192 
JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
but, like Servetus later, he paid the penalty, and was burnt to 
death. 
The discovery of America gave a death-blow to the then orthodox 
views, and the belief in what has been called patristic ethnology 
was rudely shattered. But still progress was slow. The world 
had yet to learn, as it still has to learn, that the reign of truth is 
the reign of concord amongst mankind ; that where truth reigns no 
disputes or discussions are possible, that every scientific question 
ought to be examined, even those which are most superstitious and 
most false, so as to recognize their just value, and to guard against 
being deceived by them.*" 1 
In 1721 Fabricius published his Dissert atio Critica de Hominibus, 
of which a second edition was issued seventeen years later, a re- 
markable book, not only on account of the curious information it 
contains, but as marking an epoch in the history of Anthropology. 
Strange to say, that although between the publication of the two 
editions of this work, Linnaeus had sent forth his Systema Naturce, 
Fabricius takes no notice whatever of it, and still continues his 
former argument, which was that universally believed up to the 
time of Linnaeus, that man was a being per se, "the chef tVoeuvre 
of creation, and to be studied only by physicians." t Linnaeus 
compelled naturalists to accept man as a species, or genus, by 
putting him at the head of the animal world. From the time of 
Linnaeus then it may be said that Anthropology dates. " Its 
object is the study of man as a species. It abandons the material 
individual to philosophy and medicine, the intellectual and moral 
individual to philosophy and theology." \ 
In spite of the censures of Blumenbach, Buffon, and others (and 
he had really done little to deserve them), Linnaeus was not to be 
driven from the position he had taken up, and in 1746 he states 
his opinions more strongly, and writes : 
" ]STo one has any right to be angry with me if I think fit to 
enumerate man amongst the quadrupeds. Man is neither a stone, 
nor a plant, but an animal, for such is his way of living and 
moving ; nor is he a worm, for then he would have only one foot ; 
nor an insect, for then he would have antennae ; nor a fish, for he 
has no fins ; nor a bird, for he has no wings. Therefore he is # 
quadruped, has a mouth made like that of other quadrupeds, and 
* Chevreul, quoted in Pouchet : Plurality of the Human Race, p. 9. 
f Topinard. t Quatrefages. 
