IMAGINARY KNOWLEDGE. 289 



The reader need hardly be reminded that in the 

 earlier periods of man's mental culture, he acquires 

 those opinions on which he loves to dwell, not by 

 the exercise of observation subordinate to reason ; 

 but, far more, by his fancy and his emotions, his 

 love of the marvellous, his hopes and fears. It 

 cannot surprize us, therefore, that the earliest lore 

 concerning plants which we discover in the records 

 of the past, consists of mythological legends, marvel- 

 lous relations, and extraordinary medicinal quali- 

 ties. To the lively fancy of the Greeks, the Nar- 

 cissus, which bends its head over the stream, was 

 originally a youth who in such an attitude became 

 enamoured of his own beauty : the hyacinth", on 

 whose petals the notes of grief were traced (A i, AI), 

 recorded the sorrow of Apollo for the death of his 

 favourite Hyacinthus : the beautiful lotus of India 3 , 

 which floats with its splendid flower on the surface 

 of the water, is the chosen seat of the goddess 

 Lackshmi, the daughter of Ocean 4 . In Egypt, too 5 , 

 Osiris swam on a lotus-leaf, and Harpocrates was 

 cradled in one. The lotus-eaters of Homer lost 

 immediately their love of home. Every one knows 

 how easy it would be to accumulate such tales of 

 wonder or religion. 



2 Lilium martagon. 



Ipse suos gemitus foliis inscribit et AI, AI, 



Flos habet inscriptum funestaque litera ducta est. OVID. 



3 Nelumbium speciosum. 



4 Sprengel, Geschichte der Botanik, i. 27. s Ib. i. 28. 

 VOL. III. U 



