68 HISTORY OF BOTANY. 



tion of the flower, and their orders he ascertained by the fruit. His 

 system of reform principally consisted of the following points and 

 topics : 



He divided all the plants, which were known to him, from the qua- 

 lity of the flower (corolla;) into classes, which his predecessors had 

 limited by the fruit, and these classes he subdivided into orders. He 

 arranged the genera by solid, distinfclive marks, which he borrowed of 

 the fruit; gave them fixed generical names, and placed the species, with 

 their manifold variations, under the genera*. Thus, when the lovers 

 and professors of botany met with a flower or plant unknown to them, 

 the guidance of this system enabled them to get acquainted with the 

 class by the strufture of the flower, with the order by the quality of 

 the fruit, and by the examination of both fruit and flower with the 

 species. This classification was of infinite service, in affording uncom- 

 mon aid to the memory and judgment t. His system also remained in 

 general acceptance to the time of LiNNiEus; and many learned men 

 took pains to mend its defefts. 



While TouRNEFORT was still dignified with the title of the oracle of 

 botany, one of his pupils made himself conspicuous by his heterodox in- 

 genuity. Too soon, however, was he torn from the lap of the sciences 

 to have erefted himself a throne upon the ruins of that of his master. 



* See Reformatio Botankes, Linr^o froposita a ]. M. Refteho, 1762; In Amoenl' 

 tal. Acad. vol. vi. page 306. 



f The work which contains this system, is the master-piece of Tournefort, entituled 

 Elemens de Bo/anique, ou Methode pour connoiire les Plants. Paris, 1694, three vols, oftavo, 

 and rendered afterwards more complete, under the title of InstUutiones rei Herbaria. 

 Paris, ijoo, three vols, quarto. 



This 



