240 Address of the President of the British Association. 



and of the pleasure which I derived from them, — (it is my own fault if 

 I did not derive profit, also, from Kidd in this place, and from Playfair 

 and from Hope in Edinburgh,) — my occupations have, for the larger 

 portions of my life, been such as to prevent my persevering in the pur- 

 suits which most of those before me have continued to follow, to their 

 own honor among their fellow men and to the benefit of our common 

 country. 



" It has been the practice of former presidents to address the first 

 general meeting of the Association on the progress of science during 

 the preceding year, and on its state and prospects in the present. Sir 

 Roderick Murchison, my eminent friend, who did honor to this chair, 

 took a comprehensive grasp of all the objects which this duty placed 

 within his reach. When 1 read his Address, I felt, even more than 

 before, my unfitness to follow him ; but such as I am, you have se- 

 lected me to succeed to his position and his duties ; and I shall en- 

 deavor to discharge my functions with as little discredit to your choice 

 as may be in my power. Whatever may be good in the observations 

 which follow this exordium, will be owing to my friends, the Rev. Dr. 

 Robinson, Prof. Owen, Mr. Robert Brown, and Colonel Sabine. Anx- 

 ious as I am not to disgrace your judgment in placing me where I am, 

 I am still more anxious not to assume a merit which does not belong to 

 me; and, therefore, unfeignedly begging you to attribute to the sources 

 which I have pointed out, whatever may in detail interest you in the 

 continuation of my Address, I am content with the distinction of calling 

 such men my personal friends. 



"I begin with Astronomy. — The progress of astronomy during the 

 past year has been distinguished by a discovery the most remarkable, 

 perhaps, ever made as the result of pure intellect exercised before ob- 

 servation, — and determining without observation the existence and 

 force of a planet ; which existence and which force were subsequently 

 verified by observation. It had previously been considered as the 

 great trial and triumph of dynamical science, to determine the distur- 

 bances caused by the mutual action of * the stars in their courses, 

 even when their position and their orbits were fully known; but it has 

 been reserved for these days to reverse the process, and to investigate 

 from the discordance actually observed, the existence and the place of 

 the wondrous stranger which had been silently, since its creation, ex- 

 erting this mysterious power. It was reserved for these days to track 

 the path and to measure the force which the great Creator had given to 

 this hitherto unknown orb among the myriads of the air. 



" I am aware that Lalande, more than fifty years ago, on two bign* 



which, if he had pursued the object then first discovered, would have 

 been well distinguished from the rest of the year, and would have added 

 new glory to his own name — did observe what is now fully ascertained 

 to have been the planet Neptune ; but though Uranus had just been 

 added to those bright orbs which to mortal eyes for more than two 

 thousand years have been known to circle our sun, Lalande was ob- 

 serving before Piazzi, Olbers, and Harding had added Ceres, Pallas 

 Juno and Vesta to that number, and before by those discoveries it was 

 proved, not only that the planets round the sun had passed the mys tlC 

 number of seven — since Herschel had confuted that ancient belief-*" 





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