EJ and Carolus Linnaeus

[Bertil Haggman <bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se>]

EJ:s relates mainly to France, Italy and Greece 
and his connections to the north are few: a 
journey to Iceland and Norway and, of course, 
Besuch auf Godenholm. But a consistant relation 
throughout has been Carolus Linnaeus [Sw. Carl 
von Linne] (1707 - 1778), the Swedish botanist 
who first framed the principles for defining 
genders and species of organisms and created 
a uniform system for naming them. In 1783 the 
Linnean Society in London purchased all Linnaeus' 
manuscripts. They are well taken care of but
one of Sweden's greatest cultural treasures
are actually outside the country.

EJ as a matter of fact ascribes a significance 
far beyond its contribution to the universal order 
originated by Linnaeus system of classification. 
As an act of metaphysical  imagination it extends 
its lines of definition and distinction across the 
entirety of the sphere of life. It lays out lines 
of unity and separation that are as certain as the 
lines of latitude and longitude. Thus Linnaeus could 
be said to guide in the same way as these lines on 
the map. L. takes anybody to any point in the living 
world with absolute authority.

"In him one must see more than just a scientific
giant. There is something here that is priestly in 
an ancient sense; it is a form of service rendered
to the earth. By the power of the word he transforms
the sinuous serpent into Aaron's rod"

(Collected Works, X, p. 109)

(Note: Linnaeus father was actually a priest, serving
a small community in southern Sweden).

Fixity, stability, permanence to counterbalance
the volcanic force of chaos, the shapeless being
of the earth before there are names. The protean
voice is shaped into language.

But Linnaeus belonged in the age of sovereignty,
l'esprit des lois. His contemplation of nature
was inspired by a special absolute character
of judgements and the inviolable essence of the
individual who makes them.

In _On the Marble Cliffs_ Linnaeus is also the hero
of the two brothers: "The great example we followed
was Linnaeus, who had entered the chaotic plant and
animal worlds with the marshal's staff of the word,
and whose rule over blooming fields and the legions
of crawling creatures endured more wonderfully than any
empire won by the sword".

(Collected Works, XV, p.264)

In _Typus, Name, Gestalt_ EJ observes that Linnaeus works
in the spirit of the biblical tex Genesis 1:24:

"And God said, let the earth bring forth the living creature
after his kind; cattle and creeping thing, and beast of the
earth after his kind, and it was so." The Linnean system
gives meaning to each characteristic of species only as the
marker of that place in the grid and as confirmation of the
grand design.

There are also a number of references to Linnaeus in
the diaries.

Bertil Haggman
bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se