134 THE LITERATURE OF BOTANY. 



Of his definition of a natural system as one " which neither 

 brings together dissimilar species nor separates those which 

 are nearly allied," Lindley says, " However much the words 

 of this definition may have been varied, it still retains the 

 very meaning given to it by its author." 



The French botanists claim for Bernard de Jussieu the 

 glory of working out the true natural system, though it 

 was first established in principle by Ray. The nephew 

 of De Jussieu, Laurent de Jussieu, in 1789, published 

 his celebrated " Genera Plantarum," which raised the science 

 and marked a new era in vegetable classification. Thirty 

 thousand plants were known at this time, while our present 

 list comprises over eighty-two thousand. 



In 1751, forty years after the publication of Tournefort's 

 system, and while Ray was yet pursuing his investigations, 

 the Linna3an system appeared. This new mode of distri- 

 buting vegetables was hailed with admiration. Its author, 

 Charles von Linnasus, reigned supreme without a rival 

 until the end of the eighteenth century, and even in our 

 day his patrons are neither few nor powerless. Linnaeus 

 endeavoured to work out a natural system, a slight sketch 

 of which appeared, explaining the principles upon which 

 it might be expected to rest, and pronounced the investi- 

 gations of the natural affinities to be the great object of 

 his studies and the most important part of the science. 

 He considered the artificial system as a temporary expedient 

 which however necessary at that day must inevitably give 

 place to the system of nature so soon as the fundamental 

 principles should be discovered. "The elucidation of the 

 latter," he said, " is the first and ultimate aim of botanists : 

 to this end the labours of the greatest botanists should 

 be diligently directed. For a long time," he adds, " I 



