Elements of the philosophy of plants: containing the principles of Scientific Botany. 1821. (Reprint 1978). 8 pls. 486 p. gr8vo. Cloth.

Aug.P. de Candolle received a medical degree at the University of Parisin 1804. He coined the term taxonomy in 1813 to describe the science ofclassification. Most of his own work in plant taxonomy was based uponthe earlier work of the botanist Jussieu and the zoologist Cuvier. Heconcluded that morphology, without reference to physiology, is the solebasis of taxonomy, and stated that "The whole art of natural classification consists in discovring the plan of symmetry", particularly as regards the parts of the flower. A professor atMontpellier and later at Geneva, de Candolle began a monumental plantencyclopedia in 1824 that was not completed by his son until a halfcentury. The present volume is an English translation of his famedTheorie Elementaire de la Botanique, first published in 1813, which setforth his views on classification. His taxonomic scheme provides the basis for much present day work in this field.