of these 

 principles and the true institution of the natural 

 families are to be ascribed to Laurent. 



In 1785, Desfontaines succeeded Lemonnier, and 

 A. L. de Jussieu discontinued his demonstrations 

 as the substitute of the latter. He immediately 

 commenced to draw up his Genera Plantarum se- 

 i-undum ordines naturales disposita, which was no- 

 thing else than the development of the writings 

 used in his demonstrations, and which he had been 

 bringing to perfection from the year 1774. The 

 materials prepared for the work, may, in fact, be 

 seen in a catalogue of genera, to which is added a 

 list of all the new genera indicated in recent works, 

 and which were to be arranged in their proper or- 

 der in the Genera when completed. 



The four years that intervened between 1785 

 and 1789 were thus employed in digesting the ma- 

 terials which were to enter into the composition of 

 the Genera, and in the actual completion and 

 printing of the work. The printing went on as 

 the author drew it up, and yet the successive and 

 definitive completion of the different parts led to 

 no important error, so carefully had the general 

 plan and the series of the genera been previously 

 elaborated. 



The fifty years which have now elapsed since 

 the publication of this work, and the numerous 

 investigations of the natural method which have 

 taken place since that period, allow us to regard 

 the opinion of the learned world regarding it as 

 the opinion of posterity, and this opinion is so 

 general and so unanimous in its favour, that it 

 would be fruitless to insist here upon its merit and 

 importance. However, without presuming to form 

 a judgment on what has been already determined 

 by the. most distinguished botanists of all countries, 

 we may be permitted to inquire, to what kind of 

 merit the Genera of Antoine-Laiirent de Jussieu 

 owes the influence it has exercised, not only on 

 the progress of botany, but likewise on that of 

 every other branch of natural history. 



Up to the time of the publication of the Genera 

 Plantarum, it may be said that the natural method 

 had not entered the field of public inquiry. The 

 series of Linne and Bernard de Jussieu, very in- 

 complete, and merely nominal, had no other effect 

 than suggesting some speculative reflections to men 

 who were in a condition to guess at their princi- 

 ples. The work of Adanson, destitute of general 

 principles, and destroying natural affinities in the 

 majority of cases, was presented besides in a form 

 which necessarily rendered it difficult to consult, 

 and afforded no opportunity for the author to ex- 

 plain the reasons which led him to form such and 

 uch relations. Thus from the date of 1763, the 

 time when Adanson's Families of Plants were 

 published, up to 1789 a period of twenty-six 

 years the natural method had made no progress 



in the learned world. Neither in France nor in 

 any other country, had it acquired new followeis; 

 merely a passing glimpse had been obtained of it ; 

 its nature was not yet demonstrated. The Genera 

 of 1789 had, on the contrary, a speedy influence on 

 the direction of botanical studies. This influence 

 was not indeed immediate, for the public attention 

 was then turned to events of high importance al- 

 together foreign to science. But at the end of a 

 few years the work had come almost into general 

 use throughout France in public teaching, not only 

 in the instructions of the faculties and the Garden 

 of Plants at Paris, but also in the majority of the 

 central schools, those foci of general and varied 

 instruction which were too speedily destroyed. 



Of the botanical works in ordinary use, the 

 Flore Fran9aise of Lamarck and of Decandolle, as 

 well as many local floras, were arranged according 

 to this method, and made it more generally known ; 

 and scarcely twenty years had elapsed, when an 

 eminent botanist declared himself one of its most 

 devoted champions, and contributed materially to 

 bring it to perfection. Since that time it has 

 spread over Europe, and it may be even said the 

 whole world. Its superiority over artificial methods 

 is generally acknowledged, and the latter are now 

 admitted only in their proper character, namely, as 

 more or less convenient keys for opening a way to 

 the nomenclature of vegetables. We may add, 

 with Cuvier, that the influence of the Genera 

 Plantarum is not confined to botany. Every branch 

 of natural history, and zoology in particular, have 

 derived benefit from the principles which guided 

 Jussieu, and which he has so well explained in his 

 admirable introduction ; and we are inclined to 

 think that Cuvier, in expressing this opinion, 

 founded it on his own experience, and that the 

 principles alluded to regulated him in the changes 

 he introduced into the zoological system. 



To exercise in a gradual and durable manner so 

 positive and generally acknowledged an influence 

 on the progress of science, a work must necessarily 

 unite two different kinds of merit ; general ideas 

 of a varied, important, and novel character, and as 

 perfect an application as possible of these princi- 

 ples in all their details. These, in fact, are the 

 qualities we find united in the Genera of Antoine 

 Laurent de Jussieu. The introduction, written 

 in the most perspicuous and elegant Latin ever 

 employed on scientific subjects, presents an expo- 

 sition not only of the fundamental principles of 

 the natural method, but as perfect a view of the 

 structure of vegetables as the existing state of 

 botany permitted. The characters of the classes 

 and families afford an opportunity for applying and 

 developing these principles ; and the exactness, 

 perspicuity, and precision of these characters, par- 

 ticularly such as apply to the families, still authorize 

 us, if we keep in mind the period when they were 

 framed, to consider them as models which few 

 authors have equalled, and none surpassed. Finally, 

 the notes appended to the greater part of these 

 families form, perhaps, that portion of the work 

 which most evinces the judgment and extensive 

 knowledge of the author. It was in them that be 

 often corrected the artificial tendency which a 

 linear series always assumes, that he pointed out 

 the multiplied relations of families to each other, 

 and that he indicated the doubts left upon his 

 mind by imperfect observations which he had been 

 unable to verify, or which led to the presentiment 

 of remote affinities, a foresight which greatly out- 



