November 17, 1923] 



NA TURE 



715 



Carl von Linn^. 



Linnceus {afterwards Carl von Linni) : the Story of his 

 Life, adapted from the Swedish of Theodor Magnus 

 Fries, Emeritus Professor of Botany in the University 

 of Uppsala, and brought down to the Present Time in 

 the Light of Recent Research. By Dr. Benjamin 

 Daydon Jackson. Pp. xv + 416 + 8 plates. (London : 

 H. F. and G. Witherby, 1923.) 255. net. 



THOSE who admire the work of Linnaeus were 

 indebted to Prof. Th. M. Fries in 1903 for a 

 new life of his great predecessor at Uppsala. Members 

 of the Linnean Society of London now have to thank 

 their general secretary for an English epitome of the 

 Swedish work. 



Linnaeus accounted himself " a born methodizer." 

 His contemporaries thought so too, and this belief is 

 entertained still, both by those who appreciate and by 

 those who belittle what Linnaeus accomplished. But 

 while his work justifies his own estimate, that estimate 

 does him less than justice. Linnaeus failed to foresee 

 that in one country dialectic aptitude would eventually 

 so affect ability to grasp principles as to induce dis- 

 crimination between " pure mathematics, astronomy 

 or any branch of science which aims merely at describ- 

 ing, cataloguing or systematizing," and philosophic 

 activities that afford scope for " experimental research." 

 He could scarcely have predicted that, in another coun- 

 try, the tendency to see ahead would so affect ability 

 to look around that Linnaeus could no longer be con- 

 sidered a botanist. 



The Linnaeus of the *' Lachesis Lapponica " was a 

 great naturalist of uncommon judgment, with an inborn 

 capacity for observation. The Linnaeus of the " Musa 

 Cliff ortiana " had a decided capacity for physical ex- 

 periment, which later tasks hindered him from exer- 

 cising to the full. Linnaeus regarded the improvement 

 of natural knowledge for use as important as its im- 

 provement for discovery ; in his travels as a student 

 and his later journeys on public commission, economic 

 and scientific questions received equal attention. His 

 biological study revealed the defects of received classi- 

 fications ; his economic instinct suggested the need for 

 reform ; his philosophic interest in the " mystery of 

 sex " supplied the means. 



Linnieus found the basis of method to be the recogni- 

 tion of natural kinds ; the practical segregation of 

 these into sorts and strains, and their theoretical 

 aggregation into septs and clans. These tasks may 

 proceed either by synopsis, which involves arbitrary 

 dichotomy, or by system, which entails considered 

 arrangement. Synthetic in mind, Linnaeus thought 

 system, however crude, preferable to synopsis, however 

 complete, and so improved a by-product of scientific 



NO. 2820, VOL. 1 12] 



investigation as to substitute order for chaos in the 

 domain of Nature. Linnaeus did not claim that the 

 system he outlined on May 11, 1731, when he was only 

 twenty-four, added to real knowledge ; its purpose was 

 to serve economic ends by rendering real knowledge 

 usable. Those who decry and those who excuse the 

 artificial nature of his sexual system, alike overlook 

 what Linnaeus taught. His artificial higher groups were 

 meant to serve as substitutes for natural ones, only until 

 the latter had all been detected. Like his precursors, 

 Morison and Ray, Linnaeus strove to decipher the real 

 system of Nature. E.xtending their studies, he laid the 

 foundation of that system, and only refrained from 

 applying it in practice lest those who improve natural 

 knowledge for use be thereby deprived of a thread to 

 guide them through the maze of things. Others have 

 followed Linnaeus along the path opened up by Morison, 

 and have devised systems as workable as the pragmatic 

 method of Linnaeus. Modem students of the " mystery 

 of sex " are, however, at times inclined to think these 

 " natural " systems almost as " artificial " as the 

 Linnean " sexual system." 



Until Bauhin in 1623 enumerated the plants he knew 

 with reference to their names, it was usual for those 

 who reproduced old descriptions to devise fresh desig- 

 nations. Linnaeus gave stability to Bauhin's reform 

 when, in 1753, he enumerated the names he knew with 

 reference to the plants concerned. For Linnaeus the 

 naming of kinds was a responsibility so grave that he 

 made the genus " a thing of dignity." The name of 

 a sort was, for him, necessarily that of its kind com- 

 bined with a differential statement, and the relation- 

 ship of a specific to its generic name was that of the 

 bell to its clapper or the clapper to its bell. The 

 purpose of scientific nomenclature is so akin to that of 

 heraldic achievement as to suggest that the use by 

 Linnaeus of " trivial " epithets, ancillary to yet distinct 

 from specific names, may have been taken from the 

 older and rigorously disciplined technology which em- 

 ploys " crests " as ancillary to, although independent 

 of, " arms." While advantageous in applied study, 

 these " trivial " terms have proved a mixed blessing 

 in descriptive work. Linnaeus was himself so immune 

 against both the juvenile tendency to confuse means 

 with ends, and the adult liability to care more for 

 names than things, that he did not foresee the later 

 retreat from philosophical positions secured by him for 

 science. Histories of natural " families " now supplant 

 accounts of " genera " ; now, the " trivial " terms 

 designed by him as aids in economic work are often 

 mistaken for specific names and sometimes treated as 

 entities apart. The efforts to stabilise nomenclature, 

 which this abandonment of sound scientific principles 

 has entailed, involve results so bewildering tliat one 



