[1876]


It is my duty to-night to speak about the study of Biology, and while
it may be that there are many of my audience who are quite familiar
with that study, yet as a lecturer of some standing, it would, I know
by experience, be very bad policy on my part to suppose such to be
extensively the case. On the contrary, I must imagine that there are
many of you who would like to know what Biology is; that there are
others who have that amount of information, but would nevertheless
gladly hear why it should be worth their while to study Biology; and
yet others, again, to whom these two points are clear, but who desire
to learn how they had best study it, and, finally, when they had best
study it.

I shall, therefore, address myself to the endeavour to give you some
answer to these four questions--what Biology is; why it should be
studied; how it should be studied; and when it should be studied.

In the first place, in respect to what Biology is, there are, I
believe, some persons who imagine that the term "Biology" is simply a
new-fangled denomination, a neologism in short, for what used to be
known under the title of "Natural History;" but I shall try to show
you, on the contrary, that the word is the expression of the growth of
science during the last 200 years, and came into existence half a
century ago.

At the revival of learning, knowledge was divided into two kinds--the
knowledge of nature and the knowledge of man; for it was the current