AN ADDHESS, &C. XXVll 



niary assistance, cautiously bestowed, ingenious native or 

 foreign artists; by facilitating the discovery of the nume.* 

 rous mineralogical treasures with which the bowels of our 

 country are stored, and forming a cabinet of all those sent to 

 him, for the inspection of artists in future, who may wish to 

 know their localities and various qualities. By means of 

 such an officer, government may command at any moment 

 the intellectual resources of the United States; and thus, 

 upon an emergency in the public affairs, recourse could be 

 had without delay to the combined advantages of a know- 

 ledge of the locality of numerous raw materials, and of the 

 best method of employing them for the purposes to which 

 they were applicable. The benefits of such resources are ob- 

 vious, but will be more fully estimated by those who know 

 the energetic impulse that was given to France, by such an 

 appeal, during the gloomy years of public scarcity in some 

 articles most essential to civilized existence, and to public 

 defence. Through such an officer a system of statistics 

 could be established, that would enable the government to 

 know precisely, or as it were to show a balance sheet of the 

 actual state of the country, as to various branches of manu- 

 factures, arts and agriculture: their increase, or decrease, 

 and the propriety of granting or withholding legislative pro- 

 tection. In like manner he might ascertain the gradual in- 

 crease of population, the chances of existence and the pro- 

 portions of births to deaths, in different parts of the United 

 States, a species of knowledge of incalculable consequence 

 to this country, and for want of which we are obliged to de- 

 pend in the case of insuring a life, for calculations formed 

 upon observations on mortality made at Breslaw in Silesia, 

 Stockholm, Northampton. London or Paris. But it would 

 be tiresome even to enumerate all the objects connected 

 with the improvement of the country to which such an officer. 



