BOTANY. 217 



LETTER LXXXII. 



TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON. 



SELBORNE, June 2, 1778. 



DEAR SIR, The standing objection to botany has always 

 been, that it is a pursuit that amuses the fancy and exercises 

 the memory, without improving the mind, or advancing any 

 real knowledge ; and, where the science is carried no farther 

 than a mere systematic classification, the charge is but too true. 

 But the botanist that is desirous of wiping off this aspersion, 

 should be by no means content with a list of names ; he should 

 study plants philosophically, should investigate the laws of 

 vegetation, should examine the powers and virtues of efficacious 

 herbs, should promote their cultivation, and graft the gardener, 

 the planter, and the husbandman on the phytologist. Not that 

 system is by any means to be thrown aside without system 

 the field of Nature would be a pathless wilderness but sys- 

 tem should be subservient to, not the main object of, pursuit. 



Vegetation is highly worthy of our attention, and in itself 

 is of the utmost consequence to mankind, and productive of 

 many of the greatest comforts and elegancies of life. To 

 plants we owe timber, bread, beer, honey, wine, oil, linen, 

 cotton, &c. what not only strengthens our hearts, and exhi- 

 larates our spirits, but what secures us from inclemencies of 

 weather, and adorns our persons. Man, in his true state of 

 nature, seems to be subsisted by spontaneous vegetation ; in 

 middle climes, where grasses prevail, he mixes some animal 

 food with the produce of the field and garden ; and it is towards 

 the polar extremes only, that, like his kindred bears and wolves, 

 he gorges himself with flesh alone, and is driven to what hunger 

 has never been known to compel the very beasts, to prey 

 upon his own species.* 



The productions of vegetation have had a vast influence on 

 the commerce of nations, and have been the great promoters 

 of navigation, as may be seen in the articles of sugar, tea, 

 tobacco, opium, ginseng, betel, pepper, &c. As every climate 

 has its peculiar produce, our natural wants bring on a mutual 

 intercourse ; so that by means of trade, each distant part is 

 supplied with the growth of every latitude. But, without the 

 knowledge of plants and their culture, we must have been 



* See the late voyages to the Couth Seas. 



