2 Early History of Botany [ch. 



converged, but more often pursued parallel and unconnected 

 paths. 



Botany as a branch of philosophy may be said to have 

 owed its inception to the wonderful mental activity of the 

 finest period of Greek culture. It was at this time that the 

 nature and life of plants first came definitely within the 

 scope of inquiry and speculation. 



2. Aristotelian Botany. 



Aristotle, Plato's pupil, concerned himself with the 

 whole field of science, and his influence, especially during 

 the Middle Ages, had a most profound effect on European 

 thought. The greater part of his botanical writings, which 

 belong to the fourth century before Christ, are unfortunately 

 lost, but, from such fragments as remain, it is clear that his 

 interest in plants was of an abstract nature. He held that 

 all living bodies, those of plants as well as of animals, are 

 organs of the soul, through which they exist. It was broad, 

 general speculations, such as these, which chiefly attracted 

 him. He asks why a grain of corn gives rise in its turn to 

 a grain of corn and not to an olive, thus raising a plexus 

 of problems, which, despite the progress of modern science, 

 still baffle the acutest thinkers of the present day. 



Aristotle bequeathed his library to his pupil Theo- 

 phrastus, whom he named as his successor. Theophrastus 

 was well fitted to carry on the traditions of the school, since 

 he had, in earlier years, studied under Plato himself. He 

 produced a 'History of Plants' in which Botany is treated in 

 a somewhat more concrete and definite fashion than is the 

 case in Aristotle's writings. Theophrastus mentions about 

 450 plants, whereas the number of species in Greece known 

 at the present day is at least 3000. His descriptions, 

 with few exceptions, are meagre, and the identification 

 of the plants to which they refer is a matter of extreme 

 difficulty. 



In various points of observation, Theophrastus was in 

 advance of his time. He noticed, for instance, the distinc- 

 tion between centripetal and centrifugal inflorescences — a 

 distinction which does not seem to have again attracted 

 the attention of botanists until the sixteenth century. He 



