TERMS.] GLOSSOLOGY, ETC. 345 



to previous definitions ; as if they supposed it impossible to 

 convey by words an idea of the meaning of any term what- 

 ever, without noticing at length every possible application of 

 it. Thus, in Willdenow's Principles of Botany, the most 

 common and simple terms are repeated five, six, and even 

 seven times; and in a more modern work, of very high 

 character (Les E'lemens de Physiologie Vegetale et de 

 Botanique, by Mirbel), the same practice has been carried so 

 far, that the application of the word simple is explained in 

 twenty-three different instances. 



The true principles of arranging the glossology of science 

 have, however, been long before the public. In the year 

 1797, Link, in his Prodromus Philosophies Botanica, distin- 

 guished the characteristic or common terms used in Botany 

 from those which applied only to particular organs ; and his 

 example was afterwards followed by Illiger, a learned German 

 naturalist, who, in the year 1810, proposed a total reforma- 

 tion of the method of describing the terms employed in 

 Natural History (see his Versuch einer Systematischen 

 vollstdndigen Terminologie fur das Thierreich und Pflanzen- 

 reich). Little attention, however, was paid to the principles 

 of these writers till the year 1813; when De Candolle 

 adopted them in his Theorie E'lementaire de la Botanique, 

 with his accustomed skill and sagacity. 



The characteristic terms of Botany are those which have 

 a general application to any or all of the parts of plants, and 

 must not be confounded with such as have a particular 

 application only, which will be found under the organs to 

 which they respectively belong : the former are either indi- 

 vidual or collective ; of which the first apply to plants, or parts 

 of plants, considered abstractedly; the second to plants, or 

 their parts, considered in masses. To these are to be added 

 those syllables and marks which, either prefixed or affixed to 

 a known term, occasion an alteration in its signification. 

 These I call terms of qualification. In the following arrange- 

 ment, those terms which are seldom used are marked with 

 a t ; and those are entirely omitted which are used in Botany 

 in their common acceptation. 



