History of Biology. 347 



many reasons for this, but certainly one was the insufficiency 

 of data. Vesalius and Fabricius were too earnestly engaged 

 in mastering the details of mammalian anatomy to plunge 

 into tie sea of general Biology. It needed more students 

 of Nature moulded on the Aristotelian type for work such 

 as that ; and yet it was not till the sixteenth century that 

 Gesner (1516-1565) and Csesalpinus (1519-1603) rose to 

 supply the want. It was then that the lists of species com- 

 piled by Aristotle were found so defective, and the labours 

 of these men and others of their school did much to increase 

 the range of biological knowledge. But they did more ; 

 they attempted, and with wonderful success, to generalise 

 on the observations they had made, and from a careful 

 study of the material they had collected endeavoured to 

 establish a more or less rational classification of plants and 

 animals. 



Biology was the last of the four great sciences to come 

 into being. Astronomy, the most general of them all, was 

 also the oldest. Physics and Chemistry were still in a tran- 

 sition state, and did not comprise a tithe of the array of 

 facts and conclusions which are now included under these 

 sciences. Yet just as Sociology, Anthropology, and the various 

 sub-sciences dealing with the relationship of man to man are 

 based on Biology which treats of him as an animal, struc- 

 turally and functionally, so Biology itself is, as we have 

 seen, based on the sciences of Physics and Chemistry. For 

 that reason Biology had to wait for Physics and Chemistry to 

 develop from the chaotic condition in which they were in 

 the sixteenth century into the comparatively orderly and 

 scientific department of knowledge which they became be- 

 fore the days of Cuvier, Haller, and Bonnet. Biology was 

 in the bud ; but it could not blossom until the physical and 

 chemical sciences were in a fit condition to supply the 

 necessary nourishment in the shape of suggestive ideas and 

 generalisations of wide application. 



That preparation had now been made. Kepler and 



