66 FROM THE GREEKS TO DARWIN 



refers especially to the life of man and was not 

 applied by the Greeks to other living things. As 

 expressed by Singer*/ 



Greek science exhibits throughout its history a 

 peculiar characteristic differentiating it from the 

 modern scientific standpoint. Most of the work of 

 the Greek scientist was done in relation to man. Na- 

 ture interested him mainly in relation to himself. 

 The Greek scientific and philosophic world was an 

 anthropocentric world, and this comes out in the 

 overwhelming mass of medical as distinct from bio- 

 logical writings that have come down to us. Such, 

 too, is the sentiment expressed by the poets in their 

 descriptions of the animal creation : 



Many wonders there be, but naught more wondrous 

 than man : 



The light-witted birds of the air, the beasts of the 

 weald and the wood 



He traps with his woven snare, and the brood of the 

 briny flood. 



Master of cunning he : the savage bull, and the hart 



Who roams the mountain free, are tamed by his in- 

 finite art. 



It is probable that the first English use of the word in its modern 

 sense is by Sir William Lawrence (1783-1867) in his work On the 

 Physiology, Zoology, and Natural History of Man, London, 1819; 

 there are earlier English uses of the word, however, contrasted 

 with biography." — Singer: Biology. The fact is that Treviranus 

 and Lamarck proposed the word independently in the same year. 

 See p. 285.— H. F. O. 



iCharles Singer: Biology. Pp. 167, 168; 163, 164, of The Legacy 

 of Greece. 



