In writing for children, Dr. Gray seems to have put on a new nature, in which we have a much fuller sympathy with him than we have ever had in reading his larger books. We do not like that cold English common sense which seems reluctant to admit any truth in the higher regions of thought; and we confess, that, until we had read this little child's book, "How Plants Grow," we had always suspected Dr. Gray of leaning towards that old error, so finely exposed by Agassiz in zoölogy, of considering genera, families, etc., as divisions made by human skill, for human convenience,–instead of as divisions belonging to the Creator's plan, as yet but partially understood by human students.

We hope that the appearance of this masterly little book, so finely adapted to the child's understanding, may have the effect of introducing botany into the common schools. The natural taste of children for flowers indicates clearly the propriety and utility of giving them lessons upon botany in their earliest years. Go into any of our New England country-schools at this season of the year, and you will find a bouquet of wild flowers on the teacher's desk. Take it up and separate it,–show each flower to the school, tell its name, and its relationship to other and more familiar cultivated flowers, the characteristic sensible properties of its family, etc.,–and you will find the younger scholars your most attentive listeners. And if any practical man ask, What is the use of the younger scholars learning anything about wild flowers, which the cultivation of the country may soon render extinct, and which are but weeds at best?–there are two sufficient answers ready: first, that all truth is divine, and that the workmanship of infinite skill is beautiful and worthy of the eyes which may behold it; secondly, that no mental discipline is better adapted for the young mind than this learning how to distinguish plants. No more striking deficiency is observable, in most men, than the lack of a power to observe closely and with accuracy. The general inaccuracy of testimony, usually ascribed to inaccuracy of memory, is in fact to be attributed to inaccuracy of observation. In like manner, a large proportion of popular errors of judgment spring from an imperfect perception of the data on which the true conclusions should be founded. The best remedy for this lack of clear perceptions would evidently be the cultivation of those habits of close observation and nice discrimination necessary in a successful naturalist.

1

SPENSER: Faery Queen. See also the Two Cantos of Mutability, Cant. VII.:–

"That old Dan Geffrey, in whose gentle spright The pure well-head of poesie did dwell."

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2

MILTON: Il Penseroso.

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3

WORDSWORTH: Poems of Later Years.

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4

CHAUCER: Clerke's Tale, Prologue.

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5

WARTON: Ode on his Majesty's Birthday, 1787

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6

Tyrwhitt's Chaucer: Historical Notes on his Life.

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7

Masque of the Fortunate Islands

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8

History of English Poetry, Vol. II. pp. 335-336, ed. 1840.

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9

WARTON: Birthday Ode, 1787.

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10

See his British Poets, from Chaucer to Jonson, Art. Daniel. Southey contemplated a continuation of Warton's History, and, in preparing for that labor, learned many things he had never known of the earlier writers.

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11

Jonson's classification. See his Poetaster.

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12

Lamb's Works, and Life, by Talfourd, Vol. IV. p. 89.

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13

Hesperides, Encomiastic Verses.

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14

Herrick, ubi supra.--To the haunts here named must be added the celebrated Mermaid, of which Shakspeare was the Magnus Apollo, and The Devil, where Pope imagines Ben to have gathered peculiar inspiration:– "And each true Briton is to Ben so civil, He swears the Muses met him at The Devil." Imitation of Horace, Bk. ii. Epist. i.

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15

Election of a Poet-Laureate, 1719, Works, Vol. II.

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16

Feast of the Poets, 1814.

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17

Fable for Critics, 1850.

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18

This story rests on the authority of Thomas Betterton, the actor, who received it from Davenant.

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19

Dedication of the Pastorals of Virgil, to Hugh, Lord Clifford, the son of Sir Thomas.

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20

There were some indications that portions of the farce had been written while Davenant was living and had been intended for him. Mr. Bayes appears in one place with a plaster on his nose, an evident allusion to Davenant's loss of that feature. In a lively satire of the time, by Richard Duke, it is asserted that Villiers was occupied with the composition of The Rehearsal from the Restoration down to the day of its production on the stage:–

"But with playhouses, wars, immortal wars, He waged, and ten years' rage produced a farce. As many rolling years he did employ, And hands almost as many, to destroy Heroic rhyme, as Greece to ruin Troy. Once more, says Fame, for battle he prepares, And threatens rhymers with a second farce: But, if as long for this as that we stay, He'll finish Clevedon sooner than his play."

The Review

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