Medical Properties of Flowers 



into a medicine. But when it is recognised that 

 in some way or other what we call the medical 

 properties of a plant are essential to its life and 

 well-being, then a good reason for its presence in 

 the plant is established. 



But though I feel sure that the medical pro- 

 perties of plants are necessary and essential parts 

 of them, yet they cannot form a scientific differentia 

 either in a genus or species. As with scent, so 

 with the medical or other uses of a plant, Linnaeus 

 condemned their being named to distinguish genera 

 or species, though he allowed the medical names 

 to be used as synonymous ; but his rule was, " Vis 

 et usus differentiam Botanico vanam subministrant" ', 

 and he even said that genera established pharmaco- 

 peorum gratia were contra leges creatoris. The 

 medical properties of plants may, therefore, take 

 the rank in scientific botany that the scents do ; 

 but there is one very important difference, and it 

 is on that that I wish especially to speak in this 

 paper ; and the difference is this, that in a very 

 large number of plants the good or bad qualities 

 of a plant can be distinguished by the growth, 

 shape, colour, etc., of the stems, leaves, or flowers ; 

 so that even without a deep knowledge of botany, 

 almost any observer can say of a plant that it is 

 good for human use or bad. 



This is a very old opinion, and it reached its 

 height in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 

 The old doctrine was, Millia sunt mala, millia 

 etiam remedia, and it was a matter almost of 



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