IIISTORY OF EOT AN i^. 215 



rally seeks for information respecting its origin and the prog' 

 ress by which it advanced from the first rude conce])tion3 

 which might have been formed, to its gradual development 

 and comparative perfection. The history of the. progress of a 

 science makes a part of the science itself; we are interested in 

 the various efforts of j^hilosophers, their experience and observa- 

 tions, and the trains of reasoning by which they arrived at those 

 conclusions which constitute the basis of the science. In Botany, 

 as 'in the other sciences, physical wants were the first guides; 

 man at first sought to find in vegetables, food, then remedies for 

 diseases, and lastly, amusement and instruction. 



329. The first account of plants may be traced to the history 

 of the creation by Moses. It was on the third day of this great 

 work that God said, " Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb 

 yielding seed, and the fruit-tree yielding fruit after his kind, 

 luhose seed is in itself^ upon the earth : and it was so ; and the 

 earth brought forth grass, and the herb yielding seed after his 

 kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after 

 his kind ; and God saw that it loas good.'''' After this, it is re- 

 corded, that God gave to Adam every herb and every tree hear- 

 ing fruit ; the latter was for him exclusively, but to the beasts 

 of the earth, and the fowls of the air, and to every thing wherein 

 there is life, he also gave the green herh for meat. Adam, ac- 

 cording to Holy Scripture, gave names to all the beasts of the 

 field, and the fowls of the air ; and Milton imagines, that to Eve 

 was assigned the pleasant task of giving names to flowers and 

 numbering the tribes of plants. When our first parents, as a 

 punishment for their disobedience, are about to leave their de- 

 lightful Eden, Eve, in the language of the poet, with bitter re- 

 gret exclaims : 



" Must I thus leave thee, Paradise ? 

 ***** Oh flowers 

 That never ■will in other chmate grow, 

 * * which I bred up with tender hand, 

 From the first opening bud, and gave ye names ; 

 Wlio now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank 

 Your tribes?" 



330. The Bible and the poems of Homer afford us the onlj 

 vestiges of the botanical knowledge of the earliest ages of the 

 world. Great advantages were afforded to the Jews for obtain- 

 ing a knowledge of plants, in their long wanderings over the 

 face of the earth before they settled in Judea. When in posses- 

 sion of that fertile country they extended their intercourse with 

 foreign nations ; the vessels of Solomon frequented the shores of 

 the lied Sea, the Persian Gulf, and the East Indian islands. In 



320. First account of plants traced to the history of the creiition— Milton imagines that Eve 

 gave names to the plaulfi.— 330. What is known of the progress of botany during the earliest a^'es of 



