Wit, . . . the faculty of imagination in the writer,
which searches over all the memory for the species
or ideas of those things which it designs to
represent. --Dryden.
Note: In the scholastic philosophy, the species was sensible
and intelligible. The sensible species was that in any
material, object which was in fact discerned by the
mind through the organ of perception, or that in any
object which rendered it possible that it should be
perceived. The sensible species, as apprehended by the
understanding in any of the relations of thought, was
called an intelligible species. ``An apparent diversity
between the species visible and audible is, that the
visible doth not mingle in the medium, but the audible
doth.'' --Bacon.
2. (Logic) A group of individuals agreeing in common
attributes, and designated by a common name; a conception
subordinated to another conception, called a genus, or
generic conception, from which it differs in containing or
comprehending more attributes, and extending to fewer
individuals. Thus, {man} is a species, under {animal} as a
genus; and man, in its turn, may be regarded as a genus
with respect to {European}, {American}, or the like, as
species.
3. In science, a more or less permanent group of existing
things or beings, associated according to attributes, or
properties determined by scientific observation.
Note: In mineralogy and chemistry, objects which possess the
same definite chemical structure, and are fundamentally
the same in crystallization and physical characters,
are classed as belonging to a species. In zo["o]logy
and botany, a species is an ideal group of individuals
which are believed to have descended from common
ancestors, which agree in essential characteristics,
and are capable of indefinitely continued fertile
reproduction through the sexes. A species, as thus
defined, differs from a variety or subspecies only in
the greater stability of its characters and in the
absence of individuals intermediate between the related
groups.
4. A sort; a kind; a variety; as, a species of low cunning; a
species of generosity; a species of cloth.
5. Coin, or coined silver, gold, ot other metal, used as a
circulating medium; specie. [Obs.]
There was, in the splendor of the Roman empire, a
less quantity of current species in Europe than
there is now. --Arbuthnot.
6. A public spectacle or exhibition. [Obs.] --Bacon.
7. (Pharmacy)
(a) A component part of compound medicine; a simple.
(b) (Med.) An officinal mixture or compound powder of any
kind; esp., one used for making an aromatic tea or
tisane; a tea mixture. --Quincy.
8. (Civil Law) The form or shape given to materials; fashion
or shape; form; figure. --Burill.
{Incipient species} (Zo["o]l.), a subspecies, or variety,
which is in process of becoming permanent, and thus
changing to a true species, usually by isolation in
localities from which other varieties are excluded.