Κρύσταλλον φαέθοντα διαυγέα λάζεο χερσί, ORPHEUS. Lithica. Now, if the bold but pious thought be thine, Not long the gods thy ardent wish refuse. INTRODUCTION. Sect. 1.-Of the Classificatory Sciences. HE horizon of the sciences spreads wider and wider survey of the vast domain. We have seen that the existence of Chemistry as a science which declares the ingredients and essential constitution of all kinds of bodies, implies the existence of another corresponding science, which shall divide bodies into kinds, and point out steadily and precisely what bodies they are which we have analysed. But a science thus dividing and defining bodies, is but one member of an order of sciences, different from those which we have hitherto described; namely, of the classificatory sciences. Such sciences there must be, not only having reference to the bodies with which chemistry deals, but also to all things respecting which we aspire to obtain any general knowledge, as, for instance, plants and animals. Indeed it will be found, that it is with regard to these latter objects, to organized beings, that the process of scientific classification has been most successfully exercised; while with regard to inorganic substances, the formation of a satisfactory system of arrangement has been found extremely difficult; nor has the necessity of such a system been recognized by chemists so distinctly and constantly as it ought to be. The best exemplifications of these branches of knowledge, of which we now have to speak, will, therefore, be found in the organic world, in Botany and Zoology; but we will, in the first place, take a brief view of the science which classifies inorganic bodies, and of which Mineralogy is hitherto the very imperfect representative. The principles and rules of the Classificatory Sciences, as well as of those of the other orders of sciences, must be fully explained when we come to treat of the Philosophy of the Sciences; and cannot be introduced here, where we have to do with history only. But I may observe very briefly, that with the process of classing, is joined the process of naming;— that names imply classification;-and that even the rudest and earliest application of language presupposes a distribution of objects according to their kinds;but that such a spontaneous and unsystematic distribution cannot, in the cases we now have to consider, answer the purposes of exact and general knowledge. Our classification of objects must be made consistent and systematic, in order to be scientific; we must discover marks and characters, properties and conditions, which are constant in their occurrence and relations; we must form our classes, we must impose our names, according to such marks. We can thus, and thus alone, arrive at that precise, certain, and systematic knowledge, which we seek; that is, at science. The object, then, of the classificatory sciences is to obtain FIXED CHARACTERS of the kinds of things; and the criterion of the fitness of names is, that THEY MAKE GENERAL PROPOSITIONS POSSIBLE. I proceed to review the progress of certain sciences on these principles, and first, though briefly, the science of Mineralogy. Sect. 2.-Of Mineralogy as the Analytico-classificatory Science. MINERALOGY, as it has hitherto been cultivated, is, as I have already said, an imperfect representative of the department of human knowledge to which it belongs. The attempts at the science have generally been made by collecting various kinds of information respecting mineral bodies; but the science which we require is a complete and consistent classified system of all inorganic bodies. For chemistry proceeds upon the principle that the constitution of a body invariably determines its properties; and, consequently, its kind: but we cannot apply this principle, except we can speak with precision of the kind of a body, as well as |