ULYSSES ALDROVANDI. 117 



ment of such an undertaking. We have, indeed, 

 little reason to expect in the writings of the an- 

 cients, or in those of the succeeding naturalists, any 

 example of a just classification ; still we cannot but 

 marvel when we find, that very few of them en- 

 deavoured to represent objects as they might have 

 seen them with their own eyes. Whatever may be 

 the causes of this defect, those who are extensively 

 conversant with the publications of our own times 

 must be aware, that the practice of copying from 

 books, instead of having recourse to Nature herself, 

 has not yet been relinquished ; though nothing is 

 more clear than that there can be no real progress in 

 natural history without authenticating the obser- 

 vations of preceding writers by examining the ob- 

 jects which they have described, and by noting the 

 particulars in which they are erroneous. 



