A PAPER—BY WM. GOSSIP. 165 
claimed as required, by proper application and well proved 
necessity. I throw out the suggestion for what it is worth. 
Something of the kind is required to secure the proper control 
and efficient working of the Royal Society, and I hope for it a 
fair degree of attention. 
I might enlarge upon other matters favorable to ourselves and 
to similar efforts elsewhere, but neither time nor opportunity 
serve at present for more extended observations. I will remark, 
however, in conclusion, that the Dominion, with regard to every 
element of national progress, occupies a proud and enviable posi- 
tion amongst the nations of the earth. We reckon up our 
ancestry from the Norman conquest, without much thought of 
the wonderful Providence which has consolidated the nation, and 
guided it through the chaotic and brutal ignorance of that early 
period, to the contrast of its present proud rank and develop- 
ment, at the acme of civilization and refinement and progress in 
art and science of the nineteenth century. How unmeasurably 
superior is our position, To us the offspring of all the nation- 
alities of our remote ancestry, whose blood is commingled with 
that of the Saxon, the Norman, and the Gael, the habitants of 
an hemisphere of which no knowledge then existed, is the fusion 
bequeathel which has made us all Englishmen and Britons, and 
developed the greatest nation the world ever saw. Weare the 
heirs of all their progress, to mould the future of this vast 
Dominion,—not to rest here,—but to carry it onward to a far 
greater expansion. “No pent up Utica contracts our powers.” 
The vast extent of our country and its surprising fertility. 
Its settled constitutional government and _ perfect freedom. 
Its healthiness of climate everywhere. Its frontage on two 
oceans so favorable to commerce. Its mineral and finny wealth,— 
are all bases of advantage which point to a glorious destiny. It 
needs no spirit of prophesy to foretell the result if true to our- 
selves. We have already an earnest of progress towards that 
end, in the spread of our manufactures fostered by an enlighten- 
ed government—in the liberal institutions which are conferring 
their blessings on the land and helping the consummation—in 
our Royal Society and cognate institutions, under the highest 
