Out of the mist and fog of time, the name of Aristotle looms up
large. It was more than twenty-three hundred years ago that Aristotle
lived. He might have lived yesterday, so distinctively modern was he in
his method and manner of thought. Aristotle was the world's first
scientist. He sought to sift the false from the true--to arrange,
classify and systematize.
Aristotle instituted the first zoological garden that history mentions,
barring that of Noah. He formed the first herbarium, and made a
geological collection that prophesied for Hugh Miller the testimony of
the rocks. Very much of our scientific terminology goes back to
Aristotle.
Aristotle was born in the mountains of Macedonia. His father was a
doctor and belonged to the retinue of King Amyntas. The King had a son
named Philip, who was about the same age as Aristotle.
Some years later, Philip had a son named Alexander, who was somewhat
unruly, and Philip sent a Macedonian cry over to Aristotle, and
Aristotle harkened to the call for help and went over and took charge of
the education of Alexander.
The science of medicine in Aristotle's boyhood was the science of
simples. In surgery the world has progressed, but in medicine, doctors
have progressed most, by consigning to the grave, that tells no tales,
the deadly materia medica.
In Aristotle's childhood, when his father was both guide and physician
to the king, on hunting trips through the mountains, the doctor taught
the boys to recognize sarsaparilla, stramonium, hemlock, hellebore,
sassafras and mandrake. Then Aristotle made a list of all the plants he
knew and wrote down the supposed properties of each.
Before Aristotle was half-grown, both his father and mother died, and he
was cared for by a Mr. and Mrs. Proxenus. This worthy couple would never
have been known to the world were it not for the fact that they
ministered to this orphan boy. Long years afterward he wrote a poem to
their memory, and paid them such a tender, human compliment that their
names have been woven into the very fabric of letters. "They loved each
other, and still had love enough left for me," he says. And we can only
guess whether this man and his wife with hearts illumined by divine
passion, the only thing that yet gladdens the world, ever imagined that
they were supplying an atmosphere in which would bud and blossom one of
the greatest intellects the world has ever known.
It was through the help of Proxenus that Aristotle was enabled to go to
Athens and attend the School of Oratory, of which Plato was dean.
The fine, receptive spirit of this slender youth evidently brought out
from Plato's heart the best that was packed away there.
Aristotle was soon the star scholar. To get much out of school you have
to take much with you when you go there. In one particular, especially,
Aristotle, the country boy from Macedonia, brought much to Plato--and
this was the scientific spirit. Plato's bent was philosophy, poetry,
rhetoric--he was an artist in expression.
"Know thyself," said Socrates, the teacher of Plato.
"Be thyself," said Plato. "Know the world of Nature, of which you are a
part," said Aristotle; "and you will be yourself and know yourself
without thought or effort. The things you see, you are."
Twenty-three years Aristotle and Plato were together, and when they
separated it was on the relative value of science and poetry. "Science
is vital," said Aristotle; "but poetry and rhetoric are incidental." It
was a little like the classic argument still carried on in all
publishing-houses, as to which is the greater: the man who writes the
text or the man who illustrates it.
One is almost tempted to think that Plato's finest product was
Aristotle, just as Sir Humphry Davy's greatest discovery was Michael
Faraday. One fine, earnest, receptive pupil is about all any teacher
should expect in a lifetime, but Plato had at least two, Aristotle and
Theophrastus. And Theophrastus dated his birth from the day he met
Aristotle.
Theo-Phrastus means God's speech, or one who speaks divinely. The boy's
real name was Ferguson. But the name given by Aristotle, who always had
a passion for naming things, stuck, and the world knows this superbly
great man as Theophrastus.
Botany dates from Theophrastus. And Theophrastus it was who wrote that
greatest of acknowledgments, when, in dedicating one of his books, he
expressed his indebtedness in these words: "To Aristotle, the inspirer
of all I am or hope to be."
* * * * *
After Theophrastus' death the science of botany slept for three hundred
years. During this interval was played in Palestine that immortal drama
which so profoundly influenced the world. Twenty-three years after the
birth of Christ, Pliny, the Naturalist, was born.
He was the uncle of his nephew, and it is probable that the younger man
would have been swallowed in oblivion, just as the body of the older one
was covered by the eager ashes of Vesuvius, were it not for the fact
that Pliny the Elder had made the name deathless.
Pliny the Younger was about such a man as Richard Le Gallienne; Pliny
the Elder was like Thomas A. Edison.
At twenty-two, Pliny the Elder was a Captain in the Roman Army doing
service in Germany. Here he made memoranda of the trees, shrubs and
flowers he saw, and compared them with similar objects he knew at home.
"Animal and vegetable life change as you go North and South; from this I
assume that life is largely a matter of temperature and moisture." Thus
wrote this barbaric Roman soldier, who thereby proved he was not so much
of a barbarian after all. When he was twenty-five, his command was
transferred to Africa, and here, in the moments stolen from sleep, he
wrote a work in three volumes on education, entitled, "Studiosus."
In writing the book he got an education--to find out about a thing,
write a book on it. Pliny returned to Rome and began the practise of
law, and developed into a special pleader of marked power. He still held
his commission in the army, and was sent on various diplomatic errands
to Spain, Africa, Germany, Gaul and Greece. If you want things done,
call on a busy man: the man of leisure has no spare time.
Pliny's jottings on natural history very soon resolved themselves into
the most ambitious plan, which up to that time had not been attempted by
man--he would write out and sum up all human knowledge.
The next man to try the same thing was Alexander von Humboldt. We now
have Pliny's "Natural History" in thirty-seven volumes. His other forty
volumes are lost. The first volume of the "Natural History," which was
written last, gives a list of the authors consulted. Aristotle and
Theophrastus take the places of honor, and then follow a score of names
of men whose works have perished and whom we know mostly through what
Pliny says about them. So not only does Pliny write science as he saw
it, but introduces us into a select circle of authors whom otherwise we
would not know. We have the world of Nature, but we would not have this
world of thinkers, were it not for Pliny.
Pliny even quotes Sappho, who loved and sung, and whose poems reached us
only through scattered quotations, as if Emerson's works should perish
and we would revive him through a file of "The Philistine" magazine.
Pliny and Paul were contemporaries. Pliny lived at Rome when Paul lived
there in his own hired house, but Pliny never mentioned him, and
probably never heard of him.
One man was interested in this world, the other in the next.
Pliny begins his great work with a plagiarism on Lyman Abbott, "There is
but one God." The idea that there were many arose out of the thought
that because there were many things, there must be special gods to look
after them: gods of the harvest, gods of the household, gods of the
rain, etc.
There is but one God, says Pliny, and this God manifests Himself in
Nature. Nature and Nature's work are one. This world and all other
worlds we see or can think of are parts of Nature. If there are other
Universes, they are natural; that is to say, a part of Nature. God rules
them all according to laws which He Himself can not violate. It is vain
to supplicate Him, and absurd to worship Him, for to do these things is
to degrade Him with the thought that He is like us. The assumption that
God is very much like us is not complimentary to God.
God can not do an unnatural or a supernatural thing. He can not kill
Himself. He can not make the greater less than the less. He can not make
twice ten anything else than twenty.
He can not make a stick that has but one end. He can not make the past,
future. He can not make one who has lived never to have lived. He can
not make the mortal, immortal; nor the immortal, mortal. He can change
the form of things, but He can not abolish a thing. Pliny preaches the
Unity of the Universe and his religion is the religion of Humanity.
Pliny says:
"We can not injure God, but we can injure man. And as man is part of
Nature or God, the only way to serve God is to benefit man. If we love
God, the way to reveal that love is in our conduct toward our fellows."
Pliny was close upon the Law of the Correlation of Forces, and he almost
got a glimpse of the Law of Attraction or Gravitation. He sensed these
things, but could not prove them. Pliny touched life at an immense
number of points. What he saw, he knew, but when he took things on the
word of Marco Polo and Sir John Mandeville (for these gentlemen
adventurers have always lived), he fell into curious errors. For
instance, he tells of horses in Africa that have wings, and when hard
pressed, fly like birds; of ostriches that give milk, and of elephants
that live on land or sea equally well; of mines where gold is found in
solid masses and the natives dig into it for diamonds.
But outside of these little lapses, Pliny writes sanely and well. Book
Two treats of the crust of the earth, of earthquakes, meteors, volcanoes
(these had a strange fascination for him), islands and upheavals.
Books Three and Four relate of geography and give amusing information
about the shape of the continents and the form of the earth. Then comes
a book on man, his evolution and physical qualities, with a history of
the races.
Next is a book on Zoology, with a resume of all that was written by
Aristotle, and with many corroborations of Thompson-Seton and Rudyard
Kipling. Facts from the "Jungle Book" are here recited at length. Book
Nine is on marine life--sponges, shells and coral insects. Book Ten
treats of birds, and carries the subject further than it had ever been
taken before, even if it does at times contradict John Burroughs. Book
Eleven is on insects, bugs and beetles, and tells, among other things,
of bats that make fires in caves to keep themselves warm. Book Twelve is
on trees, their varieties, height, age, growth, qualities and
distribution. Book Thirteen treats of fruits, juices, gums, wax, saps
and perfumes. Book Fourteen is on grapes and the making of wine, with a
description of the process and the various kinds of wine, their effects
on the human system, with a goodly temperance lesson backed up by
incidents and examples.
Book Fifteen treats of pomegranates, apples, plums, peaches, figs and
various other luscious fruits, and shows much intimate and valuable
knowledge. And so the list runs down through, treating at great length
of bees, fishes, woods, iron, lead, copper, gold, marble, fluids, gases,
rivers, swamps, seas, and a thousand and one things that were familiar
to this marvelous man. But of all subjects, Pliny shows a much greater
love for botany than for anything else. Plants, flowers, vines, trees
and mosses interest him always, and he breaks off other subjects to tell
of some flower that he has just discovered.
Pliny had command of the Roman fleet that was anchored in the bay off
Pompeii, when that city was destroyed in the year Seventy-nine.
Bulwer-Lytton tells the story, with probably a close regard for the
facts. The sailors, obeying Pliny's orders, did their utmost to save
human life, and rescued hundreds. Pliny himself made various trips in a
small boat from the ship to the beach. He was safely on board the
flag-ship, and orders had been given to weigh anchor, when the commander
decided to make one more visit to the perishing city to see if he could
not rescue a few more, and also to get a closer view of Nature in a
tantrum.
He rowed away into the fog. The sailors waited for their beloved
commander, but waited in vain. He had ventured too close to the flowing
lava, and was suffocated by the fumes, a victim to his love for humanity
and his desire for knowledge. So died Pliny the Elder, aged but
fifty-six years.
* * * * *
All children are zoologists, but a botanist appears upon the earth only
at rare intervals.
A Botanist is born--not made. From the time of Pliny, botany performed
the Rip Van Winkle act until John Ray, the son of a blacksmith, appeared
upon the scene in England. In the meantime, Leonardo had classified the
rocks, recorded the birds, counted the animals and written a book of
three thousand pages on the horse. Leonardo dissected many plants, but
later fell back upon the rose for decorative purposes.
John Ray was born in Sixteen Hundred Twenty-eight near Braintree in
Essex. Now, as to genius--no blacksmith-shop is safe from it. We know
where to find ginseng, but genius is the secret of God.
A blacksmith's helper by day, this aproned lad with sooty face dreamed
dreams. Evenings he studied Greek with the village parson. They read
Aristotle and Theophrastus.
Have a care there, you Macedonian miscreant, dead two thousand years,
you are turning this boy's head!
John Ray would be a botanist as great as Aristotle, and he would speak
divinely, just as did Theophrastus. It is all a matter of desire! Young
Ray became a Minor Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; then a Major
Fellow; then he took the Master's degree; next he became lecturer on
Greek; and insisted that Aristotle was the greatest man the world had
ever seen, except none, and the Dean raised an eyebrow.
The professor of mathematics resigned and Ray took his place; next he
became Junior Dean, and then College Steward; and according to the
custom of the times he used to preach in the chapel. One of his sermons
was from the text, "Consider the lilies of the field." Another sermon
that brought him more notoriety than fame was on the subject, "God in
Creation," wherein he argued that to find God we should look for Him
more in the world of Nature and not so much in books.
Matters were getting strained. Ray was asked to subscribe to the Act of
Uniformity, which was a promise that he would never preach anything that
was not prescribed by the Church. Ray demurred, and begged that he be
allowed to go free and preach anything he thought was truth--new truth
might come to him! This shows the absurdity of Ray. He was asked to
reconsider or resign. He resigned--resigned the year that Sir Isaac
Newton entered.
Fortunately, one particular pupil followed him, not that he
loved college less, but that he loved Ray more. This pupil was
Francis Willughby. Through the bounty of this pupil we get the
scientist--otherwise, Ray would surely have been starved into
subjection. Willughby took Ray to the home of his parents, who were rich
people.
Ray undertook the education of young Willughby, very much as Aristotle
took charge of Alexander. Willughby and Ray traveled, studied, observed
and wrote. They went to Spain, took trips to France, Italy and
Switzerland, and journeyed to Scotland. Willughby devoted his life to
Ornithology and Ichthyology and won a deathless place in science.
Ray specialized on botany, and did a work in classification never done
before. He made a catalog of the flora of England that wrung even from
Cambridge a compliment--they offered him the degree of LL.D. Ray quietly
declined it, saying he was only a simple countryman, and honors or
titles would be a disadvantage, tending to separate him from the plain
people with whom he worked. However, the Royal Society elected him a
member, and he accepted the honor, that he might put the results of his
work on record. His paper on the circulation of sap in trees was read
before the Royal Society, on the request of Newton. Due credit was given
Harvey for his discovery of the circulation of the blood; but Ray made
the fine point that man was brother to the tree, and his life was
derived from the same Source.
When Willughby died, in Sixteen Hundred Seventy-two, he left Ray a
yearly income of three hundred dollars. Doctor Johnson told Boswell that
Ray had a collection of twenty thousand English bugs. Our botanical
terminology comes more from John Ray than from any other man. Ray
adopted wherever possible the names given by Aristotle, so loyal, loving
and true was he to the Master. Ray died in Seventeen Hundred Five, aged
seventy-six.
* * * * *
Two years after the death of John Ray, in Seventeen Hundred Seven, was
born a baby who was destined to find biology a chaos, and leave it a
cosmos.
Linnæus did for botany what Galileo had done for astronomy. John Ray was
only a John the Baptist.
Carl von Linne, or Carolus Linnæus as he preferred to be called, was
born in an obscure village in the Province of Smaland, Sweden. His
father was a clergyman, passing rich on forty pounds a year. His mother
was only eighteen years old when she bore him, and his father had just
turned twenty-one. It was a poor parish, and one of the deacons
explained that they could not afford a real preacher; so they hired a
boy.
Carl tells in his journal, of remembering how, when he was but four
years old, his father would lead his congregation out through the woods
and, all seated on the grass, the father would tell the people about the
plants and herbs and how to distinguish them.
Back of the parsonage there was a goodly garden, where the young pastor
and his wife worked many happy hours. When Carl was eight years of age,
a corner of this garden was set apart for his very own.
He pressed into his service several children of the neighborhood, and
they carried flat stones from the near-by brook to wall in this
miniature farm--this botanical garden.
The child that hasn't a flowerbed or a garden of its ownest own is
being cheated out of its birthright.
The evolution of the child mirrors the evolution of the race. And as the
race has passed through the savage, pastoral and agricultural stages, so
should the child. As a people we are now in the commercial or
competitive stage, but we are slowly emerging out of this into the age
of co-operation or enlightened self-interest.
It is only a very great man--one with a prophetic vision--who can see
beyond the stage in which he is.
The stage we are in seems the best and the final one--otherwise, we
would not be in it. But to skip any of these stages in the education or
evolution of the individual seems a sore mistake. Children hedged and
protected from digging in the dirt develop into "third rounders," as our
theosophic friends would say, that is, educated non-comps--vast top-head
and small cerebellum--people who can explain the unknowable, but who do
not pay cash. Third rounders all--fit only for the melting-pot!
A tramp is one who has fallen a victim of arrested development and never
emerged from the nomadic stage; an artistic dilettante is one who has
jumped the round where boys dig in the dirt and has evolved into a
missnancy.
Young Carl Linnæus skipped no round in his evolution. He began as a
savage, robbing birds' nests, chasing butterflies, capturing bees, bugs
and beetles. He trained goats to drive, hitched up a calf, fenced his
little farm, and planted it with strange and curious crops.
Clergymen once were the only schoolteachers, and in Sweden, when Linnæus
was a boy, there was a plan of farming children out among preachers that
they might be educated. Possibly this plan of having some one besides
the parents teach the lessons is good--I can not say. But young Carl did
not succeed--save in disturbing the peace among the households of the
half-dozen clergymen who in turn had him.
The boy evidently was a handsome fellow, a typical Swede, with hair as
fair as the sunshine, blue eyes, and a pink face that set off the fair
hair and made him look like a Circassian.
He had energy plus, and the way he cluttered up the parsonages where he
lodged was a distraction to good housewives: birds' nests, feathers,
skins, claws, fungi, leaves, flowers, roots, stalks, rocks, sticks and
stones--and when one meddled with his treasures, there was trouble. And
there was always trouble; for the boy possessed a temper, and usually
had it right with him.
The intent of the parents was that Carl should become a clergyman, but
his distaste for theology did not go unexpressed. So perverse and
persistent were his inclinations that they preyed on the mind of his
father, who quoted King Lear and said, "How sharper than a serpent's
tooth it is to have a thankless child!"
His troubles weighed so upon the good clergyman that his nerves became
affected and he went to the neighboring town of Wexio to consult Doctor
Rothman, a famed medical expert.
The good clergyman, in the course of his conversation with the doctor,
told of his mortification on account of the dulness and perversity of
his son.
Doctor Rothman listened in patience and came to the conclusion that
young Mr. Linnæus was a good boy who did the wrong thing. All energy is
God's, but it may be misdirected. A boy not good enough for a preacher
might make a good doctor--an excess of virtue is not required in the
recipe for a physician.
"I'll cure you, by taking charge of your boy," said Rothman; "you want
to make a clergyman of the youth: I'll let him be just what he wants to
be, a naturalist and a physician." And it was so.
* * * * *
The year spent by Linnæus under the roof of Doctor Rothman was a pivotal
point in his life. He was eighteen years old. The contempt of Rothman
for the refinements of education appealed to the young man. Rothman was
blunt, direct, and to the point: he had a theory that people grew by
doing what they wanted to do, not by resisting their impulses.
He was both friend and comrade to the boy. They rode together, dissected
animals and plants, and the young man assisted in operations. Linnæus
had the run of the Doctor's library, and without knowing it, was
mastering physiology.
"I would adopt him as my son," said Rothman; "but I love him so much
that I am going to separate him from me. My roots have struck deep in
the soil: I am like the human trees told of by Dante; but the boy can go
on!"
And so Rothman sent him along to the University of Lund, with letters to
another doctor still more cranky than himself. This man was Doctor
Kilian Stobæus, a medical professor, physician to the king, and a
naturalist of note. Stobæus had a mixed-up museum of minerals, birds,
fishes and plants.
Everybody for a hundred miles who had a curious thing in the way of
natural history sent it to Stobæus. Into this medley of strange and
curious things Linnæus was plunged with orders to "straighten it up."
There was a German student also living with the doctor, working for his
board. Linnæus took the lead and soon had the young German helping him
catalog the curios.
The spirit of Ray had gotten abroad in Germany, and Ray's books had been
translated and were being used in many of the German schools. Linnæus
made a bargain with the German student that they should speak only
German--he wanted to find what was locked up in those German books on
botany.
Stobæus was lame and had but one eye, so he used to call on the boys to
help him, not only to hitch up his horse, but to write his
prescriptions. Linnæus wrote very badly, and was chided because he did
not improve his penmanship, for it seems that in the olden times
physicians wrote legibly. Linnæus resented the rebuke, and was shown the
door. He was gone a week, when Stobæus sent for him, much to his relief.
This little comedy was played several times during the year, through
what Linnæus afterward acknowledged as his fault. One would hardly think
that the man who on first seeing the English gorse in full bloom fell on
his knees, burst into tears of joy, and thanked God that he had lived to
see this day, would have had a fiery temper. Then further, the gentle,
spiritual qualities that Linnæus in his later life developed give one
the idea that he was always of a gentle nature.
In indexing the museum of Doctor Stobæus, Linnæus found his bent. "I
will never be a doctor," he said; "but I can beat the world on making a
catalog."
And thus it was: his genius lay in classification. "He indexed and
catalogued the world," a great writer has said.
After a year at the University of Lund, with more learned by working for
his board than at school, there was a visit from Doctor Rothman, who had
just dropped in to see his old friend Stobæus. The fact was, Rothman
cared a deal more for Linnæus than he did for Stobæus. "Weeds develop
into flowers by transplanting only," said Rothman to Linnæus. "You need
a different soil--get out of here before you get pot-bound."
"But about Cyclops?" asked Linnæus.
"Let Cyclops go to the devil!" It was no use to ask permission of
Stobæus. Linnæus was so valuable that Stobæus would not spare him.
So Linnæus packed up and departed between the dawn and the day, leaving
a letter stating he had gone to Upsala because it seemed best and
begging forgiveness for such seeming ingratitude.
When Linnæus got to Upsala he found a letter from Doctor Cyclops,
written in wrath, requesting him never again to show his face in Lund.
Rothman also lost the friendship of Stobæus for his share in the
transaction.
* * * * *
When Linnæus arrived at Upsala he had one marked distinction, according
to his own account--he was the poorest student that had ever knocked at
the gates of the University for admittance. Perhaps this is a mistake,
for even though the young man had patched his shoes with birch bark, he
was not in debt.
And the youth of twenty-one who has health, hope, ambition and animation
is not to be pitied. Poverty is only for the people who think poverty.
It is five hundred English miles from Lund to Upsala. After his long,
weary tramp, Linnæus sat on the edge of the hill and looked down at the
scattered town of Upsala in the valley below. A stranger passing by
pointed out the college buildings, where a thousand young men were being
drilled and disciplined in the mysteries of learning. "Where is the
Botanical Garden?" asked the newcomer.
It was pointed out to him. He gazed on the site, carefully studied the
surrounding landscape, and mentally calculated where he would move the
Botanical Garden as soon as he had control of it. Let us anticipate here
just long enough to explain that the Upsala Botanical Garden now is
where Linnæus said it should be. It is a most beautiful place, lined off
with close-growing shrubbery. After traversing the winding paths, one
reaches the lecture-hall, built after the Greek, with porches, peristyle
and gently ascending marble steps. On entering the building, the first
object that attracts the visitor is the life-size statue of Linnæus.
To the left, a half-mile away, is the old cathedral--a place that never
much interested Linnæus. But there now rests his dust, and in windows
and also in storied bronze his face, form and fame endure. In the
meantime, we have left the young man sitting on a boulder looking down
at the town ere he goes forward to possess it.
He adjusts his shoes with their gaping wounds, shakes the dust from his
cap, and then takes from his pack a faded neckscarf, puts it on and he
is ready.
Descending the hill he forgets his lameness, waives the stone-bruises,
and walks confidently to the Botanical Garden, which he views with a
critical eye. Next, he inquires for the General Superintendent who lives
near. The young man presents his credentials from Rothman, who describes
the youth as one who knows and loves the flowers, and who can be useful
in office or garden and is not above spade and hoe. The Superintendent
looks at the pink face, touched with bronze from days in the open air,
notes the long yellow hair, beholds the out-of-door look of fortitude
that comes from hard and plain fare, and inwardly compares these things
with the lack of them in some of his students. "But this Doctor--Doctor
Rothman who wrote this letter--I do not have the honor of knowing him,"
says the Superintendent.
"Ah, you are unfortunate," replies the youth; "he is a very great man,
and I myself will vouch for him in every way."
Oh! this glowing confidence of youth--before there comes a surplus of
lime in the bones, or the touch of winter in the heart! The
Superintendent smiled. Knock in faith and the door shall be
opened--there are those whom no one can turn away. A stray bed was found
in the garret for the stranger, and the next morning he was earnestly at
work cataloguing the dried plants in the herbarium, a task long delayed
because there was no one to do it.
* * * * *
The study of Natural History in the University of Upsala was, at this
time, at a low ebb. It was like the Art Department in many of the
American colleges: its existence largely confined to the school catalog.
There were many weeks of biting poverty and neglect for Linnæus, but he
worked away in obscurity and silence and endured, saying all the time,
"The sun will come out, the sun will come out!" Doctor Olaf Rudbeck had
charge of the chair of Botany, but seldom sat in it. His business was
medicine. He gave no lectures, but the report was that he made his
students toil at cultivating in his garden--this to open up their
intellectual pores. In the course of his work, Linnæus devised a sex
plan of classification, instead of the so-called natural method. He
wrote out his ideas and submitted them to Rudbeck.
The learned Doctor first pooh-poohed the plan, then tolerated it, and in
a month claimed he had himself devised it. On the scheme being explained
to others there was opposition, and Rudbeck requested Linnæus to amplify
his notes into a thesis, and read it as a lecture. This was done, and so
pleased was the old man that he appointed Linnæus his adjunctus. In the
Spring of Seventeen Hundred Thirty, Linnæus began to give weekly
lectures on some topic of Natural History.
Linnæus was now fairly launched. His animation, clear thinking, handsome
face and graceful ways made his lectures very popular. Science in his
hands was no longer the dull and turgid thing it had before been in the
University. He would give a lecture in the hall, and then invite the
audience to walk with him in the woods. He seemed to know everything:
birds, beetles, bugs, beasts, trees, weeds, flowers, rocks and stones
were to him familiar.
He showed his pupils things they had walked on all their lives and never
seen.
The old Botanical Garden that had degenerated into a kitchen-garden for
the Commons was rearranged and furnished with many specimens gathered
round about.
A system of exchange was carried on with other schools, and Natural
History at Upsala was fast becoming a feature. Old Doctor Rudbeck
hobbled around with the classes, and when Linnæus lectured sat in a
front seat, applauding by rapping his cane on the floor and ejaculating
words of encouragement.
Linnæus was now receiving invitations to lecture at other schools in the
vicinity. He made excursions and reports on the Natural History of the
country around. The Academy of Science of Upsala now selected him to go
to Lapland and explore the resources of that country, which was then
little known.
The journey was to be a long and dangerous one. It meant four thousand
miles of travel on foot, by sledge and on horseback, over a country that
was for the most part mountainous, without roads, and peopled with
semi-savages.
There were two reasons why Linnæus should make the trip:
One was he had the hardihood and the fortitude to do it.
And second, he was not wanted at Upsala. He was becoming too popular.
One rival professor had gone so far as to prefer formal charges of
scientific heresy; he also made the telling point that Linnæus was not a
college graduate. The rule of the University was that no lecturer,
teacher or professor should be employed who did not have a degree from
some foreign University.
Inquiry was made and it was found that Linnæus had left the University
of Lund under a cloud. Linnæus was confronted with the charge, and
declined to answer it, thus practically pleading guilty. So, to get him
out of Upsala seemed a desirable thing, both to friends and to foes. His
friends secured the commission for the Lapland exploration, and his
enemies made no objections, merely whispering, "Good riddance!" To be
twenty-four, in good health, with hair like that of General Custer, a
heart to appreciate Nature, a good horse under you, and a commission
from the State to do an important work, in your left-hand
breast-pocket--what Heaven more complete!
A reception was tendered the young naturalist in the great hall, and he
addressed the students on the necessity of doing your work as well as
you can, and being kind. Before beginning his arduous and dangerous
journey, Linnæus went to Lund to visit his old patron, Doctor Stobæus.
Time, the great healer, had cured the Doctor of his hate, and he now
spoke of Linnæus as his best pupil. He had left hastily by the wan light
of the moon, without leaving orders where his mail was to be forwarded;
but now he was received as an honored guest. All the little
misunderstandings they had were laughed over as jokes.
From Lund, Linnæus went to his home in Smaland to visit his parents.
It is needless to say that they were very proud of him, and the
villagers turned out in great numbers to do him honor, perhaps, in their
simplicity, not knowing why.
* * * * *
The account of the Lapland trip by Linnæus is to be found in his book,
"Lachesis Lapponica."
The journey covered over four thousand miles and took from May to
November, Seventeen Hundred Thirty-one. The volume is in the form of a
daily journal, and is as interesting as "Robinson Crusoe." There is no
night there in Summer; but for all this, Lapland is not a paradise.
It is a great stretch of desert, vast steppes and lofty mountains, with
here and there fertile valleys. To be out in the wide open, with no
companions but a horse and a dog, filled Linnæus' heart with a wild joy.
As he went on, the road grew so rough that he had to part with the
horse, which he did with a pang, but the dog kept him company.
To be educated is to liberate the mind from its trammels and fears--to
set it free, new-chiseled from the rock. Linnæus reveled in the vast
loneliness of the steppes and took a hearty satisfaction in the hard
fare. His gun and fishing-rod stood him in good stead; there were
berries at times, and edible barks and watercress, and when these failed
he had a little bag of meal and dried reindeer-tongues to fall back
upon.
The simplicity of his living is shown best in the fact that the expenses
for the entire journey, occupying seven months, were only twenty-five
pounds, or less than one hundred twenty-five dollars. The Academy had
set aside sixty pounds, and their surprise at having most of the money
returned to them, instead of a demand being made for more, won them,
hand and heart. He had hit the sturdy old burghers in a sensitive
spot--the pocketbook--and they passed resolutions declaring him the
world's greatest naturalist, and voted him a medal, to be cast at his
own expense. Fame is delightful, but as collateral it does not rank
high.
Linnæus was without funds and without occupation. He gave a course of
lectures at the University on his explorations, where every seat was
taken, and even the stage and windows were filled. The sprightliness,
grace and intellect Linnæus brought to bear illumined his theme.
When Linnæus lectured, all classes were dismissed: none could rival him.
His very excellence was his disadvantage. Jealousy was hot on his trail,
for he was disturbing the balance of stupidity. A movement grew to force
him from the college. Formal charges were made, and when the case came
to a trial the even tenor of justice was disturbed by Linnæus making an
attack on Professor Rosen, his principal enemy, with intent to kill him.
Dueling has been forbidden in all the universities of Sweden since the
year Sixteen Hundred Eighty-two, and the diversion replaced by quartet
singing. So when Linnæus challenged his enemy to fight, and warned him
he would kill him if he didn't fight, and also if he did, things were in
a bad way for Linnæus.
The former charges were dropped to take up the more serious--just as
when a man is believed to be guilty of murder, no mention is made of his
crime of larceny.
Poor Linnæus was under the ban. The enemy had won: Linnæus must leave.
But where should he go--what could he do? No college would receive him
after his being compelled to leave Upsala for riot. He decided that if
disgrace were to be his on account of revenge, he would accept the
disgrace. He would kill Rosen on sight and then either commit suicide or
accept the consequences: it was all one! And so, laying plans to waylay
his victim, he fell asleep and dreamed he had done the deed.
He awoke in a sweat of horror!
He heard the officers at the door! He staggered to his feet, and was
making wild plans to fight the pursuers, when it occurred to him that he
had only dreamed. He sat down, faint, but mightily relieved.
Then he laughed, and it came to him that opposition was a part of the
great game of life. To do a thing was to jostle others, and to jostle
and be jostled was the fate of every man of power. "He that endureth
unto the end shall be saved."
The world was before him--the flowers still bloomed, and plants nodded
their heads in the meadows; the summer winds blew across the fields of
wheat, the branches waved. He was strong--he could plant and plow, or
dig ditches, or hew lumber!
Some one was hammering on the door; they had been knocking for fully
five minutes--ah! There had been no murder, so surely it was not the
officers.
He arose slowly and opened the door, murmuring apologies. A letter for
Carolus Linnæus! The letter was from Baron Reuterholm of Dalecarlia. It
contained a draft for twenty-five pounds, "as a token of good faith,"
and begged that Linnæus would accept charge of an expedition to survey
the natural resources of Dalecarlia in the same way that he had Lapland,
only with greater minuteness. Linnæus read the letter again. The draft
fluttered from his fingers to the floor.
"Pick that up!" he peremptorily ordered of the messenger. He wanted to
see if the other man saw it too.
The other man did pick it up! Linnæus was not dreaming, then, after
all!
* * * * *
This second expedition had two objects: one was the better education of
Baron Reuterholm's two sons, and the other the survey. One of these sons
was at the University of Upsala, and he had conceived such an admiration
for Linnæus that he had written home about him. No man knows what he is
doing: we succeed by the right oblique. Little did Linnæus guess that he
was preparing the way for great good fortune. The second excursion was
one of luxury. It lacked all the hardships of the first, and involved
the management of a party. Reuterholm was a rich Jewish banker, and a
man in close touch with all Swedish affairs of State. This time Linnæus
was provided with ample funds.
Linnæus had a genius for system--a head for business. He classified men,
and systematized his work like a general in the field. There were seven
young naturalists in the party, and to each Linnæus assigned a special
work, with orders to hand in a written report of progress each evening.
That the "Economist" or steward of the party was an American lends an
especial note of interest for us. After Dalecarlia it was to be America!
In money matters he was punctilious and accurate, the result of his
early training in making both ends meet. The habits of thrift, industry,
energy and absolute honesty had made him a marked man--there is not so
much competition along these lines.
The maps, measurements, drawings, and the exact, short, sharp, military
reports turned in at regular intervals to the Baron won that worthy
absolutely.
Linnæus was a businessman as well as a naturalist. It would require a
book to tell of the glorious half-gypsy life of these eight young men,
moving slowly through woods, across plains, over mountains and meadows,
studying soil, rocks, birds, trees and flowers, collecting and making
records.
Camping at night by flowing streams, awakening with the dawn and cooking
breakfast by the campfire in a silence that took up their shouts of
laughter in surprise, and echoed them back from the neighboring hills!
At last the journey was ended. Linnæus had proved his ability to
teach--his animation, good-cheer and friendly qualities brought his
pupils very close to him. Reuterholm insisted that he should attach
himself to the rising little college at Fahlun. There he met Doctor
Moræus, a man of much worth in a scientific way. At his house Linnæus
made his home. There was a daughter in the household, Sara Elizabeth,
tall, slender, appreciative and studious. One of the Reuterholms had
courted her, but in vain.
There were the usual results, and when Carolus and Sara Elizabeth came
to Doctor Moræus hand in hand for his blessing, he granted it as good
men always do. Then the Doctor gave Linnæus some good advice--go to
Holland or somewhere and get a doctor's degree. The enemies at Upsala
called Linnæus "the gypsy scientist." Silence them--Linnæus was now a
great man, and the world would yet acknowledge it. Sara Elizabeth agreed
in all of the propositions.
Love, they say, is blind, but sometimes love is a regular telescope.
This time love saw things that the learned men of Upsala failed to
discover--their diagnosis was wrong. Linnæus had prepared a thesis on
intermittent fever, and he was assured that if he presented this thesis
at the medical school at Harderwijk, Holland, with letters from Baron
Reuterholm and Doctor Moræus, it would secure him the much desired M.D.
A few months, at most, would suffice. He could then return to Fahlun and
take his place as a practising physician and a professor in the college,
marry the lady of his choice and live happy ever afterward.
So he started away southward. In due time, he arrived at Harderwijk and
read his thesis to the faculty. Instead of the callow youth, such as
they usually dealt with, they found a practised speaker who defended his
points with grace and confidence. The degree was at once voted, and a
"cum laude" thrown in for good measure. Linnæus was asked to remain
there and give a course of lectures on natural history. This he did.
Before going home he thought he would take a little look in on Leyden,
at that time the bookmaking and literary center of the world. At Leyden
he met Gronovius, the naturalist, who asked him to remain and give
lectures at the University. He did so, and incidentally showed
Gronovius the manuscript of his book on the new system of botanic
classification.
Gronovius was so delighted that he insisted on having the book printed
by the Plantins at his own expense. Here was a piece of good fortune
Linnæus had not anticipated.
Linnæus now settled down to read the proofs and help the work through
the presses. But he never idled an hour.
He studied, wrote and lectured, and made little excursions with his
friends through the fields. The book finished, he hastened to send
copies back to Fahlun to Sara Elizabeth, saying he must see Amsterdam
and then go to Antwerp to visit his new-found printer-friends there, and
then go home!
At Amsterdam he remained a whole year, living at the house of Burman,
the naturalist.
The wealthy banker, Cliffort, first among amateur botanists of his day,
invited Linnæus to visit him at his country-house at Hartecamp. Here he
saw the finest garden he had ever looked upon. Cliffort had copies of
Linnæus' book and he now insisted that the author should remain, catalog
his collection and issue the book with the help of the Plantins, all
without regard to cost. It took a year to get the work out, but it yet
remains one of the finest things ever attempted in a bookmaking way on
the subject of botany.
About the same time, with the help of Cliffort, Linnæus published
another big book of his own called, "Fundamenta Botanica." This book
was taken up at Oxford and used as a textbook, in preference to Ray.
Linnæus received invitations from England and was persuaded to take a
trip across to that country. He visited Oxford and London, and was
received by scientific men as a conquering hero. He saw Garrick act and
heard George Frederick Handel, where the crowd was so great that a
notice was posted requesting gentlemen to come without swords and ladies
without hoops. Handel composed an aria in his honor.
Returning to Leyden, Linnæus was urged by the municipality to remain and
rearrange the public flower-gardens and catalog the rare plants at the
University. This took a year, in which three more books were issued
under his skilful care.
He now started for home in earnest, by way of Paris, with what a
contemporary calls "a trunkful of medals."
Paris, too, had honors and employment for the great botanist, but he
escaped and at last reached Fahlun. He had been gone nearly four years,
and during the interval had established his place in the scientific
world as the first botanist of the time.
"It was love that sent me out of Sweden, and but for love I would never
have returned," he wrote.
Linnæus and Sara Elizabeth were married June Twenty-six, Seventeen
Hundred Thirty-nine.
Now the unexpected happened: Upsala petitioned Linnæus to return, and
the man who headed the petition was the one who had driven him away and
who came near being killed for his pains. Linnæus and his wife went to
Upsala, rich, honored, beloved.
Linnæus shifted the scientific center of gravity of all Europe to a
town, practically to them obscure, a thing they themselves scarcely
realized.
Henceforth, the life of Linnæus flowed forward like a great and mighty
river--everything made way for him. He was invited by the King of Spain
to come to that country and found a School of Science, and so lavish
were the promises that they surely would have turned the head of a
lesser man. Universities in many civilized countries honored themselves
by giving him degrees.
In Seventeen Hundred Sixty-one, the King of Sweden issued a patent of
nobility in his honor, and thereafter he was Carl von Linne. In England
he was known as Sir Charles Linn.
Sainte-Beuve, the eminent French critic, says that the world has
produced only about half a dozen men who deserve to be placed in the
first class. The elements that make up this super-superior man are high
intellect, which abandons itself to the purpose in hand, careless of
form and precedent; indifference to obstacles and opposition; and a
joyous, sympathetic, loving spirit that runs over and inundates
everything it touches, all with no special thought of personal pleasure,
gratification or gain.
Linnæus seems in every way to fill the formula.
[Illustration: THOMAS H. HUXLEY]