358 THROUGH THE FIELDS WITH LINNAEUS 



viewed Mm with the greatest admiration, and Governor 

 Tulbagh sent him another and an incomparable collec- 

 tion of plants from the Cape, where his pnpiJ had 

 formerly not been permitted to collect for him. 



Linnaeus was one of the first who contended that 

 the sea is decreasing and that the continents are 

 increasing; basing his theory upon his Scandinavian 

 observations, where that the land is gradually rising is 

 a certainty. He says he went back as far as the exist- 

 ence of Paradise, which is one of those private-diary 

 sort of sentences that convey more to the writer's mind 

 than they do to another's. ' Linne would willingly have 

 believed the earth to be older than the Chinese assert 

 had the Scriptures allowed him ' l that is, the Scrip- 

 tures as they were read through the darkened glasses 

 of prejudice. c He tried to explain the stratification of 

 mountains. He read the earth, minerals, vegetables, 

 and animals as in a book.' He ends the notes for his 

 ' Autobiography ' with a psalm : ' The Lord hath caused 

 him to spring from a trunk 'without root, and planted 

 him again in a distant and more delightful spot, and 

 caused him to rise up to a considerable tree. The Lord 

 inspired him with an inclination for science, so pas- 

 sionate as to become the most gratifying of all others. 

 There follows a long list of what the Almighty has 

 done for him : ' honoured him with the titles of archi- 

 ater, knight, nobleman, and with distinction in the 

 learned world. . . . Permitted him to visit His secret 

 1 Diary. 



