The family herbal, or, An account of all those English plants, which are remarkable for their virtues, and of the drugs which are produced by vegetables of other countries; with their descriptions and their uses, as proved by experience ... / by Sir John Hill ... embellished with fifty-four coloured plates.

  • Hill, John, 1714?-1775.
Date:
[1812]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The family herbal, or, An account of all those English plants, which are remarkable for their virtues, and of the drugs which are produced by vegetables of other countries; with their descriptions and their uses, as proved by experience ... / by Sir John Hill ... embellished with fifty-four coloured plates. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    cause it is in vain that we know betony is goodi for head-achs, or self-heal for wounds, unless we can distinguish betony and self-heal from one another, and so it runs through the whole study. We are taught by it to know what plants belong to what names, and to know that very distmctly ; and we shall be prevented by that knowledge from giving a purge for an astringent, a poison for a remedy ; let us therefore esteem the sfudy of botany, but let us know, that this use of the dis- tinctions it gives is the true end of it ; and let us respect those, who employ their lives in establish- ing those distinctions upon the most certain founr dation, upon making them the most accurately, and carrying them the farthest possible: these are the botanists ; but with all the gratitude we owe (hem for their labours, and all the respect we shew them on that consideration let us under- stand them as but the seconds in this scieiice. The principal are those who know how to bring their discoveries to use, and car] say what are the ends that will be answered by those plants, which they have so accurately distinguished. The boy col- lects the specimens of herbs with great care, and bestows ten years in pasting them upon pa- per, and writing their names to them : he does well. When he grows a man, he neglects his useful labours ; and perhaps despises himself for the misemployment of so much time : but if he has, to the knowledge of their forms, added afr terward the study or their virtues, he will be fir from censuring himself for all the pains he took to that end. He who wishes well to science and to raanr kind, must wish this matter understood: and thig is the way to bring a part of knowledge into cre- dit, which, as it is commonly practised, is not a