994. Names sanctioned by general use are for the most part held sacred among botanists. The study of natural history is, from the multitude of objects with which it is conversant, necessarily so encumbered with names, that students require every possible assistance to facilitate the attainment of those names, and have a just right to complain of every needless impediment. Tho names established throughout the works of Linnï¾µus are become current coin ; and cannot be altered without great inconvenience. Those who alter names, often for the worse, according to arbitrary rules of their own, or in order to aim at consequence, which they cannot otherwise attain, are best treated with silent neglect. When, however, solid discoveries and improvements are made in the science - when species or genera have been confounded by Linnï¾µus himself, and new ones require to be separated from them, the latter must necessarily receive appropriate appellations; as also when a totally wrong and absurd name has by mistake been given, as Begonia capensis. In such cases names must give place to things, and alterations proceeding from such causes must be submitted to. (Smith's Introduction, ch. 22.)
