12 NATURAL HISTORY. 



' History of Animals,' has been the object of extravagant 

 and uncalled-for eulogy ; while other critics, as a reaction 

 from this, have shown themselves unduly oblivious of its 

 unquestionable merits. Thus Cuvier,* on the one hand, 

 says of it : 'I cannot read this work without being carried 

 away with wonder. Indeed it is impossible to conceive 

 how a single man was able to collect and compare the 

 multitude of particular facts implied in the numerous 

 general rules and aphorisms contained in this work.' On 

 the ofher hand, Mr George Henry Lewes, t though 

 admitting that it is 'a stupendous effort ' when viewed in 

 comparison with the works which for centuries succeeded 

 it, remarks that 'looked at absolutely, that is to say in 

 relation to the science of which it treats, it is an ill- 

 digested, ill-compiled mass of details, mostly of small 

 value, with an occasional gleam of something better. 

 There is, strictly speaking, no science in it at all. There 

 is not even a system which might look like science. 

 There is not one good description. It is not an 

 anatomical treatise ; it is not a descriptive zoology ; it 

 is not a philosophy of zoology; it is a collection of 

 remarks about animals, their structure, resemblances, 

 differences, and habits. As a collection it is immense. 

 But it is at the best only a collection of details, without 

 a trace of organisation ; and the details themselves are 

 rarely valuable, often inaccurate.' 



It would be quite out of place to enter here into any 

 detailed analysis of the ' History of Animals,' or of the 

 less famous but not less important treatise 'On the 



* ' Histoire des Sciences Naturelles,' 1841, torn. L, p. 146. 



t 'Aristotle, a Chapter from the History of Science,' 1864, p. 271. 



