23S REMARKABLE OCCURRENCES 



LiNN-€us gave even so late as 1772, a fine proof of the lasting vi- 

 gour of iiis genius, wiiich encompassed all nature ; and at the same time 

 of that liveliness of fancy which heightened the charms of his ideas. 

 When he resigned o,n the 14th of December his fun&ions of Re&or 

 of the University, which he had thrice exercised, he made an oration 

 on the delights of nature, (Dclicice Naturce). He had composed this 

 oration in a short time, though overwhelmed with a variety of other 

 important business. The whole academical forum found it so beauti- 

 ful, that the students of all the Swedish provinces sent deputies to him 

 on the next day to intreat him to translate it into the Swedish tongue 

 from the Latin. This was the fifth public oration of Linnaeus, the 

 first he made when he resigned his office as president of the Royal 

 Academy at Stockholm; the second he delivered in 1741, the third in 

 1743, and the fourth in presence of the Royal Family of Sweden in 

 1759. He was no professed orator; but his language was that of 

 nature and truth. Without displaying the embellishments and the art 

 of a Cicero or a Demosthenes this oration also captivated by its 

 simplicity and energy, and occasioned rapturous admiration. As in 

 his writings and in the professorial chair, so was he in his speeches, 

 that systematic man, who concatenated phrase with phrase, and showed 

 plainly the progressive course of his ideas. Nothing but death could 

 dissolve his love and fondness of science, and his desire of obtaining 

 the most minute knowledge of nature. In 1773 he wrote the follow- 

 ing letter to Mr. Pennant, the celebrated British Zoologist at Lon- 



in adojersauos^famae ejus insidlantes, expertus sum in eo ammum placabilem, et i^quum m 

 itn'i'versum de aliorum meritis judicium, ut -vel iniquissimus vel morosissimus censor hxc au- 

 diens, in amor em ejus raferetur neceise esset.—MvKKAy in his Preface to the Sy sterna Vege- 

 labilium. 



don^ 



