ANECDOTES. 281 



" ample of his pupil Forskal before his eyes, who immediately after 

 « his return from Goettingen, saw himself involved in so many theolo- 

 « gical disputes, as would, perhaps, have been carried too far, had he 

 « not left the field of litigation, by setting out on his voyage to 

 « Arabia. 



« LiNNiEUS knew how to secure to himself, even in his earlier days, 

 « that dominion over the three reigns of nature, which he preserved 

 " till death. 



" In mineralogy his very countrymen entered the lists of contention. 

 *' against him. He certainly was often attacked and censured with in- 

 " justice ; and the little inaccuracies, which will never fail to exist in, 

 « works of that importance, ought to have been palliated and over- 

 " looked, on account of the other great merits of their author. It is, 

 " however, an incontrovertible fa£l, that he first introduced systematic 

 " regularity in the mineral reign. He formed the classes, and detcr- 

 " mined the genera and species by regular distinftive marks, which he 

 " derived from the external appearance. Thus mineralogy became a 

 " regular science, after it had formerly been but a chaos created by the 

 " miners, who used to discriminate the minerals partly by praftice and 

 " partly by fire. Linn-eus having once left the mines, having no la- 

 « boratory, and being over-burdened by a multiplicity of other occu- 

 " pations, discontinued to exert himself so much in mineralogy. His 

 " system is however excellent, his hypothesis the fruit of the ripest 

 " refle6lion, his description of the species are excellent, and his obser- 

 « vations truly important. In spite of all attacks, his name will likc- 

 ^' wise be handed down in this science to the latest posterity. 



o o 



" The 



