RECORDS OF MEETINGS. C89 



Stephen Sewall, Esq'., the Rev^ Edward Wigglesworth & the Rev*? 

 Samuel Williams, be a Committee to agree upon the names, number 

 and duties of the several officers they shall judge necessary or con- 

 venient to the Academy and the tenure or estate they shall respectively 

 have in their offices : Also to prepare such rules, orders and bye-laws, 

 as they shall judge necessary or convenient for the well-ordering and 

 good government of the Academy. Also to consider of the times, 

 places and manner of convening the Fellows of the Academy and the 

 number of Fellows which shall be present to constitute a meeting of 

 the Academy : to devise a common seal for the Academy, to consider 

 for what causes fines shall be levied & what the fines shall be, and to 

 report their proceedings upon the premises at the adjournment of this 

 meeting. 



5. That this meeting be adjourned to the second Wednesday of July 

 next at ten o'clock in this place. 



The President called attention to the words in the minutes, 

 " The R,ev. President Langdon then prayed," and asked Rev. 

 Edward H. Hall if he could remove an odium scientiiie from the 

 academy in abandoning this custom — in the hope that he would 

 assure the members that although they were birds of passage — 

 lone wandering — they were not lost. 



Reverend Mr. Hall then spoke as follows : 



The Revd. President Langdon then prayed. 



It is well that the ravages of time have preserved for us this brief 

 statement, for so far as appears, that was the first and perhaps the last 

 time that the divine blessing was invoked within the Academy walls. 

 There was no special intent in this, for the absence of prayer was by no 

 means unknown in the early Puritan gatherings, and we find Governor 

 Bowdoin, the first president of the Academy closing his inaugural ad- 

 dress with a full evangelical invocation of almighty favor and support ; 

 at the same time, in view of the perfunctory character so often assumed 

 in this service, it is a satisfaction to remember this relation of religion 

 to science through the whole history of the Academy ; each paying due 

 honor to the other with as little intrusion as possible into the other's 

 domain. Science I suppose pays best homage to religion by showing 

 its reverence for the laws of the universe without attempting to force 

 its spiritual interpretation upon them. 



Meantime it is pleasant to note that the American Academy turned 

 at once to Harvard College in initiating its career. The Rev. Samuel 

 Langdon was not one of the most noted of our early presidents. 



VOL. XLVI. — 44 



