MICniGAN STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 371 



and experience are fully equal to my own. I know, too, how 

 precious our time is, and I should not attempt it were it not a 

 duty enjoined by the constitution of our Society. This duty 

 will be performed in as brief a manner as its importance will 

 permit. 



I would therefore suggest that it is desirable for us to gather 

 up for future use the lessons which have been acquired by the 

 experience of the past. We have been so busy in accumulating 

 knowledge in the various branches of our culture, that we 

 have had no time to look back and to systematize the inferences 

 and deductions to be drawn from our operations. But we 

 believe the time has now come when we should pause, and sur- 

 vey the field, and make a review of the lessons which science 

 has taught ; for science is but a statement of these lessons, — 

 experience systematized and trained for progress. It is the 

 grains of sand that roll up the mountain, the drops of water 

 that make the ocean, and it is lesson upon lesson, fact upon 

 fact, which must build up the science we wish to create- 

 Nothing in the present age astonishes us more than the won- 

 derful power of association, — the centralization of thought 

 and action for the promotion of particular objects, thus collect- 

 ing the experience of individuals, and diffusing this knowledge 

 for the benefit of the world. How clearly is this seen in the 

 operations of our own Society. How great the changes and 

 how rapid the progress since its formation ! Then its list of 

 members was 107 ; now its roll contains the name? of 311 

 persons. Then its sphere of operations was limited by the 

 boundaries of a few States; now its field extends from ocean to 

 ocean, from the Provinces to the Gulf, and wherever the foot 

 of civilization rests in our broad domain. Nor is it too much 

 to say, that in this space of time more progress has been made 

 in the science of pomology than in the whole period since 

 the settlement of our country. Never before was the interest 

 80 engrossing, or so widely extended. By publications, cor- 

 respondence, and the remarkable facilities for interchange and 



