MKETING. o 



series of years affords a weight to their utterances which cannot 

 bo attached to the statements of those whose opportunities 

 have been comparatively Hmited. A review of the papers in 

 this Volume, so rich in contributions from authors well 

 known in the scientific world, would be out of the question 

 in a brief annual report. 



It is satisfactory to note the value placed upon the Institute's 

 Journal, as evidenced by Public Libraries in various parts of 

 the world subscribing for the whole of the volumes. 



Lectures. 



12. At home and abroad the Journal (every paper in which 

 is jDrinted under the superintendence of its own author) is 

 increasingly used by Members and others,* and it has been 

 remarked by many that they have found it of much value 

 when preparing lectures to show the falsity of the theory so 

 often propounded, " that science and philosophy are alike 

 opposed to religious belief." This idea has its advocates both 

 at home, abroad, and in some of our colonies ; and in many 

 localities the Members of this Institute and others have made 

 strong efforts to oppose it, and in so doing have found the 

 Journal, as some have expressed it, ''just what they needed.''^ 

 These have thus become centres for making the Institute 

 known, as well as carrying out its high objects. 



Translations. 



13. The translation of portions of the Journal into foreign 

 languages has long been a fact. Summaries of the proceedings 

 at the Institute's more important meetings are now published 

 in India in the five leading dialects, and a large Indian 

 society has taken a set of the second series of the Journal 



* It is gratifying to observe the results that have followed in more than 

 one instance from the use to which Members and friends have put the Trans- 

 actions. In one important colony, a formidable society, established by 

 atheists, founded several schools for boys and infants (in one infant school 

 there were seventy, in another sixty-three, and lesser numbers in others), and 

 sought by lectures and publications to prove that the progress of science had 

 jiiven a death-blow to the Christian religion. The local Members of the 

 Institute held a meeting, and arranged for lectures, to be compiled from the 

 Institute's Transactions (and a telegram was sent 12,000 miles for a further 

 supply of copies). All the inHdel leaders were specially invited to the 

 lectures (with a view to attacking the evil at its root), and very shortly 

 afterwards the vice-president of the intidel society resigned. His "Abjura- 

 tion " has been published : it is a strong denunciation of the party of which 

 he now ceases to be a leader. 



