430 Proceedings of the British Association. 



of mathematical deduction, then will they not only become gradually 

 negligent in the discharge of their other and more j)ractical duties, and 

 their observations themselves and their nautical almanacs will then de- 

 generate, instead of improving, to the peril of navies and of honour; but 

 also they will have done what in them lay to mutilate outward nature, 

 and to rob the mind of its heritage. For, be we well assured that no 

 euch search as this, were it only after the smallest of those treasures which 

 ■wave after wave may dash up on the shore of the ocean of truth, is ever 

 unrewarded. And small as those five seconds may appear, which stir the 

 xnind of Bessel, and are to him a prophecy of some knowledge undis- 

 covered, perhaps unimagined by man, wc uiay remember that when Kep- 

 ler was " feeling," as he said, " the walls of ignorance, ere yet he reach- 

 ed the brilliant gate of truth," he thus expressed himself respecting discre- 

 pancies which were not larger for the science of his time : — " These eight 

 minutes of difference, which cannot be attributed to the errors of so exact 

 an observer as Tycho, are about to give us the means of reforming the 

 whole of astronomj'." We, indeed, cannot dream that gravitation shall 

 ever become obsolete ; perhaps it is about to receive some new and 

 Striking confirmation ; but Newton never held that the law of the inverse 

 square was the only law of the action of body upon body, and the ques- 

 tion is, whether some other law or mode of action, co-existing with this 

 great and principal one, may not manifest some sensible efi'ect in the 

 heavens to the delicacy of modern observation, and especially of modern 

 reduction. It was worthy of the British Association to interest them- 

 selves in such a subject : it was worthy of British rulers to accede 

 promptly to such a request. I have been drawn into too much length by 

 the consideration of this instance of the external effects of our Associa- 

 tion, to be able to do more than allude to the kindred instance of the 

 publication of the Observations on the Tides in the port of Brest, which 

 has, I am informed, been ordered by the French government, at the re- 

 quest of M. Arago and the French Board of Longitudes, who were stimu- 

 lated to make that request by a recommendation of the British Associa- 

 tion at Edinburgh. Many other topics, also connected with your pro- 

 gress and prospects, I must pass over, having occupied j-our time so 

 long ; and, in particular, I must M'aive what, indeed, is properlj' a sub- 

 ject for your general committee — the consideration whether any thing can 

 be done, or left undone, to increase still more the usefulness of this 

 Association, and the respect and good-will with which it is already 

 regarded by the other institutions of this and of other countries. As an 

 Irishman, and a native of Dublin, I may be suffered, in conclusion, to 

 add my own to the many voices which welcome this goodly company of 

 English, and Scottish, and foreign visitors to Ireland and to Dublin. 



Tuesday. — After the sectional business of the day Avas con- 

 cluded, a magnificent entertainment was given to the Association 

 by the members of the Zoological Society, at their beautiful 

 gardens. In the evening, the meeting in the Eotundo heard 

 a lecture by Dr Lardner upon steam-engines, particularly as 

 lapplied to the purposes of locomotion, with details and illus- 

 trations derived from the rail-road undertakings already com- 

 pleted, and the great works in progress. 



Wednesday. — This day a splendid dejeune was given by the 

 Royal College of Surgeons. In the evening, in the Rotundo, 

 abstracts of the proceedings of the different sections were read 



