THE USE OF SYSTEM. 



I may venture to say the only use of what, in Natural History, 

 is called a system, meaning thereby a methodical classification, is, 

 that it may serve as a frame-work or a cabinet, into the par- 

 titions of which many little facts may be stored and dove-tailed, 

 that would otherwise be scattered through the memory at ran- 

 dom, at the great hazard of being lost. The advantage of a 

 system of this kind then consists in its preserving such collec- 

 tions of facts, as a cabinet preserves a collection of specimens; 

 and, provided the several facts be not too far separated from 

 their usual associations, it matters little what other qualities the 

 system possess. Simplicity indeed must always be valuable, and 

 a simple system may be likened to a plain unornamented cabinet, 

 where the specimens hold a prominent place and the cabinet 

 itself is almost overlooked; while a complex system may, in the 

 same way, be likened to a cabinet bedizened with grotesque 

 carving and fretwork, the compartments of which are " curiously 

 cut"* and fantastically arranged, consisting indeed chiefly of 

 empty framework, without a useful fact or an interesting speci- 

 men on which the mind can rest. To the manufacture of such 

 gew-gaw nursery toys, I confess, I am hostile, because I think 

 it is lowering the dignity of philosophy; and she has no dignity 

 to spare for such a purpose, amidst the numerous humiliations 

 which philosophers daily meet with in attempting to fathom what 

 is unfathomable, and to explain what to man is inexplicable in the 

 works of God. 



* Tailor. With a trunk sleeve. 

 Grumio. I confess two sleeves. 

 Tailor. The sleeves curiously cut. 

 Petruchio. Ay, there's the villainy. 

 Grumio. Error i'the bill, Sir; error i'the bill. 



Shakesp. Taming of the Shrew. 



