William Smellie (encyclopedist)

thumb| William Smellie (1740 – 24 June 1795) was a Scottish printer who edited the first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. He was also a naturalist and antiquary. He was a joint founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, co-founder of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and a friend of Robert Burns. Quotes The polypus has no stomach, or rather, like vegetables, its whole body may be considered as a stomach. Its natural cavity contains no viscera; and when this animal is turned outside-in, it still continues to live and to digest its food, in the fame manner as if it had received no injury. The mode by which plants are nourished is extremely analogous; they imbibe by the roots, the trunk, the branches, the leaves, and the flowers. Instead therefore of having no stomach, their whole structure is stomach. In regard to the brain, the polypus and many other insects are deprived of that organ. Hence neither stomach nor brain are essential characters which distinguish the animal from the vegetable. Quoted in Charles White, An Account of the Regular Gradation in Man, &c. (1790), pt. 1, p. 3 External links Category:Academics from Scotland Category:Botanists from Scotland Category:Printmakers Category:Naturalists from Scotland Category:1740 births Category:1795 deaths