254 B O T 
getable world ? Weak and tender in infancy; beautiful 
and ialacious in youth ; grave, robtid, and fruitful, in 
manhood ; and when old age approaches, the head droops, 
the fprings of life dry up, and, in fine, the poor totter¬ 
ing vegetable returns to that dull from whence it fprung. 
3. Molus. — No inanimate body is capable of felf-motion. 
Whatever moves fpontaneoufly is endowed with a living 
principle: for motion depends on the fpontaneous propul- 
iion of humours ; and wherever there is a fpontaneous pro- 
pulfion of humours, there alfo is life. That vegetables 
are capable of motion, is evident from the following fadts: 
plants, when confined within doors, always bend towards 
the light, and fome of them even attempt to make their 
efcape by the windows. The flowers of many plants pur- 
fne the fun from eaft to w ell, rejoicing in his beams. Who 
then can deny that vegetables are poffeffed of living and 
felf-moving powers > 4 Morbus. —The term difeafe means 
nothing more than a certain corruption of life. It is well 
known that vegetables are (object to difeafes as well as 
animals : when over-heated, they turn tliirfty, languifh, 
and fall to the ground ; when too cold, they are tormented 
with the chilblain, and not unfrequently expire-, they are 
fometimes afflicted with cancers; and every plant is infed- 
ed with lice peculiar to its fpecies. 5. Mors. —Death is 
oppofed to life, the former being only a privation of the 
latter. Experience flicvvs, that every living creature mult 
die. But as vegetables are daily cut off by internal dif¬ 
eafes and external injuries ; as they are fubjedt to death 
from the attacks of hunger, third, heat, cold, &c. with 
w hat propriety could vegetables be thus faid to die, unlefs 
we allow that they previoully lived? 6. Anatomia .— Under 
this head Linnieus refers to Malpighius and Grew, for fhe 
organic fibres, membranes, canals, velicles, See. of plants, 
as additional proofs of their living powers. 7. Organizatio. 
—Vegetables not only propel humours, but alio prepare 
and fecern a number of different juices for the fruit, the 
neiStar, See. analogous to the various fecretions in animal 
bodies. From thefe fadts and obfervations Linnaeus con¬ 
cludes, that plants are unquedionably endowed with life 
as well as animals ; and then proceeds in the follow ing 
manner to (hew how thefe animated vegetables propagate 
their fpecies. 
After difeuffing the long exploded dodfrine of equivocal 
generation, he lays hold of another maxim of Dr. Harvey, 
viz. Omne vivum ex ovo. — It being fully evident, (fays lie,) 
from the foregoing chain of reafoning, that vegetables are 
endowed with life, it neceffarily follows, agreeable to this 
maxim of Harvey, that every vegetable mud in like man¬ 
ner derive its exiflence from an egg. But, as vegetables 
proceed Irom eggs, and as it is the didinguidiing property 
of an egg to give birth to a being fimilar to that which 
produced it, the feeds mud of courfe be the eggs of vege¬ 
tables. Granting then that the feeds of vegetables are in¬ 
tended by nature to anl'wer the fame end as the eggs of 
animals, and confidering at the fame time that no egg can 
be fecundated without receiving an impregnation from the 
male, it follows, that the feeds or eggs of vegetables can¬ 
not be fecundated by any other means. Hence the necef- 
flty of vegetables being provided with organs of generation. 
But w here are thefe organs fituated ? The anfwer is eafy : 
We have already found impregnated feeds w ithin the flow¬ 
ers of plants; and it is natural to expeT that the genitalia 
fhould not be at a greater didance. Now, as copulation 
always precedes birth, and every flower precedes the fruit, 
the generating faculty mud be aferibed to the flower, and 
the birth to the fruit. Again, as the anthene and dig¬ 
mata are the only effential parts of flowers, thefe parts mud 
neceffarily be the organs of generation. 
Being thus far advanced, Linnaeus affirms, that the an¬ 
therae are the tcjles, and that the pollen performs the office 
of tHe male femen. Thefe affirmations he endeavours to 
edablilh by the following arguments: 1. Prcecedcntia. — 
The antherae, or vegetable tedes, always precede the fruit; 
and, as Icon as the antherae come to maturity, which con- 
dantly happens before the maturity of the fruit, they con- 
A N Y. 
tinue to throw out their pollen as long as the flower lads j 
but decay and fall off whenever the fruit comes to perfect 
tion. 2. Situs. —The antherae of all plants are uniformly 
fituated in fitch a manner that the pollen may with the 
greated facility fall upon the (ligma, or female organ. 3. 
Tempus. —The antherae and digma always flourifh at the 
fame time. 4. Loculamcnta. —When the antherae are dif¬ 
fered, they difeover as great a variety of drudture as the 
pericarpia or feed capfules: for fome of them have one 
cell, as the mercury; fome two, as the hellebore, &c. 
5. Cajtratio. —If all the antherae be cut od' from an herma¬ 
phrodite plant, jud before the flowers begin to expand, 
taking care at the fame time that no plant of the fame fpe¬ 
cies grow near it, the fruit will either prove entirely abor¬ 
tive, or produce barren feeds. 6. Figura. —When the 
pollen of different plants is examined by the nvicrofcope, 
it exhibits as great a variety of figures as is difeoverabie 
in the feeds themfelves. The accumulated force of thefe 
arguments, (concludes Linnaeus,) amounts to a full de- 
mondration that the antherae are the tedes, and that the 
pollen is the femen or genitura of vegetables. 
The male organ being thus invedigated, he imagines, 
that none will hefitate to pronounce the digma tO' be the 
female organ, efpecially when the following obfervations 
are diffidently attended to. The pidillum is compoled of 
the germen, dylus, and digma. The germen, being only 
a kind of rudiment of the future feetus or feed, ceafes to 
exid as foon as the flower comes to maturity. Neither is 
the dylus an effential part, as many flowers have no dylus. 
But no fruit ever comes to maturity without the affidance 
of the digma. It follows, that the digma mud be the fe¬ 
male organ adapted by nature for the reception of the pol¬ 
len or impregnating fubdance. This will appear dill clearer 
from the following chain of reafoning. 1. Situs. —The 
digmata are always fituated (0 that the pollen may with 
mod eafe fall upon them. Befides, it is remarkable, that 
in mod plants (though not in all) the number ot the dig¬ 
mata exactly correfponds with the loculamenta or cells of 
the pericarpium. 2. Dccidentia. —The digmata of mod 
plants, like the antherae, decay and fall off as foon as they 
have dilcharged their proper function ; which evidently 
diews, that their office is not to ripen the fruit, but folely 
to anlwer the important purpofe of impregnation. 3. Ab~ 
fcijjio. —The argument here is precifely the fame with the 
cadratiotv of the antherae ; and the ref u It is likevvife the 
fame, namely, the dedruflion of the fruit. Thefe argu¬ 
ments (concludes Linnaeus) are diffident to demondrate, 
that the digma is the female organ ot generation, or that 
organ which is fuited for the reception and conveyance ot 
the femen to the vegetable eggs. Hence plants may be 
faid to be in adu veneris, when the antherae or tedicivli 
fpread their pollen over the digma or female vulva. 
To Anew how the coitus of vegetables is effected, is the 
next object of invedigation. He affirms, that the pollen 
is conveyed, by means of the wind or inlects, to the moid 
digma, where it remains until it-difeharges a fubtile fluid, 
which being abforbed by the veffels of the digma, is car¬ 
ried to the feeds or ova, and impregnates them. His proofs 
are taken from the following particulars. 1. Oculus. — 
When the flowers are in full blow, and the pollen flying 
about, every one may then fee the pollen adhering to the 
digma. This he illudrates by mentioning as examples the 
tricoloured violet, flower-de-luce, bell-flower, &c. 2. Pro~ 
fortio. —The ftamina and piflilla, in mod plants, are of 
equal heights, that the pollen, by the intervention, of the 
wind, may, with the greater facility, fall upon the digma. 
3. Locus. —The (lamina of mod plants furround the pidil-. 
lum, to give the pollen an opportunity of tailing upon the 
digma at every breeze of wind. 4. Tempus. — It is alio re¬ 
markable that the damina and piffilla condantly appear at 
the fame time. 5. Pluvioe. —The flowers of mod plants 
expand by the heat of the fun, and (hut themfelves up. in 
the evening, or in rainy weather. The final caule of this 
mud be to keep the moidure from the pollen, led it diould 
• be thereby coagulated, and of courfe prevented from being 
blown 
