BOTANY. 



Diosco- 



riJts. 



History, favourite disciple of Aristotle, a philosopher, whose 

 ' " ' 'iT~~ ardent and comprehensive mind, had left scarcely any 

 thing unexplored in the circle of the sciences. To 

 the knowledge which he had derived from the lessons 

 of such a master, as well as from the use of an inva- 

 luable library, which that master, at his death, be- 

 queathed to him, as his successor in the Peripatetic 

 school, Theophrastus added the result of much per- 

 sonal observation. And when he was now advanced 

 in life, and had thrown his materials into that form 

 which appeared to him most eligible, he at length 

 favoured the world with a philosophical work on his 

 favourite subject, entitled 7r(gi (fwrui ta~ref:ixt, or the 

 History of Plants. The greater part of this publi- 

 cation, into which he introduced a description of 500 

 plants, is still extant; but as he adopted no better 

 principles of arrangement than the variable ideas which 

 soil, size, lactescence, and ceconSmical uses suggest, 

 its merit in these days is considered as arising chiefly 

 from the scientific and classical views which it gives us 

 of the structure and general ccconomy of vegetables. 



A bout 400 years afterwards, he was followed in the 

 same course of observation and study by Dioscorides, 

 a native of Cilicia, but of Grecian extraction. After 

 having made several extensive journies through dif- 

 ferent parts of Asia, and spared no pains to get ac- 

 quainted with the names and virtues of all the plants 

 that were then known, this diligent botanist publish- 

 ed an account of 600, distributed, from their officinal 

 qualities, into the four classes of aromatic, vinous, 

 medicinal, and alimentary vegetables. But though 

 his descriptions are accurate and more comprehensive 

 than his predecessors, his principles of arrangement 

 are scarcely less objectionable ; and it may be added, 

 that he wrote particularly with a view to illustrate 

 the medical virtues of plants. 



The elder Pliny, who lived but a few years after 

 Dioscorides, and who ultimately fell a victim to his 

 love of knowledge in an attempt to approach MoTint 

 Vesuvius immediately after an eruption, devoted, his 

 attention, among other things, to plants. In the 

 course of his History of the World, which may be 

 viewed as a compilation of all that was known to the 

 ancients on the subject of natural history, he has 

 given us some account of upwards of 1000 species. 

 But, as we might naturally expect in a compilation 

 from authors of various merit, his facts and descrip- 

 tions are often inaccurate, and mixed with a good 

 deal of extraneous matter ; and his whole work, so 

 far as he treats of plants, is so devoid of order, that 

 the only distinction which he makes use of is, the 

 obvious, but very uncertain one, of trees, shrubs, 

 and herbs. 



From the time of Pliny downwards, for the space 

 of several hundred years, we scarcely read of any per- 

 son who made a figure as a botanist. The study of 

 the science was either wholly neglected, or pursued 

 only by a few insulated individuals, without any ideas 

 of method, or advantage from the labours of their 

 predecessors. In Arabia, it is true, an attempt was 

 made, about the close of the eighth century, to bring 

 it into repute, by Serapis, Razis, Avicenna, and 

 others; who, for this purpose, translated the writings 

 of the- Greek authors, and made various compilations 

 from them. But, in the western world, the birth- 

 1 



Pliny, 

 born 

 A. D. 20. 

 Died 

 A,D. 76. 



place heretofore of genius and learning, improvement 

 of every kind was arrested ; society was put back 

 from its natural course, and a darkness that might 

 be felt succeeding every where the ravages of those 

 numerous hords of barbarians that poured in upon 

 the Roman empire, extinguished for ages the very 

 glimmerings of science. It was only about the be- 

 ginning of the sixteenth century, that a taste for bo- 

 tany, keeping pace with the revival of learning-, be- 

 gan to be again cultivated. The works of Theo- 

 phrastus, Pliny, Avicenna, and other ancient authors, 

 were translated, and given to the public with the 

 notes and illustrations of several learned commenta- 

 tors. And, in the mean time, the stock of know- 

 ledge contained in them was enlarged, and by de- 

 grees reduced into a more convenient form by the la- 

 bours of men who devoted themselves to the task of 

 original observation. 



Otto Brunfels, a native of Mentz, who died in 

 1534 at Berne, in Switzerland, where he had gone to 

 practise medicine, was the person who may be said 

 to have taken the lead in this respect, having publish- 

 ed, four years before his death, a work containing 

 the fruit of his own researches, in two vols. folio, il- 

 lustrated with cuts, which he entitled, Historia Plan- 

 tarum Argentorati. A short while after, Hierony- 

 mus Bock, or Tragus, as he is generally called, a 

 German, who was born in 1498, and died in 1554, 

 published a history of plants in his Kreiiterbuch, into 

 which he introduced pretty accurate descriptions of 

 800 species, arranged according to their habit, size, 

 and figure, and accompanied with cuts ; which, like 

 those of Brunfels, are, however, rude, and such as 

 might be expected in the infancy of engraving. Eu- 

 ricus Cordus, and his son Valerius, who were natives 

 of Hesse, and nearly contemporaries of Tragus, were 

 rather eminent for their labours in illustrating the 

 descriptions of their predecessors, and more especial- 

 ly of the ancients, than for adding to the sum of ori- 

 ginal discovery. Leonard Fuchsius, however, a Ger- 

 man, who was born in 1501, and died at Tubingen, 

 where he was professor in 1566, Peter Andreas 

 Matthiolus, physician at Siena, in Italy, who flou- 

 rished about the same time, and had made the wri- 

 tings of the Greek authors, but chiefly those of Dios- 

 corides, in a particular manner his study, Rembert 

 Dodonaeus, physician to the Emperor Charles V., 

 and latterly professor of botany at Leyden, where he 

 died in 1585, Matthias de Lobel, physician to James 

 I. of Great Britain,^-our countryman Dr Turner, au- 

 thor of the British Herbal, and above all, the celebra- 

 ted Charles L'Ecluse, or Clusius, a Flemish botanist, 

 who, after travelling through many countries, with 

 much risk, and more than one serious accident to 

 himself, from devotedness to his favourite pursuit, 

 became superintendent of the. emperor's gardens at 

 Vienna ; and towards the close of his life, which hap- 

 pened in 1609, accepted of an invitation to be professor 

 at Leyden, contributed, in a very eminent degree, 

 by their own observations, as well as by the improve- 

 ments which they made on the labours of preceding 

 writers, to the advancement of the science. Botany, 

 it is true, had not yet assumed any regular form ; 

 and the histories of the plants which they published, 

 consisted of little else than descriptions, more or less 





History. 



Modern 

 history of 

 botany. 



Brunfels. 

 Died 1534. 



Tragiu. 

 Born 1493. 

 Died 1554. 



Cordus. 

 Born 1515. 

 Died 1544. 



Fuchsius. 



M.-mhio- 

 lus. 



Horn 1500. 

 Died 1577. 



Dodonjeus. 

 Born 1517. 

 Died 1586. 

 De Lobel. 

 Turner. 

 Died 156S. 

 Clusius. 



