sense. After, indeed, Linne, by his invention of generic and
specific names, had made classification possible, and by his own
enormous labours had shown how much could be done when once a
method was established, the science has grown rapidly enough. But
before him little or nothing had been put into form definite enough
to allure those who (as the many always will) prefer to profit by
others' discoveries, than to discover for themselves; and Natural
History was attractive only to a few earnest seekers, who found too
much trouble in disencumbering their own minds of the dreams of
bygone generations (whether facts, like cockatrices, basilisks, and
krakens, the breeding of bees out of a dead ox, and of geese from
barnacles; or theories, like those of elements, the VIS PLASTRIX in
Nature, animal spirits, and the other musty heirlooms of
Aristotleism and Neo-platonism), to try to make a science popular,
which as yet was not even a science at all. Honour to them,
nevertheless. Honour to Ray and his illustrious contemporaries in
Holland and France. Honour to Seba and Aldrovandus; to Pomet, with
his "Historie of Drugges;" even to the ingenious Don Saltero, and
his tavern-museum in Cheyne Walk. Where all was chaos, every man
was useful who could contribute a single spot of organized standing
ground in the shape of a fact or a specimen. But it is a question
whether Natural History would have ever attained its present
honours, had not Geology arisen, to connect every other branch of
Natural History with problems as vast and awful as they are
captivating to the imagination. Nay, the very opposition with
which Geology met was of as great benefit to the sister sciences as
to itself. For, when questions belonging to the most sacred
hereditary beliefs of Christendom were supposed to be affected by
the verification of a fossil shell, or the proving that the
Maestricht "homo diluvii testis" was, after all, a monstrous eft,