HISTORY OF BOTANY. 7 



The first direct evidence of any botanical enquiry amonst the 

 Komans, is that which is furnished in the works of Dioscorides and 

 Pliny ; but though these philosophers were long regarded as the best 

 and most infallible guides in the study of plants, botany derived 

 from their labours but little advantage; and the laudable example 

 which they set, seems to have been as much neglected by the 

 Romans, as that of Theophrastus was among the Greeks; for it was 

 permitted to lay, like all other departments of science, buried in the 

 ignorance and barbarism of the darker ages, except in as far as it 

 was cultivated by Galen, Avicenna, and a few other Asiatic Greeks, 

 till the period of the revival of learning in Europe. 



15. During that part of history, emphatically called 

 " the dark age," a dismal gloom enveloped the whole 

 of the civilized world ; ignorance, superstition and bar- 

 barism tyrannized over learning and genius ; knowledge 

 of any kind, was to be acquired only by searching 

 among the rubbish of monasteries; fabulous legends 

 supplied the place of truth, and the deception of a crafty 

 priesthood debased, at the same time that they enslaved 

 the minds of men. 



In this long and melancholy course of years, the few scattered 

 writings that appeared on natural history, were the productions of 

 monks, and compiled from old authors; but even these were cloaked 

 in almost unintelligible jargon, and it was not till the middle of the 

 sixteenth century, that the sun of science again burst from the thick 

 cloud, and shed its rays upon the north of Europe. 



16. At the revival of the sciences, botany was exactly 

 in the same state as the ancients left it, merely a cata- 

 logue or list of the names of about one thousand plants ; 

 for although the ancients had made numerous enquiries 

 respecting the physiology of vegetables, they had not 

 deduced any very scientific results. 



