ADDRESS. XXXV 



vernment, the collective science of a country should be on the most amicable 

 footing with the depositories of its power; free, indeed, from undue control 

 and interference, not dangling in antechambers, nor wiping the dust from 

 palace staircases, uncontaminated by the passions and influences with which 

 statesmen have to deal, but enjoying its good will and favour, receiving and 

 requiting with usury its assistance on fitting occasions, and organized in such 

 a manner as to afford reference and advice on topics with respect to which 

 they may be required. One more recent instance of the operations of this 

 Society in this respect I may mention, in addition to those I have slightly 

 enumerated. I do not refer in detail to other most important operations 

 which owe their origin to this Society — the Magnetic Expedition now in pro- 

 gress ; the extension of the Trigonometrical Survey on an expanded scale, sug- 

 gested by you, and liberally adopted by the Board of Ordnance — these and 

 many other similar matters are recorded in your Transactions ; and to those 

 Transactions, rather than to any defective catalogue of mine, I would refer 

 those who may doubt the benefit of our labours. The most recent instance, 

 however, I cannot omit ; I mean the important accession to the means of this 

 Society of a fixed position, a place for deposit, regulation, and comparison of 

 instruments, and for many more purposes than I could name, perhaps even 

 more than are yet contemplated, in the Observatory at Kew. This building 

 was standing useless. The Council of the Association approached the throne 

 with a petition that they might occupy it, and I am happy to say that the 

 sceptre was gracefully held towards them ; and I think this transaction a 

 fair instance of that species of connexion between science and government, 

 which I hope may always be cultivated in this country. I am informed 

 that the purposes to which this building is readily and immediately appli- 

 cable, are of an importance which none but men advanced in science can 

 appreciate. You will hear further of them in the Committee of Recom- 

 mendations. 



With reference to the past transactions of the Society, it would be a pre- 

 sumption in me to enter upon any detail. I confess, however, that on looking 

 over the printed Transactions of the year 1839, my eye was caught by a pa- 

 ragraph of the introduction to Prof. Owen's treatise on the fossil reptiles of 

 Great Britain, in which he avows that but for the assistance of the Associa- 

 tion he should have shrunk from the undertaking of that work. The context 

 to this passage is a vast one. Those who wish to feel the entire force of the 

 commentary it conveys, must follow it through the pages of subtle disquisition 

 which succeed it. I ask you, learned and unlearned alike, to give but a glance 

 at those pages. See how the greatest — am I wrong in calling him so ? — of 

 the British disciples of Cuvier walks among the shattered remnants of former 

 worlds, with order and arrangement in his train. Mark how, page after page, 

 and specimen after specimen, the dislocated vertebrae fall into their places, — 

 how the giants of former days assume their due lineaments and proportions, 

 some shorn of the undue dimensions ascribed to them on the first flush of 

 discovery, others expanded into even greater bulk, all alike bearing the inde- 

 lible mark of adaptation to the modes of their forgotten existence, and preg- 

 nant with the proofs of wisdom and omnipotence in their common Creator. 

 This is a portion, at least, of the results of this Society. I select it for no- 

 tice, because it deals with a subject which comes, partially at least, within the 

 comprehension of those to whom algebraical formulae or the hieroglyphics 

 of mathematical science are a sealed letter. 



Gentlemen, I have endeavoured by these remarks to convey to you the ge- 

 neral reasons which induced me, an unscientific man, to wish this Society 

 success, and to endeavour to assist that success by any means at my disposal. 



