2 JO Memorial of George Brozvn Goode. 



The two societies are still institutions of national importance, not only 

 because of a time-honored record and useful work, but on account of 

 important general trusts under their control. Although all their meet- 

 higs are held in the cities where they were founded, their membership is 

 not localized, and to be a Member of the American Philosophical Society 

 or a Fellow of the American Academy, is an honor highlj- appreciated 

 by every American scientific man. 



The Philosophical Society (founded before the separation of the colo- 

 nies) copied the Royal Society of Great Britain in its corporate name, as 

 well as in that of its transactions, and in its ideals and methods of work 

 took it for a model. 



The American Academy, on the other hand, had its origin " at a time 

 when Britain was regarded as an inveterate enemy and France as a gen- 

 erous patron," ' and its founders have placed upon record the statement 

 that it w^as their intention ' ' to give it the air of France rather than that 

 of England, and to follow the Royal Academy rather than the Royal 

 Society. ' ' '' And so in Boston the academy published Memoirs, while 

 conservative Philadelphia continued to issue Philosophical Transactions. 



In time, however, the prejudice against the motherland became less 

 intense, and the academy in Boston followed the general tendency of 

 American scientific workers, which has always been more closely parallel 

 with that of England than that of continental Europe, contrasting 

 strongly with the disposition of modern educational administrators to 

 build after German models. 



It would have been strange indeed if the deep-seated sympathy Avith 

 France which our forefathers cherished had not led to vStill other attempts 

 to establish organizations after the model of the French Academy of 

 Sciences. The most ambitious of these was in connection with the 

 Academy of Arts and Sciences of the United States of America, whose 

 centi'al seat w^as to have been in Richmond, Virginia, and whose plan 

 was brought to America in 1788 by the Chevalier Quesnay de Beaure- 

 paire. This project, we are told, had been submitted to the King of France 

 and to the Royal Academy of Science, and had received an unqualified 

 indorsement signed by many eminent men, among others by Eavoisier 

 and Condorcet, as well as a similar paper from the Royal Academy of 

 Paintings and Sculpture signed by Vernet and others. A large sum was 

 subscribed b}' the wealthy planters of Virginia and by the citizens of 

 Richmond, a building was erected, and one profes.sor. Doctor Jean 

 Rouelle, was appointed, who was also commissioned mineralogist in 

 chief and instructed to make natural-history collections in America and 

 Europe. 



The population of Virginia, it proved, was far too scattered and rural 

 to give any chance of success for a project which in its nature was only 



' Letter of Manasseh Cutler to Doctor Jonathan Stokes, August 17, 1785. 

 ^ Idem. 



