30 Scientific Societies. 



followers of Hercules — the strong, earnest, and laborious inquirers 

 after truth ; and when she does reveal them to any man, that man 

 becomes the benefactor and enlightener of the world. Some such 

 men I saw last August at Nottingham, and looking round it was 

 with regret and sorrow that I found myself unable to discover 

 among these wise, practical philanthropists even a dozen men who 

 had ever been at public schools. Surely this is a source of sorrow, 

 even if it be not a source of reproach to us. Need it continue to 

 be so any longer ? I am sure it need not ; I trust it will not. 

 And I say unhesitatingly that 1 look to this Scientific Society as 

 one of the means which may tend to hasten abetter state of things. 

 I only wish from the bottom of my heart that there had been such 

 a society when I was a boy at school. The accidental awakening 

 of a tendency, the chance development of an aptitude, might have 

 made all the difference in my own life, as it may make all the 

 difference in many lives. For, remember, in dwelling on the 

 gigantic practical utility of science, I have been dwelling on that 

 which all truly scientific men regard least in its history. What they 

 regard is the discovery of truth, for the sake of truth, and for the 

 love of truth alone ; the deciphering of God's inscriptions, because 

 they are His, and independently of what they may reveal. I 

 might have dwelt equally on the value of scientific inquiry to the 

 mind in elevating and strengthening its powers ; or on the deep 

 true happiness it involves; or on its genuinely spiritual and reli- 

 gious aspect — " when we can look forth into that ample world of 

 daylight which we can never hope to overrun, and into that over- 

 arching heaven, where, amid clouds, lightning, and sudden tempest, 

 there are revealed, to those who look for them, lucid openings into 

 the pure, deep empyrean, as it were the very body of the heaven 

 in its clearness ; and when, best of all, we may remember who it 

 is who stretched out the heavens as a tent to dwell in, and on 

 whose footstool we may kneel, and out of the depths of our heart 

 cry aloud Te Deum veneramur, te sancte Pater." 



If then any ask what we, the Harrow Scientific Society', have 

 done, I answer thus: — we have enjoyed friendly, and I trust 

 happy, interesting, and stimulating opportunities for meeting 

 each other on a common intellectual ground as fellow students 

 in the wonderful works of God ; we have seen, and constantly 

 see, many objects of extreme beauty, and scientific interest; we 

 have listened to some very admirable papers ; we have discussed 

 some very curious problems ; we have been honoured by the visit 

 of some very eminent representatives of English literature and 

 English science ; we have received, and are constantly continuing, 

 to receive for the use of the School some valuable presents from 

 donors known and unknown who felt a desire to see among us a 



