MEETINGS OF SOCIETIES. 4I 
guishing mark, not of an individual, but ot all objects of the same 
kind. The flowers of the field and of the garden were arranged 
into groups or kinds long before there was a science of Botany— 
a tact which is sufficiently attested by the existence in our lan- 
guage of such names as daisy, buttercup, rose, lily, and so forth. 
In like manner the name oak, ash, fir, palm, &c., bear witness 
that the trees also were grouped and classified according to their 
kind, and if we turn to the animal kingdom we find that the same 
process has been going on there anterior to, and altogether inde- 
pendent ot, any notion of a science of Zoology. Take for example 
such names as ox, sheep, horse, dog, lion, each a general name 
for all animals of the same species. Nor was this instinctive 
grouping confined to the arranging of things into species or lowest 
kinds; the process, though loosely and unsystematically, was car- 
ried upward by combining species into larger groups, and then 
again into still larger, till the widest possible was reached. This 
will be sufficiently evident if we compare the meaning of the 
words—palm, tree, vegetable, thing, or of these—tiger, beast-of- 
prey, animal, living-creature, being. Enough has been said, how- 
ever, to show that the process of classification, which is one of the 
main functions of science, is also the most essential feature of 
ordinary knowledge, and that its results have been embodied in the 
language of every-day life. But though this is true and well 
worthy of being noted, there is a wide difference between such 
classification and that which is effected by the man of science. In 
the first place the classification of natural objects by ordinary men 
is for the most part spontaneous and instinctive—a natural growth 
rather than the result of a conscious purpose. 
“ Hence men generally have classified objects in a loose, super- 
ficial way, and by means of the most obvious and striking resem- 
blances. On this point Professor Hentrey in his course of Botany 
says:—‘ But there is a great difference practically between the 
kinds of things accepted in the ordinary affairs ot life and the 
kinds admitted in science, more especially in Biological science . . 
The notion of a genus like that of a species, is not only common 
to all departments of human knowledge, but is also existent in the 
language of common life in its special natural history sense, only 
requiring for scientific purposes to be more strictly defined. In 
every language we find genevic names applied to plants, such as 
willow, rose, violet, and a hundred others, each of which terms is 
indicative of a group or kinds or species, more or less extensive 
in different cases, corresponding exactly in its logical value to the 
genus of the botanist. Some of these groups are characterised by 
very striking peculiarities, sothat even the genera of vulgar lan- 
guage corresponded very nearly with those of the botanist; but 
in the generality of cases the popular collective names are applied 
on superficial grounds of resemblance, and include widely diverse 
species. For example, the term violet is made to bind together 
not merely the common scented and other true violets, but the 
Dane’s violet (Hesperis), a plant of the cabbage family, the Cala- 
thian violet (Gentiana Pneumonanthe), a true and characteristic Gen- 
tian, the dog’s tooth violet (Evythvomum Dens-Canis), a plant of the 
lily tamily, &c. ; while the term rose is extended from true roses to 
Oisti, or rock-roses, rhododendrons, Alpine roses, &c. It is ob- 
vious here that there can be no near ‘blood relationship,’ if we 
