74 
GENERAL AURANGEMENT. 
GENEEAL AEEANGEMENT OF THE CONTENTS OF 
THE MUSEUM. 
Use of the NATURAL HISTORY is an old term, used to describe the study 
m^ory^ ^ of processes or laws of the Universe, and the results 
of the action of those processes or laws upon such of the 
materials of which it is composed as are independent of the 
agency of man. 
It is thus contrasted with the history of Man and his works, 
and the changes which have been wrought in the Universe by 
his intervention. 
This distinction afforded a convenient and rational basis for 
the division of the numerous and multifarious objects collected 
together in the old building of the Museum at Bloom sbury. 
When it was decided, for the reasons mentioned above, to effect 
a separation of the collections, those that were purely the 
products of what are commonly called " natural " forces were 
removed to the new building at South Kensington, while those 
showing the effects of Man's handiwork remained at Blooms- 
bury. Like most others of the kind, this distinction cannot 
be applied too rigidly. Such lines of demarcation almost 
always overlap. For instance, examples of modification of 
animal or plant structure under Man's influence legitimately 
find a place in a Museum of Natural History, especially as 
they may afford illustrations of the mode of working of natural 
laws. Prehistoric stone implements, again, are shown in the 
Geological Department, in order to illustrate the co-existence 
of Man with extinct Mammals. 
Processes or laws cannot, however, be satisfactorily demon- 
strated in a museum ; therefore such branches of knowledge as 
deal cliiefly with these, as Astronomy, Physics, Geology (in 
the stricter sense of the word), and the experimental sciences, 
