Royal Society. g3 



others in their search after useful Icnowledge and true glory The 

 president then announced, that the second medal on the Royal 

 foundation was awarded to James Ivory, M.A., for his papers on 

 the laws regulating the forms of the planets, on astronomical re- 

 fractions, and on other mathematical illustrations of important parts 

 of astronomy. He then entered into a particular view of the me- 

 rits of the papers communicated by Mr. Ivory to the Royal Society 

 being seven in number, on the most difficult and abstruse points of 

 science; and quoted M. de Laplace as having borne testimony to 

 some of their merits. After paying some high compliments to 

 Mr. Ivory for his disinterested pursuit of objects of science which 

 have no immediate popularity, and which are intelligible only to a 

 few superior minds, and stating that all the mathematicians of the 

 council were unanimous in claiming this reward for him ; he said 

 he felt satisfaction in the hope that this reward mio-ht as an ex 

 ample, renovate the activity of the Society, which for^so many years 

 was pre-eminent in this department of science, and that it mi^ht 

 return, veteris vestigia Jlamma, with new ardour to its long nec^lected 

 fields of glory. ^ 



Whether, said the President, we consider the nature of the 

 mathematical science or its results, it appears equally among the 

 nob est objects of human pursuit and ambition. Arisino- a work of 

 intellectual creation, from a iesv self-evident propositions on the 

 nature of magnitudes and numbers, it is gradually formed into 

 an instrument o? pure reason, of the most refined logic, applyin- to 

 and il ustratmg all the phenomena of nature and art? and embracinc. 

 the whole system of the visible universe. And the same calculus 

 measures and points out the application of labour, whether bv 

 animals or machines-determines the force of vapour, and confines 

 the power of the most explosive agents in the steam engine— re- 

 gulates the forms of structures best fitted to move through the 

 waves-ascertains the strength of the chain bridge necessary to 

 pass across arms of the ocean-fixes the principles of permanent 

 foundations m the most rapid torrents ; and, leaving the earth filled 

 with monuments of its power, ascends to the stars, measures and 

 weighs the sun and the planets, and determines the laws of their 

 niotions ; and even brings under its dominion those cometary masses 

 that are, as it were, strangers to us, wanderers in the immensity of 

 space; and applies data gained from the contemplation of the 

 sidereal heavens to measure and establish time, and movement, and 

 niagnitudes below. ' 



In announcing the award of the medal on Sir Godfrey Copley's 

 foundation, for this year, the President stated, that it had bc4n 

 given to James South, Esq. for his paper on the observations of 

 the apparent distances and positions of 458 double and triple stars, 

 published in the present volume of the Transactions 



Ihe researches and observations of double stars, said the Presi- 

 den, recommended by Mr. Mitchell, were pursued at first by Sir 

 \\ilham Herschel, in the hope of discovering the parallax of the 

 fixed stars ; and, afterwards, when his discoveries opened new views 

 of the nature of the sidereal heavens, with the hope of ascertaining 



whether 



