134 The American Naturalist. [February, 
EDITORIALS. 
EDITORS, E. D. COPE, AND J. S. KINGSLEY. 
—Boranists are waking up to the fact that they have too long 
neglected to conform to the law of priority in nomenclature. The 
return to older names of genera, species, etc., produces temporary 
inconvenience, but it is in the interest of stability, which is the funda- 
mental condition of convenience in this matter. Persons who are 
accustomed to use certain names find it difficult to change them, and 
endeavor to make exceptions to the general rule, as some leading bot- 
anists are now proposing. But the sooner a clearing up of the whole 
matter is made the shorter will be the diseomfort, for the law of pri- 
ority is fundamental and must be supported under all circumstances 
that fall within the scope of nomenclature. 
It is evident, however, that in cases which violate other laws of — 
nomenclature, the law of priority has no application. Such are typo- 
_ graphic and orthographic errors ; also terms which cannot be given a 
Latin or Greek form: Such rules are the conditions of ordinary schol- 
arship. There is another rule which belongs to scientific scholarship 
which has been hitherto respected, but which a small number of 
American zoologists are endeavoring ‘to set aside. This is, that no 
name or term is available for scientific use which has not been accom- 
panied by a definition prior to the publication of any other name for 
the same thing published with a description. So self-evident is the 
necessity of this rule that it has been adopted without exception by all 
scientific societies and committees in all countries which have proposed 
or revised laws of nomenclature. The primary element in all exact 
language is the definition of terms, and to omit this condition from 
scientific nomenclature is to abandon science and to go into literature, 
if mere word-making can be dignified by:such a title. When we 
remember what a passion this word-making becomes in some persons, 
it is clear that science must have some protection from it. The only 
_ way that this protection may be had is to demand a raison detre for 
every name that is proposed. The student then knows with what he 
has to deal, and the proposer places himself on record in an available 
form. The abuses of the neglect of this rule are self-evident, since it 
lays the sciences open to charlatanism and to pretence of every i 
tion, and makes scientific literature of the catalogues of the showman z 
and the salesman. 
