FOUNDING OF THE ACADEMY 13 



the time when the idea of a national academy first began to 

 take root, these needs had been more or less adequately met. 

 Colleges had been established in most of the States of the Union 

 and were in a prosperous condition, research had been prose- 

 cuted in nearly every branch of science, and commerce and 

 the development of the country had been encouraged by exten- 

 sive surveys and other activities of the Government. The objects 

 which the founders of the National Academy of Sciences had 

 in view were of a somewhat different character. What they 

 were can best be learned from those who were leaders in the 

 movement. In the third section of the act of incorporation it is 

 provided, that " The Academy shall, whenever called upon by 

 any department of the Government, investigate, examine, ex- 

 periment, and report upon any subject of science or art." In 

 the first report of the Academy to Congress, dated March 28, 

 1864, Professor Bache, the first President, remarked: 



" The want of an institution by which the scientific strength of the country may 

 be brought, from time to time, to the aid of the government in guiding action 

 by the knowledge of scientific principles and experiments, has long been felt by the 

 patriotic scientific men of the United States. No government of Europe has been 

 willing to dispense with a body, under some name, capable of rendering such aid 

 to the government, and in turn of illustrating the country by scientific discovery 

 and by literary culture." 20 



In the report for 1867, Joseph Henry, then President of the 

 Academy, refers to the objects of the Academy in the following 

 terms: 



" The objects of this association are principally to advance abstract science, and ^ 

 to examine, investigate, and experiment upon subjects on which information is 

 desired by the government. 



" It was implied in the organization of such a body that it should be exclusively 

 composed of men distinguished for original research, and that to be chosen one of 

 its members would be considered a high honor, and consequently a stimulus to 

 scientific labor, and that no one would be elected into it who had not earned the 

 distinction by actual discoveries enlarging the field of human knowledge. 



" The names of the fifty original members were included in the act of organi- 

 zation and were chosen from among those of the principal cultivators of science 

 in this country. For the appointment of these members the academy itself is not 



20 Rep. Nat. Acad. Sci. for 1863 (1864), p. i. 

 3 



