1870 PRESIDENT OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION 21 



pour this as a libation to the tutelary deities of the 

 town." 



The same evening he was the guest of the Sphinx 

 Club at dinner at the Royal Hotel, his friend Mr. P. 

 H. Eathbone being in the chair, and in proposing the 

 toast of the town and trade of Liverpool, declared 

 that commerce was a greater civiliser than all the 

 religion and all the science ever put together in the 

 world, for it taught men to be truthful and punctual 

 and precise in the execution of their engagements, 

 and men who were truthful and punctual and precise 

 in the execution of their engagements had put their 

 feet upon the first rung of the ladder which led to 

 moral and intellectual elevation. 



There were the usual clerical attacks on the 

 address, among the rest a particularly violent one 

 from a Unitarian pulpit. Writing to Mr. Samuelson 

 on October 5 he says : 



Be not vexed on account of the godly. They will 



have their way. I found Mr. 'a sermon awaiting 



me on my return home. It is an able paper, but like 

 the rest of Ms cloth he will not take the trouble to make 

 himself acquainted with the ideas of the man whom he 

 opposes. At least that is the case if he imagines he 

 brings me under the range of his gum 



On October 2 he writes to Tyndall : 



I have not yet thanked you properly for your great 

 contribution to the success of our meeting [i.e. his lecture 

 " On the Scientific Uses of the Imagination "]. I was 

 nervous over the passage about the clergy, but those con- 



