in which it is contained, belong to the academy. T h e former fu-
perintendant o f the cabinet, Mr. Sparmann, has been let alide,
and fucceeded by Dr. Quenzel, a young man o f great induftry,
to whom the academy are indebted for the new order in which
the cabinet, that was formerly in the utmoft confufion, is now arranged.
Dr. Quenzel is a confiderable proficient in natural hif-
tory, and the academy could not have made choice o f a more
proper perfon for undertaking that charge.
In 1799 the academy was divided into leven different claffes,
and a certain number o f members was afligned to each. «This
■diviiion o f the fciences was indeed a fevere trial o f the abilities o f
the academicians. In order to make fuch a diftribution with
philolbphical precifion, it would have been neceffary either to deduce
the genealogy o f all the fciences and correlponding arts, from
the parental ftock o f common principles in the human mind ; or
m fome other way to have made an accurate, though general
claffification o f the various objects o f truth or knowledge.
T h e great Lord Bacon formed a plan in his book De Augmentis
Scientiarum, o f all the arts and fciences o f which man is capable,
by referring them to the leading powers o f the mind ; memory,
judgment, and imagination. This plan has been followed almoft
by every author that has come after him, even by the writers o f
the French Encyclopaedia. But thefe gentlemen have declared,
w ith great candour and judgment, that they experienced an em-
barraffment in the arrangement o f their lubjefts, in proportion to
the latitude allowed o f arbitrary choice ; as the different branches
of
o f knowledge might be referred either to the beings which they
have for their objects, or to the different faculties o f the foul.
Difficulties attend either plan. T h e former involves us in an
endlefs labyrinth, not only o f genera and fpectes, and thefe too the
mere work o f the human mind; but o f individual objefts not to be
reduced with precifion to any clafs or mutual correfpondence:
the latter implies that latitude o f arbitrary choice, which the
French encyclopaedifts have juftly remarked.
T h e fcientific academicians o f Stockholm have not adopted
either o f thefe plans, but {truck out a new one o f their own, as is
to be perceived in the following claffification, which feems to reft
principally on the myftical number feven. T he firft clafs have
for the fubjedt o f their inquiries, ¡economy general and rural. This
clafs is compofed o f fifteen members. The fecond, confifting alfo
o f fifteen members, has for its object, commerce and the mechanical
arts. T h e third clafs, in number alfo fifteen, exterior phyjics and
natural hi/lory. T h e fourth clafs, likewife fifteen, interior phyjics
and natural philofophy. T he fifth clafs, in number eighteen, mathematics.
T h e fixth clafs, fifteen in number, medicine. T h e fe-
venth and laft clafs, confifting o f twelve members, is configned to
belles-lettres, the hi/lory o f the world, languages, and other ftudies
uleful or agreeable.
It is evident that the whole o f this arrangement is characterized
by an air o f inaccuracy, whimficality and confufion. T h e
laft clafs i s . plainly contrived as a receptacle for the various fub-
jefts o f inveftigation not provided for in any o f the former divifions.
V o l . I. f t In