330 CHAPTER 25. 
Swede, which is now fo univerfally followed. 
Of the rife and progrefs of this inveftigation^ 
I proceed to give a concife account, before 
I pisrfue the Iketch of Brittjh authors. 
A vague and indecifive opinion concern- 
ing the fexes of plants, prevailed among the 
antient philofophers of Greece. We are in- 
formed by Aristotle, that Empedo- 
CLES particularly taught, that the fexes 
*^ were united in plants." This opinion 
was a natural confequence of the doilrine 
which this philofopher, in common with 
Anaxagoras, Democritus, and Pla- 
to taught, that plants were fentient and 
" animated beings.'* This idea has met 
with, ingenious advocates among the mo- 
derns, who have been induced to favour it, 
not only from the general analogy exifting 
between animals and vegetables, and the 
difficulty of fixing the limits between them, 
but from the more ftriking inftances of ap- 
parent irritability, and obedience to the 
adlion of certain Jlimuli: fuch are, the gene- 
ral affedlion plants have for light; the rota- 
tory motion of many towards the fun ; the 
faculty of others in clofing the leaves 
at 
