26 INTRODUCTION. 



requires some explanation. By perfect animals we understand those 

 that, in the number and importance of their functions, and in the 

 complicated structure of their organs, make an approach to Man : 

 whilst those are called ' imperfect ' whose simple organisation, and 

 less numerous functions, remove them from that perfection of which 

 Man supplies the pattern. In this sense, as I conceive, the expres- 

 sion may be well defended. ARISTOTLE says that in all other things 

 we must proceed just as we do in the investigation of coins, com- 

 paring them individually with those which are best known to us : 

 but man is necessarily the best known to us of all animals 1 . Let it 

 be added, that Man is in fact the center of organisation to which 

 the animals, like rays, may be considered to converge and so is the 

 union of what is most perfect and most beautiful in them all 2 . 

 Hence animals which have a resemblance to man are, not without 

 reason, styled perfect. 



On the art of Classifying (Taxinomia). 



Such conceptions become still clearer by unfolding the art of 

 Classifying. Classification and systematic division are indispensable 

 in Natural History. How innumerable are the species of animals 

 which are scattered over the surface of the earth ! Each of these 

 species has its country, its determinate form, its peculiar properties. 

 How shall we attain to all this knowledge: how shall we turn 

 to account the observations of earlier writers, how learn to what 

 species they refer ? how can we, in fine, communicate our own 

 observations to others, unless we make use of a classification? 

 Classifications then are as old as the study of Natural History, and 

 their difference is to be sought in their more or less scientific found- 

 ation and plan. By means of its systematic arrangement the study 

 of Natural History obtains a more extensive influence upon our 

 entire scientific cultivation, and in this respect it cannot be suffi- 

 ciently recommended to young persons, in order that they may 



yap vofAla/uaTa irpbs TO afrrois HicaffTov yvupi^Tarov SoKifidfovffU', OVTW 87] 

 Kal v TOIS AXXoiS. '0 5' &vdpwjro'i T&v {(buy yvupifAwTOLTov rifuv avdyK-rjs tarlv. 



2 See J. G. HERDER'S Idem, zur Philosophic der GeschicJtie der Menschen. Carlsruhe, 

 1794. i Thl. s. 100 108. 



