90 LINN&US AS AN EVOLUTIONIST 



1747, addressed to his most intimate and 

 trusted friend, J. G. Gmelin, author of Flora 

 Sibirica, he gives confidential expression to the 

 restraints under which he feels that he is obliged 

 to write on matters that impinge upon the 

 domain of theology; to his unwillingness to 

 face the disapproval of the Lutheran and 

 orthodox ecclesiastics who, in his day, ruled 

 the destinies of all seats of learning in Sweden. 

 He says to Gmelin : 



"You disapprove my having located Man 

 among the Anthropomorphi. But man knows 

 himself. Now we may, perhaps, give up 

 those words. It matters little to me what 

 name we use; but I demand of you, and of 

 the whole world, that you show me a generic 

 character one that is according to generally 

 accepted principles of classification by which 

 to distinguish between Man and Ape. I 

 myself most assuredly know of none. I wish 

 somebody would indicate one to me. But, 

 if I had called man an ape, or vice versa, I 

 should have fallen under the ban of all the 

 ecclesiastics. It may be that as a naturalist 

 I ought to have done so." 1 



1 This, though written as we have said in 1747, was never 

 published until 1861. The original Latin text of the letter 

 occurs in "Joannis Georgii Gmelini, Reliquiae quse, supersunt 



