34] 
CHAPTER IV. 
Foundation of the Linnean Society.—Sir J. E. Smith elected Pre- 
sident.—List of the Fellows in 1790.—Letters of Mr. Smith.— 
Letters from various Foreign Professors.— Charter —Presi- 
dent’s Address on the Twentieth Anniversary. 
FouNDATION OF THE LINN2ZAN SOCIETY. 
In looking round upon the literary institutions and 
learned academies of Europe, it will be seen that 
they have generally owed their origin and success 
either to large endowments, to royal favour, or to 
the commanding influence of persons already known 
by their scientific attainments, or their station. This 
Society is almost a solitary example of an institu- 
tion deriving its origin from an individual, young 
and unknown to fame, without rank, without wealth, 
without support, whose ardour for the pursuit of 
science led him to risk the expectation of a mode- 
rate independence, by bringing into his native coun- 
try, at the expense of his patrimony, those rich 
materials for which princes had contended, and upon 
which he was to establish a new Society, and give 
to it its name, its character and direction. At the 
commencement of a lucrative professional life, Sir 
James cheerfully abandoned the promises it held 
forth, to become the leader of a band of naturalists, 
who should follow in the steps of the immortal Lin 
