and Proceedifigs of the late Viesident of the Roy ul Society . 173 



*' The bitter spirit" (as the writer in the New Times calls it) 

 did not " break out on the dismissal of Dr. Hutton from one of 

 the secretaryships," but much earlier. Some of the causes which 

 fomented it will appear by a few quotations from a pamphlet 

 entitled " An History of the Instances of Exclusion from the 

 Royal Society," published early in 17S4. 



" The charge we bring against Sir .Tojeph Banks is, that, 

 though not entrusted with any such power, either by statute or 

 custom, and very unfit, from his acknowledged violence of temper, 

 and from his incapacity to judge of literary qualifications, ia 

 which he is himself shamefully deficient, to be entrusted with it, 

 he has repeatedly interposed in a clandestine manner, to procure 

 rejections of proper candidates, with the visible design of taking 

 away the privilege of the body at large, and making himself the 

 sole master of the admissions, — in other words, the monarch of 

 the Society." 



tant and extensive. AVe honour the great inventors — the world is debtor to 

 Nkwton. But of a thousand mathematicians, not the human cube root has, 

 ever been, or will be, more than the depository of the dusty problems, that 

 the bookmakers of the art, the Simpsoxs, and Huttons, and Bonny- 

 lASTLES, have transmitted to them. Tliis pride ' that pnflcth up,' has 

 had more fatal powers of perversion, and religion has no where found more 

 inveterate prejudice or more morbid repulsion than among those men, ren- 

 dered incapable of discerning truth unless it came in the whole dignity of 

 an algebraic formula. The bitter sjjirlt broke out in the Royal Society on 

 the dismissal of Dr. Hvtton from one of the secretaryships. How Dr. Hi r- 

 TON, whose life, till he was mature, was spent in keeping a village school 

 in Westmoreland, [indaUcet, the vW.nge of Newcastle upon Tyne,] could have 

 sustained the office without numberless offences agairst the Jiabits of good 

 society, it is difficult to conjecture j and his merits as a mathematician were 

 common-place. 



* Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage; 

 And even the saying ran, that he could gauge.' 



" Sir Joseph Banks, in point of general accomplishment, public utility, 

 and rational and enlarged employment of Ills understanding, was worth the 

 whole host, of which no single name did honour even to their ov/n narrow 

 pursuit. HoKSLKv, after-vards a bishop, was the principal among the dis- 

 turbers. His Comraentaiy on the PriHcip/a,the most meagre and inefficient 

 that ever came from the press, is this man's tribute to science. But he 

 was virulent, insolent and intriguing. The Bench restrained him, and he 

 jjradi'.Hlly cooled , but in the hostility against Sir Joseph Banks he gave 

 full way to the bitterness of his nature. The President's conduct was ))ut 

 to the vote, and on the 8th of January 17'-^-l, t1ie Resolution " that this So- 

 ciety do approve of Sir Joskph IIan lis for their President, and will support 

 him," wiis carried by a great majority. Measures of conciliation were now 

 adopted. A vote was passed, that Dr. Hutton had done nothing to forfeit 

 tlie confidence of the Society : and, on the other hand, tliat it would be 

 more convnient to have his office executed by a resident in London. Since 

 that period opposition has slept. The Presidency has been in honour and 

 activity." 



In 



