CHAP. 1.—THE PROPERTIES OF PLANTS.
Nature and the earth might have well filled the measure of our admiration, if we had nothing else to do but to consider the properties enumerated in the preceding Book, and the numerous varieties of plants that we find created for the wants or the enjoyment of mankind. And yet, how much is there still left for us to describe, and how many discoveries of a still more astonishing nature! The greater part, in fact, of the plants there mentioned recommend themselves to us by their taste, their fragrance, or their beauty, and so invite us to make repeated trials of their virtues: but, on the other hand, the properties of those which remain to be described, furnish us with abundant proof that nothing has been created by Nature without some purpose to fulfil, unrevealed to us though it may be.