Chap, i.] from Brunfels to Kaspar Bauhin. 23 



trees. ' Fructus ' is that in which the seed is formed, but fre- 

 quently it is itself the seed, as where the latter is not enclosed 

 in anything else and is formed naked. We must not be led by 

 these words to think of our Gymnosperms, but must under- 

 stand that here, as with all botanists till the time of A. L. 

 de Jussieu and Joseph Gartner (1788), naked seeds mean dry 

 indehiscent fruits. 



De l'Obel, from whom especially we might have looked for 

 similar explanations, has given none. 



The absence of more profound comparative examination of 

 the parts of plants, as shown in the examples of terminology 

 here adduced, may serve as an additional support of the asser- 

 tion, that natural affinity was not inferred from exact comparison 

 of the form of organs, but was the result of a feeling arising 

 from the likeness of habit directly apprehended by the senses, 

 that is by the collective impression produced by the whole 

 plant. 



Passing to the consideration of the attempts in systematic 

 botany made by the Germans in this period, the chief thing to 

 notice is, that the division into the main groups of trees, 

 shrubs, undershrubs, and herbs was the one generally 

 adopted ; these groups were borrowed from antiquity and 

 were maintained even by the special systematists, from Cesal- 

 pino to the beginning of the 18th century; nor was any 

 change made in principle when these four groups were 

 reduced to three or two (trees and herbs). It was moreover 

 considered to be self-evident that trees were the most perfect 

 plants. Hence when relationship is spoken of in subsequent 

 remarks, it must be understood that this holds good only 

 within the groups just mentioned. The classifications of the 

 German and Dutch botanists not only sprang from the de- 

 scribing of individual plants, but they were originally in a 

 certain sense identical with it. In undertaking to describe 

 individual forms, the first task was to separate those which 

 closely resembled one another, for the resemblance of syste- 



