OPPONENTS OF LINN^US. 



121 



soon made every sentiment of amity vanish. Even in the year 1737? 

 his critical zeal brought forth a very violent pamphlet against Lin. 

 N^us, which contained few arguments, but a most copious deal of 

 nonsense and ribaldry*. He combated in this work the New Sexual 

 System of Linn ^ us in a manner peculiar to himself. LinnjEus had 

 maintained in this system — that in the animal as well as in the vege- 

 table reign, there were frequently several males to one female : — 

 plures mariti ; una fxmina in eodem thalamo. — " What man in the 

 *« world," declaims Siegesbeck against this well-expressed propo- 

 sition, — " will ever believe that God Almighty should have introduced 

 « such confusion, or rather such shameful whoredom for the propagation 

 « of the reign of plants. Who would instruft young students in such a 

 « voluptuous system without scandal t?" 



Linn-eus having obtained a copy of this invidious produQion, com- 

 plained of it in a letter to Haller, in the following satyrical ex- 

 pressions: " I wish to God, SiEGESEECK had written those things be- 

 « fore I published my first treatise ! I would then have learned in my 

 *« youth, what I must now learn in my manhood, namely, not to write, 

 <* to hear others and be silent myself. What could induce me to be 

 « so foolish as to bestow so much time, so many days and nights upon 

 a science, to reap such fruits — to berome after all the derision of the 

 « world! Siegesbeck aflFords no arguments; his whole book is one un- 

 " interrpted strain of declamation. Whether I answer or am silent, 



» Botanosophiae Verioris Sciographia ; cui accedit ob argumenti analogiam Epicrisis in 

 Linnaei Systema Plantarum, &c. Petrop. 410. 



f Ecquis vero unquam credet, tales confusiones, vel si mavis scortationes quasi detestabiles 

 in Regno Vegetabili ad propagationem a D. O, M. esse subordinatas ? Ecquis Methodum 

 Ulem lascivam studiosae juventuti sine ofFensa potent aperire ? 



R « both 



