4 THE PRESIDENT S ADDRESS. 



earth's crust, must, to a great extent, ignore all preconceived opinions, 

 and exert its keenest powers to collect, verify and register facts. 

 Whether th^se facts, when ascertained, may tend to support or to 

 weaken opinions and ideas — dear as life itself, possibly — to the heart 

 of the investigator, is a matter which should be absent from his 

 thoughts, as a dangerous enemy to the rigid impartiality with which 

 his labors ought to be conducted. 



It is of surpassing importance to us all, that Truth in all its purity 

 should be unfolded to us ; it is therefore of as paramount importance 

 that those to whom we look for the precious revelation, should pursue 

 their enquiries with a perfectly free glance — and with a judicial impar- 

 tiality — unstained by the secret desire to find evidence to support a 

 forgone conclusion. 



Now, this principle is at the root of all scientific investigation, and 

 also underlies much of the distrust that attends it. If we know that 

 one man has strong opinions in favour of the Mosaic Cosmogony, and 

 another is decidedly committed against it, we know enough of human 

 nature to suspect the deductions which each may draw from his 

 researches into a subject that as yet has hardly taken its place among 

 the exacter Sciences. If we can find one whom we know to have 

 started on his enquiry determined to see and register every phenomenon 

 — one whom we can trust as not wilfully closing his eyes to appear- 

 ances at least as striking as others that he records, lest they should 

 bear against some previous theory or dogma, this man will be honoured 

 by the earnest attention of every sound mind, and his report trusted 

 as, with whatever imperfections, containing the honest record of things 

 as he saw them. 



We all know of the means pursued to get up evidence in support 

 of parti alar theories. The history of Parliamentary " Blue Books '" 

 illustrates the practice. We have heard too often how such things 

 are managed. A committee sits to take evidence on some subject of 

 projected reform — sanitary, social or financial. It is true that all are 

 invited to bear testimony, but practically the getting up of evidence 

 is in the hands of a few, and those few almost always the persona 

 most thoroughly committed to some particular specific for the evil 

 sought to be remedied. We hear of cases where the determined 

 theorist comes to enquire of men as to their knowledge of facts or 

 conclusions from observation or experience. The witness whose 

 opinions favored that of the applicant is carried off to testify ; he who 



