Page:The Library, volume 5, series 3.djvu/162

1 50 LEIBNITZ AS A LIBRARIAN. Leibnitz's system of classification was a curious one, and was mapped out as follows: I. Theology; II. Jurisprudence; III. Medicine ; IV. Intellectual Philosophy ; V. Mathematics (Philosophia rerum imaginationis) ; VI. Physics (Philosophia rerum sensibilium) ; VII. Philology (and Literature) (Res linguarum, but including Poetry) ; VIII. Civil History; IX. Literary History and Bibliography; X. Colle6ted works and miscellanea. This system much more resembles what are now known as 'practical' schemes of classification that is, in- tended for division of books in a library according to their classes upon a simple and convenient method. It makes no pretensions to logical sequence and relative arrangement like the schemes of Gesner, Savigny, Francis Bacon, Comte, and others. When Leibnitz got down to class ten he showed himself a wise man and experienced librarian in the final division he made. Encyclo- paedias, dictionaries of knowledge, and bound volumes of pamphlets are hated by every enthu- siastic classifier, and supply a capital instance of form coming into collision with matter. Leibnitz wrote so much in Latin or French that as a contributor to German literature his impor- tance was relatively small. His writings and letters in German were collefted and edited by his admirer, Dr. Guhraucr (1838-40);' they amount to about a thousand pages in two odlavo volumes bound together, but a certain amount of this is from the pens of his correspondents. 1 < Leibnitz (G. W.), Deutsche Schriften,' herausg. von G. C. Guhrauer. 2 vols. 8vo. Berlin, 1838-40.