Page:Greek Biology and Medicine.djvu/102

 GREEK BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE historian of botany would seem to be that the botanical ideas of both master and pupil had not an altogether favorable effect upon the progress made by that science, say, from the sixteenth century onwards. ^^ Theophrastus would not have been the pupil of his master had he not been impressed with the luring analogies and even continuities ob- served by Aristotle, between the vegetable and animal kingdoms. In fact these observed — or ill-observed — resemblances or analogies not infrequently led him astray, whatever breadth of view they gave him. For example: " The primary and most important parts, which are also common to most [plants], are these, root, stem, branch, twig; these are the parts into which we might divide the plant, regarding them as members, corresponding to the members of animals; for each of these is distinct in character from the rest, and together they make up the whole." ^® He saw, however, that " we must not assume that in all respects there is complete cor- respondence between plants and animals. And that is why the number also of parts is inde- terminate; for a plant has the power of growth in all its parts, inasmuch as it has life in all its [80]