58 CLASS MAMMALIA. 



must gradually take in parts to be enabled to form any 

 adequate conception of the mighty whole. There is but 

 one Being whom " minuteness cannot perplex, nor magni- 

 tude encumber ;" but one ineffable intellect that can at once 

 take in the infinity of the universe, and every minutest 

 atom in the vast creation. That intellect which compre- 

 hendeth all things, because it containeth all things. But 

 the intellect of man must proceed in succession, as it is in- 

 capable of receiving the whole, and in generalization and 

 abstraction, as it cannot retain all the parts. Systems are 

 valuable, only in so far as they further these intellectual 

 operations, as they assist comprehension and retention. 

 On this principle then, the undue multiplication of divisions 

 and sub-divisions is highly objectionable. It requires al- 

 most as great an effort of memory to retain the divisions, 

 as it would to retain the things divided. 



But a fondness of system-making and reforming is the 

 grand vice of superior intellects. It is a fault arising out of 

 that power which distinguishes the human above every other 

 animal, and points out its divine affinity. Man, in his way, 

 would be a creator, like him in whose image he exists — nay, 

 he is a creator, and a wonderful one. But as all human 

 works and systems must be imperfect, and as it is the ten- 

 dency of superior minds to aim at perfection, so when the 

 work of innovation once begins, it is apt to be carried to an 

 extreme. Thus, when men threw off their allegiance to the 

 hierarchy of Rome, the division of sects became endless, 

 and each sect pronounced its own way to be the exclusive 

 path to salvation. They agreed only in abusing the stand- 

 ard they had deserted and reviling one another ; and many 

 conscientious men, puzzled as to choice of faiths, and tired of 

 vacillation, were glad to return and repose themselves on the 

 bosom of a supposed infallible mother. It has been with phi- 

 losophy and science as with religion. The chair of Aristotle, 

 like that of St. Peter, long thundered forth its dictates to the 



