In his system he rejected the division into trees, shrubs, and herbs,
showing by good examples that there is no real distinction of the kind
in nature. From many of his remarks in his critical dissertations
we might infer that he possessed a very fine feeling for natural
relationship, but at the same time expressions occur which seem to
show that he did not at all appreciate its importance in the system;
we notice this in Tournefort also. Because flowers come before the
fruit he jumps with curious logic to the conclusion that the main
divisions in the system should be derived from the flower, and in
following this rule he makes use of exactly that mark in the corolla
which has the least value for classification, namely, regularity or
irregularity of form. It is strange, moreover, that Bachmann, who spent
a considerable fortune on the production of copper-plate figures of
plants without any special object, though he founded his system on
the form of the flower, should yet have devoted only a superficial
study to its construction; his account of it is very inferior to that
of any one before or since his time. His classification thus founded
cannot be said to be an advance in systematic botany; nevertheless, he
had no lack of adherents, and among them in Germany, Heucher, Knaut,
Ruppius, Hebenstreit, and Ludwig; in England, Hill and others, who made
alterations here and there in his system, but any real development of
it was from its nature an impossibility; he endeavoured to defend it
against the assaults of Ray and Dillen; Rudbeck also declared against
him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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