THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 3 



and the material and even the sesthetic possessions of the world. And in 

 that assurance (he continued) we may rejoice that Science has never been 

 so widely and so enthusiastically cultivated as at the present time, with 

 so complete sincerity, or (we may claim) with more brilliant success.' 

 This claim, by no means exaggerated, invites reflection upon the intimate 

 association of the results of scientific research with the daily lives and affairs 

 of everyone of us. And it is a good thing to reflect upon this, even for those 

 who have no sort of direct contact with scientific research, if only because 

 the doing so may dispel an attitude towards Science, which personifies 

 it somewhat as the ancients personified the powers of darkness, and invests 

 it with some of their sinister attributes. Such an attitude of mind is 

 fortunately less common than it used to be. Professor Lamb, in the address 

 already qiioted, referred to a certain feeling of dumb hostility toward 

 Science and its works, which still survives. No doubt it does ; but at 

 least it has ceased to be vocal, as it was in the earlier days of the Associa- 

 tion. It became loud (for example) at two of the meetings in this very place. 

 The later of these two occasions was the Oxford Meeting in 1860, and the 

 field of battle was the section of Botany and Zoology, in which the theories 

 put forward in Darwin's Origin of Species were debated, in a manner which 

 has passed into history, between Wilberforce, Bishop of Oxford, on the one 

 hand, and Huxley and Hooker on the other. 



The earlier occasion, however, more appropriately illustrates, by 

 contrast, the modern realisation of our debt to Science. 



The second meeting of the Association, in 1832, took place in Oxford. 

 The University was not, at that time, without distinguished cultivators of 

 Science. The invitation to Oxford came from Charles Daubeny, who com- 

 bined the professorships of chemistry, botany, and rural economy, and the 

 president was William Buckland, then Canon of Christ Church and pro- 

 fessor of mineralogy and geology. But a strong body of opinion resented the 

 recognition of Science by the University when carried to the extent of 

 conferring honorary degrees upon four of the distinguished visitors. The 

 famous Keble, moved for once to anger, referred to those who were thus 

 honoured as a ' hodge-podge of philosophers.' Their names were David 

 Brewster, Kobert Brown, John Dalton, and Michael Faraday. Each of 

 these men has left in the history of his own special branches of Science an 

 outstanding memorial. Brewster's researches into optics were his greatest 

 scientific achievement ; to our own gratitude he has an especial claim as 

 the leader ainong the founders of our Association. Brown's services to 



botany were unsurpassed ; perhaps that of widest appeal is his very 



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