ATTEMPT BY LINNJEUS AT A NATURAL SYSTEM. 335 



natural affinities to be the great object of his studies, and the 

 most important part of the science. He considered the Artificial 

 system as a temporary expedient, which, however necessary at 

 that day, would inevitably give place to the system of nature, so 

 soon as its fundamental principles should be discovered. The 

 elucidation of the latter, he said, is the first and ultimate aim of 

 Botanists; to this end the labour of the greatest Botanists 

 should be diligently directed ; and the merest fragments of this 

 system should be carefully studied. Though not then fully dis- 

 covered, he spoke of the pursuit of it as held in high estimation 

 by the wisest Botanists, and as being thought of little conse- 

 quence only by the less learned. " For a long time," he adds, 

 " I have laboured to establish it ; I have made many disco- 

 veries, but have not been able to perfect it; yet while I live, I 

 shall continue to labour for its completion. In the mean time, 

 I have published what I have been able to discover ; and whoso- 

 ever shall resolve the few plants which still remain, shall be my 

 Magnus Apollo. Those are the greatest Botanists, who are 

 able to correct, augment, and perfect this method ; which those 

 who are unqualified should not attempt." Those therefore, who, 

 priding themselves upon their being disciples of Linnaeus, con- 

 tinue to employ his temporary and artificial system of classifica- 

 tion, to the exclusion of one founded upon Natural principles, 

 imagining that they are upheld by his authority, quite mistake the 

 views of their great master, and sadly misrepresent his opinions. 

 489. The knowledge of the Vegetable Kingdom obtained by 

 Linnaeus, however, was far too small in amount, to enable him 

 to frame a Natural System upon sound principles. The number 

 of species known to him was probably not an eighth part of 

 those with which Botanists are now acquainted; and no 

 arrangement, therefore, could be formed, which was not marked 

 by many wide and unsightly gaps. Further, so little was at 

 that time known of the internal arrangement of the organs of 

 plants, that even the distinction between the two principal forms 

 of structure in the stem, evident and well-marked as it now 

 appears, was not then understood. Nevertheless, with that 

 sagacity which so remarkably characterised him, Linnaeus suc- 

 ceeded in grouping together genera into orders, which are even 



