LECT. I.] UTILITY OF BOTANtf. 19 



a natural order ; SIR JOSEPH BANKS ; MILLER ; 

 HfiDwrc; DRYANDER; GARTNER; SIR J. E. SMITH, 

 President of the Linnsean Society ; WILLDENOW; 

 PROFESSOR VAIIL ; HUMBOLDT, the South Ameri- 

 can traveller; ROXBURGH; and many others, whose 

 names are well known and not undeservedly cele- 

 brated. 



Having finished the rapid sketch of the rise 

 and progress of the science, which I proposed to 

 exhibit to you, let us now pass on to the consider- 

 ation of its utility as a branch of general know- 

 ledge. In reflecting upon this part of our subject, 

 Medicine first presents itself to our attention, as 

 deriving the greatest assistance from it. With the 

 healing art, as we have already noticed, Botany 

 originated ; and, until the period of the renowned 

 empiric Paracelsus, who introduced the use of 

 chemical remedies, almost the whole resources of 

 medicine were drawn from the vegetable kingdom. 

 Although it can scarcely be denied that the use of 

 mineral remedies has been, upon the whole, fa- 

 vourable to the advancement of the profession, by 

 putting into the hands of its practitioners very 

 powerful agents for altering and controlling, as it 

 were, the powers of the animal system ; yet it may 

 be doubted whether mankind have not suffered, in 

 some degree, by the change, inasmuch as the at- 

 tention of the medical philosopher has been di- 



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