SECTION IV. 1882. eee ey 
I.—The Quebec Group in Geology, with an Introductory Address. 
By A. R. C. Szuwyn, LL.D. FRS. 
(Read May 25, 1882.) 
We have already listened to the interesting address of His Excellency the patron and 
founder of our Nociety, and also to those of our esteemed President and Vice-President, 
Principal Dawson and M. Chauveau, who have dealt fully and far more ably than I 
could do, with the vast history and the future prospects of literature and science in Canada, 
including geological research, to which our President has so largely contributed. There- 
fore, but few remarks of a general nature seem to be needed from me on this occasion. 
There is, however, one subject, I desire briefly to allude to before entering on that which 
I have selected for the consideration of this the first gathering of Canadian geologists 
representing all parts of the Dominion. 
In my experience of scientific work nothing has impressed me more forcibly than the 
little sympathy and the constant “ struggle for life” which scientists have to encounter in 
new countries and by which their exertions in the cause of science are sadly hampered 
and retarded. This, doubtless, arises largely from the fact that in such countries men of 
leisure and of means are few and far between, and only a small fraction of these few is 
found who take any interest in scientific work. To the larger number such investigations 
are wholly without interest, because they leave to them no apparent or immediate prac- 
tical value or one that can be estimated in dollars and cents. In spite, however, of these 
difficulties Canadian geologists have succeeded in attaining and holding a recognized and 
highly honorable position in the scientific world. It is needless to dwell on the history 
and details of the struggle which has achieved this result and in which you all, with others 
now no more, have nobly shared. It behoves us, however, and especially the younger 
members of the corps, to remember that the fight is not ended, that, as in the past, so in 
the future, the struggle will have to be maintained. But if this Society, now so auspi- 
ciously inaugurated, effects that much needed concentration and consolidation of the efforts 
of the hitherto scattered combatants, uniting them in one solid phalanx, we may feel 
assured that the struggle of the future will be a far less arduous one than that of the past. 
More especially will this be so if we never for a moment forget that the only object of 
scientific enquiry is truth. That the soul and life of this search in which we are all 
engaged consists in the fresh interchange of thought, in the love of full and complete 
investigation, with fair and open discussion, unbiassed by and irrespective of all personal 
considerations and based not on theory, but on carefully observed and honestly stated 
facts. Such evidence, treated in the spirit I have indicated, certainly will lead us to the 
truth, but we must always guard against confounding it, as has so often been done, with 
ingenious theory and dogmatic assertion, because these, however clever or eloquently 
supported they may be, are almost certain to lead us in a direction the very opposite to 
that in which it should be our aim to travel. For similar reasons partizanship, however 
Sec. IV., 1. 
