HISTORY OF BOT1NY. 
287 
terminated only with his life. Before his time the art of de- 
scribing plants with precision and accuracy was unknown ; 
but his descriptions were neither faulty from superfluous terms, 
nor from the omission of important circumstances. lie was the 
first who proposed to divide plants into classes. 
Ocesalpinus, a native of Florence, who was contemporary 
with Clusius, proposed to form species into classes. The char- 
acters which ho employed for this purpose, were the duration 
and size of plants, presence or absence of flowers, the situation 
ofl the seed, the number of cells in the fruit, and the number of 
seeds which they contained, the adherence of the calyx to the 
germ, and the nature of the root, whether bulbous or fibrous. 
This method was too imperfect to be followed, having neither 
the simplicity or the unity to render its application useful. 
John Bauhin, though younger than Gesner, was his friend 
and pupil; he composed a general history of plants; this was 
a work evincing great learning and accurate investigation. Gas- 
pard Bauhin, the younger brother, no less active and learned, 
and endowed with a still more penetrating genius, conceived the 
design of a work which should contain a history of all known 
plants, together with the different names which other writers 
had applied to the same plant. Clusius and the elder Bauhin 
had imagined something like a genus of plants, formed by a 
group of similar species, but Gaspard Bauhin expressed this 
more decidedly in remarks upon generic distinctions; his work, 
which was the result of forty years’ labour, is said to have been 
of great assistance to Linnaeus, in perfecting our present system 
of botany. 
The 17th century, in its commencement, was not favorable 
to the sciences. Europe was agitated by continual wars, and 
the arts of peace were neglected ; but in the last part of that 
age, the taste for natural history revived ; men of highly gifted 
minds applied themselves to the study of botany, and many un- 
dertook long voyages with the only design of examining foreign 
plants. Botanists were astonished with the great number of in- 
teresting plants discovered by travellers in the region of South 
Africa, around the Cape of Good Hope, and in the East India 
Islands. 
At this period the plants of our own country began to excite 
the curiosity of scientific Europeans. Among the number of 
voyagers to America, was a Roman Catholic priest, Plunder, 
celebrated for his mathematical and botanical knowledge ; he 
Coesalpinns — characters employed by him in the formation of classes — 
The Bauhins — Commencement of the 17th century not favorable to the 
sciences — Last part of that age, taste for Natural History revived. 
