264 MECHANICS* INSTITUTIONS. 



novels, romances, and works of a similar class and character 

 have no business in a Mechanics* Institute ; that they w^eaken 

 the reasoning powers, and inflame the imagination ; that the 

 principles developed in those works are for the most part pesti- 

 lential and injurious to the morals of Oie young, and calculated 

 to dwarf and stunt the growth of a vigorous understanding : 

 because, after the tender mind has once become well impreg- 

 nated with such absurdities, it is but rarely that it can be led 

 back to relish more manly and rational pursuits ; and again, the 

 introduction of such books is certainly alien to the ends for'which 

 such Institutions were erected, and entirely opposed to the 

 creation of an enlarged and philosophical spirit of enquiry. The 

 rage for sentimental trash and love-fictions has for too long a period 

 reflected discredit on the Devonport Institute ; but many of the 

 junior members, having become aware of their weakening influence 

 on the mind, have enlisted themselves into a chemical class for 

 the purpose of reading their own original essays, and then can- 

 vassing their contents. Still, amidst all these defects, the tide of 

 mental improvement is rolling on with astonishing force, and a 

 quotation from Laplace's "Exposition du Systbme du Monde " 

 seems to me admirably adapted to the times in which we live. — 

 ** Car r empire lent, mais irresistible de la raison, V emporte, k 

 la longue, sur les jalousies nationales et sur les obstacles qui 

 s' opposent an bien d' une utilite generalement sentie.*' " For 

 the empire of reason, slow but irresistible, prevails at last over 

 national jealousies, and all the obstacles which are opposed to 

 the good of a utility generally felt." 



The results of knowledge, however slow, are always certain; 

 always beneficial; for knowledge possesses within itself, like 

 steam, almost unlimited powers of expansion, insinuating itself in- 

 to every pore and crevice of the community, diminshing ignorance 

 in her most varied and brutal forms, humanizing by its progress 

 the most obstinate prejudices, softening those passions of our 

 nature, whose rankness if not stopped, would prove horribly 

 destructive, and elevating the moral character of man, to a nearer 

 and closer resemblance of the beautiful image of his Creator. 



M. A. P. 



