1 882. 99 Trans. N. Y. Ac^^Sci. 



was no Pantheist. The doctrine of "the convertibility of the forces," 

 or, as others have preferred to state if, "ihe persistence of force," 

 gives us a single infinite force as the life of the world ; and this neces- 

 sarily identifies itself with what the Christian calls God. 



Spencer, indeed, maintains that we cannot know the infinite; but he 

 himself calls it " the First Cause ;" declares it is the vital agency in 

 every change, and proclaims it " productive," and shows thus a clear 

 knowledge of it in the weightiest possible relations. 



Tyndall hesitates to speak thus plainly, and says : " I will not call 

 him, or it, a cause or a power ;" but silence is not philosophy. If there 

 is this single and universal agency, the consequence follows that all 

 nature's movement is due to this one great cause, which originally 

 shaped the earth and formed the heavens. 



Correlation lays ths foundation for a belief in the theistic concep- 

 tion. We have but to prove the intelligence, and the moral and per- 

 sonal character of this infinite cause, and we have before us what 

 Christ called the " Lord of heaven and earth ;" and this, the familiar 

 argument of Paley, and the rest of our teleological writers, enables us 

 to do triumphantly. 



In view of this great generalization, of one only force in the uni- 

 verse, the whole perplexing and obscuring maze of second causes and 

 minor forces disappears — we are face to face with the infinite, with 

 which alone we have to do. Thus, while Evolution seems almost to 

 banish God from the creation, the profounder philosophy of Correlation 

 restores this grand conception, and makes us feel that in very truth it 

 is in the First Cause that " we live, and m.ove, and have oar being." 



January 30lh, 1SS2. 



Section of Geology and Mineralogy. 

 The President, Dr. Newberry, in the chair. 

 Fifty-seven persons present. 



The committee, consisting of the President and Recording Secretary, 

 to whom had been referred the preparation of a memorial to the au- 

 thorities of the State, regardmg the completion of the volumes of the 

 Geological Survey, reported the following resolutions, which were unani- 

 mously adopted by the Academy. 



Whereas, A large amount of new and valuable material has been 

 prepared by Prof. James Hall for the completion of his series of 

 reports on the Palaeontology of New York, many of the plates having 

 been already engraved ; and, 



Whereas, The publication of this material would require only a rela- 



