PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION. 59 



Characters of this kind are given in the Systema 

 Natur^ and Systema Vegetabilium of Linnaeus, as 

 well as in our Flora Britannica, and the Genera 

 Plantarum of Jussieu. In the latter are subjoined, 

 in a different type, various accessory or explanatory 

 characters, of great value, respecting the herbage, 

 or general habit, of every Genus. 



105. These principles of Generic discrimination are 

 equally stable and important, whether Genera be 

 considered, with Linnaeus, as natural assemblages; 

 or with some other botanists, as commodious arti- 

 ficial contrivances. 



106. It seems to me that the soundest most irrefra- 

 gable Genera, have been established by those bo- 

 tanists who believed them to be founded in nature ; 

 those who think otherwise, being prone to recur to 

 minute distinctions, of whose relative importance 

 they have no principle by which they can judge. 



1 07. While Rosa, Rttbus, Quercus, SalLv, Ficus, Cy- 

 pripedium, Epimedium, and Begonia exist, it will 

 be vain to deny that Generic distinctions are found- 

 ed in nature, though botanists may, as yet, be very 

 far indeed from having discovered them all cor- 

 rectly. 



