Let us next observe the conditions of ideality in vegetables. Out of a
large number of primroses or violets, I apprehend that, although one or
two might be larger than all the rest, the greater part would be very
sufficient primroses and violets. And that we could, by no study nor
combination of violets, conceive of a better violet than many in the
bed. And so generally of the blossoms and separate members of all
vegetables.
But among the entire forms of the complex vegetables, as of oak-trees,
for instance, there exists very large and constant difference, some
being what we hold to be fine oaks, as in parks, and places where they
are taken care of, and have their own way, and some are but poor and
mean oaks, which have had no one to take care of them, but have been
obliged to maintain themselves.
That which we have to determine is, whether ideality be predicable of
the fine oaks only, or whether the poor and mean oaks also may be
considered as ideal, that is, coming up to the conditions of oak, and
the general notion of oak.
Sec. 8. The difference of position between plants and animals.
Now there is this difference between the positions held in creation by
animals and plants, and thence in the dispositions with which we regard
them; that the animals, being for the most part locomotive, are capable
both of living where they choose, and of obtaining what food they want,
and of fulfilling all the conditions necessary to their health and
perfection. For which reason they are answerable for such health and
perfection, and we should be displeased and hurt if we did not find it
in one individual as well as another.
Sec. 9. Admits of variety in the ideal of the former.
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