Founding of the Institution 37 



agencies were coming into existence which were destined to 

 exert a very positive and decisive influence upon the charac- 

 ter of the new organization. Chief among these was the Na- 

 tional Institution, a society organized May 15, 1840, by the 

 adoption of a constitution and a declaration of objects, which 

 were, "To promote science and the useful arts, and to estab- 

 lish a national museum of natural history," etc. Its constitu- 

 tion, as printed on the cover of the second bulletin of the 

 society, was decidedly prophetic of the future plan of the 

 Smithsonian Institution. The society was established in a 

 broad and liberal way. Its membership was strong, includ- 

 ing at the beginning about ninety representative men of 

 Washington, among them members of Congress, scientific 

 men, clergymen, and prominent citizens, and an equal num- 

 ber of corresponding members, including all the leading men 

 of the country. Among its officers were ex-President Ad- 

 ams, the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Navy, the 

 Chief of Engineers of the Army, and other prominent offi- 

 cials. Its meetings were largely attended, its promoters were 

 enthusiastic, gifts of books and specimens began to come in, 

 and its prospects were in every way flattering. 



From the beginning, the Smithson legacy and its proper 

 disposition was the subject most frequently discussed by the 

 founders of the National Institution. For years, indeed, it 

 was the opinion of many influential men that this society 

 ought to be made the custodian of the Smithson fund. How 

 strongly this was urged is indicated in the letter addressed to 

 the Secretaries of War and of the Navy in 1842, in which the 

 managers stated that the object of the National Institution is 

 " to increase and to diffuse knowledge among men" making 

 prominent the words of Smithson, instead of the official 

 designation of the objects of their own society. 



The influence of the society was strongly and continuously 



