460 



EBPOET 1879. 



restricting the yearly elections to 15 members, the number of Fellows has gradu- 

 ally become smaller. The Royal Society of Edinburgh has now 428 members, 

 and the Royal Irish Academy 328 members, making altogether 1,805 members. 



In comparison with the return given in 1868, the number of members of the 

 three leading Societies was as follows, showing a decrease of 4 per cent.: — 



For the promotion of the physical and mathematical sciences, including all that 

 is classed under the various branches of natural philosophy — all, in fact, that we 

 know of the material universe — we have at least nine societies, having together some 

 5,300 members. We have, first, the Physical Society, holding its meetings at South 

 Kensington, with 270 members. Next, the Chemical Society, for the study of the 

 laws which regulate the relation of the elements with one another, and to which their 

 compounds are subject in their mutual action, and of the properties of the elements 

 and of the compounds formed by their union. The Chemical Society has made 

 considerable progress within the last ten years. It now consists of 1,015 members. 

 Geology is another branch of physical science, as the science of the earth, including 

 all the sciences that treat of the constitution and distribution of the inorganic matter 

 of the earth, as well as those which describe the living beings that inhabit it. 

 The Geological Society has 1,336 members. Astronomy is a mathematical as well 

 as a physical society. It is physical in so far as it ^is concerned with the nature 

 of the power or forces that carry on the heavenly motions, the laws that they 

 observe, and the calculation of the motions from a knowledge of their laws. The 

 Royal Astronomical Society has now 631 members. Meteorology, which treats of 

 the phenomena and modifications of the atmosphere as regards weather, climate, 

 &c, is another physical science. The Meteorological Society of England has 425 

 members ; the Scottish Meteorological Society 658 members. For mathematics, 

 as the science which has for its subject-matter the properties of magnitude 

 and number, we have the London Mathematical Society, with 147 members. And 

 in connection with the science of numbers, applicable alike to all that relates 

 to the physical, economical, moral, or intellectual condition of mankind, we have 

 the Statistical Society. Some doubt has been expressed as to whether statistics be 

 more an art than a science. Statistics are truly fit instruments in the hand of men of 

 science. In chemistry and medicine, in astronomy and meteorology, in population 

 and education, in commerce and finance, the scientific collection of facts or the nu- 

 merical expression of experience is of the greatest utility, and there is doubtless much 

 art in the using of statistics. In the words of Lord Derby in his opening address 

 to this Section at Cheltenham, its characteristics as a scientific method of obser- 

 vation are, ' that it proceeds wholly by the accumulation and comparison of regis- 

 tered facts ; that from those facts alone, properly classified, it seeks to educe 

 general principles; and that it rejects all d, priori reasoning, employing hypothesis, 

 if at all, only in a tentative manner and subject to future verification.' Dr. Guy, 

 in his paper on the meaning of the term ' statistics,' asserted the claims of Statistics 

 as a science on the ground of its exact classification and nomenclature, of its nu- 

 merical method, of its analysis in tabular forms, of its power of eliminating dis- 

 turbing elements, and establishing numerical equalities. The province of the 



