ON THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE SYSTEM.

A natural system is, as the immortal Linnaeus already warned, the ultimate goal of Botany. Many followers of this great man, however, seem to consider it in such a way that it would always remain among pious wishes; at the very least, not a few have judged any attempt at such a construction to be rash. But now I hope it is agreed by all that any artificial method whatsoever does not in any way satisfy the true purpose of science, but is merely a shallow, or even pernicious A full comparison of both methods of arrangement would exceed our limits too much. Decandolle has expounded this most elegantly. Arguments usually recited regarding the difficulty of the Natural System contradict the truth. Beginners acquire a certain knowledge of plants more easily according to natural orders than from the sexual system. It is true that they do not perceive the natural system, but the natural orders lead to its knowledge. Nor is it uncertain, because the place of many forms in the artificial system wavers, and in this one the greatest confusion arises from a defect of parts, etc. compendium, remote from all essential study. On the contrary, the natural system, regarding all parts and their more sublime reason, contains the explanation within itself and binds physiological study most closely. Natural orders are indeed only fragments of this, but to their true disposition, the knowledge of all forms, as...