I KCTURE I. 13 



Ii in. iv li)\\-MT br nujcli doubted 

 \\li.thcr tin study of Natural History has been 

 greatly ad\an< I by their institution. 



It ^ ini|i"^;l)lc not to allow some degree of 

 just;. , com plaints uttered on this subject by 



an ingenious naturalist in a neighbouring nation, 

 \\lio thu.N expresses his sentiments. 



By u hat fatality does it happen, that the beau- 

 tiful and elegant science of Natural History is be- 

 come an assemblage of systems, of methods, and 

 discussions of nomenclature, as dry and tedious as 

 they are idle and unnecessary? How can it hap- 

 pen that men of any sterling sense should spend 

 their time in endeavouring to reduce into geome- 

 trical divisions the beautiful gradations of Nature, 

 and to be the slaves to arbitrary and petty ar- 

 rangements, which rise and perish, like so many 

 mushrooms, and which appear to be of no oth-r 



t but to disgust and fatigue those who are 

 doomed to study them? When shall we see a stop 

 put to that inundation of new and barbarous words 

 and terms, which deform and disgrace almost all 

 our new works on Natural Hi-story, and which 

 threaten to reproduce the scholastic jargon of 



