1813.] upon Werner's Mineralogical Method. 24B 



either in literature or science. Though chemistry and mine- 

 ralogy have been much more generally cultivated io Germany 

 than in any other country, and though during the last 35 years 

 they have undergone a Complete revolutioUj he affirms that not 

 a single philosophical idea has been furnished by a German^ 

 v/hile the whole philosophy of chemistry and mineralogy is due 

 to the French* 



The Reflections of Mr. Chenevix consist of three distinct 

 parts: 1* A discussion respecting mineral species, in which the 

 ahsiirdity of the Wernerian method is exposed, and the immense 

 superiority of the system of Haiiy stated and descanted on. 

 2. An examination of the descriptive language of Werner, m 

 v^hich its defects, inaccuracies, and inelegancies, are enlarged 

 upon, and exposed to ridicule. Mr. Chenevix allows that it 

 answers welL enough to distinguish minerals from each other; 

 hut he contends that it is too easy, and too unphilosophical, to 

 be adopted by a man of science, and that it is fit only for miners^ 

 find persons destitute of education. 3. A critique^ or rather an 

 invective, against the German mode of teaching, German litera- 

 ture, and German literati ; and a comparison of the state of 

 philosophy in Britain, France^ and Germany. — Let us take a 

 view of each of these topics in the order presented by Mr. Che-^ 

 nevix. 



I. It is somewhat singular that though Mr. Chenevix studied 

 mineralogy, as he informs us, for 18 months at Freyberg, and of 

 course must have heard the principles of the Wernerian method 

 detailed by Werner himself, yet all the knowledge of it, which 

 he seems to possess^ he obtained from the writings of D'Au- 

 buisson and Brochant^ two French mineralogists; the first of 

 whom wrote the essay, which Chenevix quotes, while he was 

 attending Werner for the first time ; and Brochant published his 

 system of mineralogy without having had the previous advantage 

 of studying at Freyberg at all. Mr. Chenevix quotes the follow- 

 ing passage from D'Aubuisson, on which he builds a great part 

 of his reasoning 



All minerals which have essentially the same constituent 

 parts, both in res{)ect of quality and quantity, form the same 

 species ; and all those which differ essentially belong to differeot 

 species. If different minerals in the same species having the 

 same characters respectively (one character excepted)^ differ 

 from other minerals by two or thfee characters (a greater number 

 would occasion a difference in species), they form a distinct 

 subspecies. When an individual in a species or subspecies has 

 only character different, it forms a variety.^* 



On this quotation Mr. Chetievix descants at considerable 

 length. He shows that it is improper to assume the number of 

 different characters as the base of classification^ without aiiy 



a 2 



