44 MEMOIR OF AUGUSTUS DE MORGAN. 



and that any farther alteration will be merely a distinction 

 without a difference. I firmly believe that every member of the 

 Council has acted to the best of his ability and opportunity, and 

 also feel that the Council, as a body, has ever shown itself more 

 zealous about substance than about quibbling forms ; but they 

 might as well frame laws and institutions for Mars or Jupiter as 

 for thoue who are predetermined to be dissatisfied. 



I therefore trust, in order that tne vigour of the Society 

 may not be fettered, that the Council will take effectual steps to 

 repel every disorderly attempt to impute motives or impugn its 

 conduct, as well as to stifle their rancorous disputes, which can 

 only engender an atrophy of moral work. If this is not insisted 

 on, the meeting, which was purely instituted for the propagation 

 of Science, will quickly degenerate into a spouting club, in which, 

 instead of the adduction of undistorted facts, we shall be exposed 

 to all the artillery of premisses without conclusions, and conclu- 

 sions without premisses, added to the iteration of undigested 

 thoughts in all the turgidity of ill-taste; and even were the 

 reasoning powers among us more perfect, we should only be 

 making much noise and little progress, leaving the good uncer- 

 tain and remote, while the evil would be certain and immediate. 

 Moreover, the disputatious system, being both irritable and irri- 

 tating, is altogether as absurd for astronomers as would be the 

 dramatising of Newton's Principia. 



I therefore firmly hope that a perfect union in the cause we 

 are embarked on will distinguish our efforts, for the straightfor- 

 ward course of duty is as perfectly practicable as it is desirable. 

 I have the honour to be, sir, 



Your obedient servant, 



W. H. SMYTH. 



Professor De Morgan, Sec. Ast. Soc. 



Who the individual was whose e whims ' Captain 

 Smyth refers to I cannot say. But it is a significant fact 

 that Sir J. South, whose Presidency had not expired when 

 the charter was granted, was not re-elected in the new 

 staff of officers, nor does his name appear on the Council 

 after this time. 



Mr. De Morgan's acquaintance with his colleagues on 

 the Council of the Astronomical Society became in several 

 cases intimate friendship. His friends were Mr. Baily, 



