Abstract
The study of plants was nothing new when The Royal Society was founded, but some of our earliest Fellows changed it drastically. Perhaps they did not do this as suddenly or as completely as did Newton for dynamics, but in the long run they had at least as great an influence on views of the natural world and how to study it. Did God create all the great variety of plants no one (in Europe) had ever seen before, and if so why? Plants brought back by explorers, especially from North America, and plants looked at in the microscope, together with the taxonomic system constructed by Linnaeus, replaced the plants grown in monastic gardens and their successors in public botanic gardens, and the study of plants for purely medicinal uses.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
