The treasury of natural history ; or, a popular dictionary of animated nature ... To which are added, a syllabus of practical taxidermy, etc / [Samuel Maunder].

  • Maunder, Samuel, 1785-1849
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The treasury of natural history ; or, a popular dictionary of animated nature ... To which are added, a syllabus of practical taxidermy, etc / [Samuel Maunder]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    19/846
    kindly furnished me. The Engravings are in Mr. R. Branston’s best manner, and will no doubt be properly appreciated. I shall now proceed to give a Systematic Classification of the principal contents of this volume, a mode which, 1 trust, will be found at once simple and scientific, and calculated to remove any objection that might be urged against my adoption of the alphabetical arrangement in the body of the Work. As Cuvier has remarked, “ there can only be one perfect method, which is the natural method. An arrangement is thus named in which beings of the same genus are placed nearer to each other than to those of all other genera ; the genera of the same order nearer than to those of other orders ; and so in succession. This method is the ideal to which Natural History should tend ; for it is evident that, if we can attain it, we shall have the exact and complete expression of all nature. In fact, each being is determined by its resemblance to others, and its differences ftnm them; and all these relations would be fully given by the arrangement which we have indicated. In a word, the natural method would be the whole science, and each step towards it tends to advance the science to perfection.” * * “ When the Almighty Creator willed to bring into existence this mundane system, lie -formed it according to a preconcerted plan, with ; all its parts beaiitirully linked together and mu- ■ tually corresponding. ‘All thiiijjs were ordered , in measure, and number, and weight.' [Wisdom, : xi. 20.] There was nothing dehcient, nothing ; superfluous; but the whole, in tlie strictest : sense, ‘was very good,’ [Genes, i. 31.] and cal- i culated in the nigliest degree to answer the I purpose of its Great Author. I call it a sys- ■ tem of Correlation, because there is discernible . in it, in tlie first place, a concatenation of its parts, by which, as to tlieir forms and uses, ob- ■ jects are linked together in groups by a chain , of afiSnities; so tliat we pass from one to tlie : other by gentle gradations, witliout liaving to 1 overleap any wide interval. We see also a ' gradual ascent from low to liigli, from less to more excellent. And this leads us to anotlier kind of relationship between natural objects, by which, though placed in distinct groups or in a different senes, they in some sort represent and symbolize eacli other. Examples of tliis rela- tionship by analogy are to be found in every kingdom of nature, and often form an ascend- ing series from tlie lowest to tlie highest; for, as we shall see hereafter, these resemblances appear to maintain a certain correspondence with each other as to their relative situations; so that, for instance, in the animal kingdom they ascend step by step, without being linked by affinity or having any real juxtaposition, from the lowest groups, towards man, who stands alone at the head, or in the centre of all.” — Kirby and Spence’s Introduction to Entomology, vol. iv.