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Show l .... I ... ... _, _ .. .... . 310 lMPOR'f ANCE OF district; and so it seemed for some ten or fifteen years. _But,. alas! the epidendric miasma (as those ~ho bel_wve m ~erial infections would probably call 1t) was m the a1r, and the epidendric poison was at the roots ; and never did dry rot consume a beam of bad oak more certainly, or even more rapidly, than all the fair promises of future forests were swept from those moors. In a whole mile a clown c_annot now find a rude walking-stick; and even the little grove by the ruined fortilage has departed without axe or fire, and the ruins are as bare as ever. Innumerable instances of the same kind might be given, all tending to show that we have " much to learn," and therefore must observe much before w-e come to any certain general conclusion, about the germination and the growth of vegetables. But vegetables are, as it were, the foundations of our whole cultivated productions, as without them we ~ould neither have animals nor implements. Hence, If we are to have any claim to the title of useful observers, we must so observe as to keep those general relations always in view. It is not enough ~hat we see a beautiful flower, or any other attractIve appearance; and that we give it a name, local or learned, and set down every particular in the form and arrangement of its parts, the tints of its colour its taste, its odour, the time of its appearance, th~ length of its continuance, and the period at whic it is gone. All that is but an amplification of t e name-a resolving of that into those parts of the sum of which in their union it is the sign; for, if we understand the name, it will bring all those particulars to our recollection. To take a simple instance, the name " daisy'' will suggest to the mind all the observable properties of that flower, which are known to the person by whom that name is pronounced, wp.ether it be restricted to the little daisy with the crimson tipped petals, which has been called ~'daisy," or "day's eve·" from its closing at night CLOSE OBSERVATION. :nt and opening in the morning, or to any of the other . compositfE, which are popularly called by the same name. We must b_ear ~n mind that, though the present momentary :Vl~W IS necessary to the obtaining of knowledge, 1t 1s not useful knowledge taken merely in itself. Observations bear nearly the same relation to knowledge tha~ acorns have to oaks,-they are the seeds of knowledge, and we can no more have the tree of knowledge witaout first having the seed than we can any tree of the forest; but in the one case, as well as the other, the seed must grow before we can have the tree. A man who continued merely gathering acorns all his life would not be any more in possession of an oak than a man who never saw an acorn; and just so a man who kept all his life looking at mere appearances would have no more knowledge than a man desti_tute of all the organs, or all the means of observatiOn. Bu~ if a ~an observed an acorn growing it would be qmte ~ dttferent matter. If he noticed the place ancl the c1rcumstances under which it began to grow and continued its growth, he would have no more to do than to place another similar acorn in circumstances exactly similar, m order to make sure of obtaining another tree. Even then, the perfection and certainty of the success would bear wholly on the similarity both ?f. t~e object and the circumstances; and the;efore 1t IS m that that the value of observation consists. In ~11 natural occur~ences there is, to our perception, a little play-the cucumstances may be a little different, and yet we may observe no difference in the res~1lt, let us s.cn.Itinize it as we may. But that is o'Yn~g to th~ h_m1t of our observation being always w1thm the hm1t of nature, so that when the difference of the circumstances (all of them being known) eludes our observation, so does the difference of the result. |