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164
Glaucus; Or, The Wonders of the Shore
·
Charles Kingsley
10
Moreover,
Natural
History,
if
not
fifty
years
ago,
certainly
a
hundred
years
ago,
was
hardly
worthy
of
men
of
practical
common
sense.
After,
indeed,
Linné,
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.
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