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ADVERTISEMENT. 



1 HE Committee appointed by the Royal Society to direct the 

 publication of the Philosophical Transactions^ take this opportunity 

 to acquaint the Public, that it fully appears, as well from the 

 council-books and journals of the Society, as from repeated de- 

 clarations which have been made in several former Transactions^ 

 that the printing of them was always, from time to time, the 

 single act of the respective Secretaries, till the Forty-seventh 

 Volume : the Society, as a Body, never interesting themselves 

 any further in their publication, than by occasionally recom- 

 mending the revival of them to some of their Secretaries, when, 

 from the particular circumstances of their affairs, the Transactions 

 had happened for any length of time to be intermitted. And 

 this seems principally to have been done with a view to satisfy 

 the Public, that their usual meetings were then continued, for the 

 improvement of knowledge, and benefit of mankind, the great 

 ends of their first institution by the Royal Charters, and which 

 they have ever since steadily pursued. 



But the Society being of late years greatly enlarged, and their 

 communications more numerous, it was thought advisable that a 

 Committee of their members should be appointed, to reconsider 

 the papers read before them, and select out of them such as they 

 should judge most proper for publication in the future Transac- 

 tions; which was accordingly done upon the 26th of March, 

 1752. And the grounds of their choice are, and will contipue to 



