17 



sound much more like an incantation than a name. 

 We can imagine the overwhelming astonishment, 

 with which the vulgar and the genteel ignorant must 

 have listened, when he was pouring out these " ses- 

 quipedalia verba''' to designate a common weed. 

 Well may we excuse them for replying, when urged 

 to partake of the pleasures of such a study, " The 

 kernel of your nut, for aught we know, may be very 

 sweet, but the shell is too hard for us to crack." 



Again, so long as the mind remained occupied in 

 no other manner than the acquisition of new plants, 

 without knowing in what way to appreciate their 

 respective peculiarities, discoveries continued to be 

 made slowly, and to be of little value when made. 

 As soon, however, as botanists arrived at the art of 

 arranging upon philosophical principles, the materials 

 they possessed, their attention was strongly directed 

 towards supporting their respective systems by the 

 addition of new objects and new facts ; — and the 

 strenuous investigations, instituted on this account, 

 naturally brought them acquainted w ith an abundance 

 of subjects, the existence of which the imperfection 

 of their previous knowledge could not have led them 

 to suspect. 



The following statistics will place this in a strong 

 light. The entire Flora of Homer amounts to less 

 than thirty species. In the Holy Bible, according to 

 Sprengel, seventy-one plants are noticed by name ; 

 and two hundred and seventy-four are spoken of by 

 Hippocrates, who was born four hundred and fifty 

 years before Christ. Theophrastus, of about the same 

 3 



