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lency encourages us to hope that you will be pleased to inquire 

 into the character and objects of our Society. If the manner 

 in which we have discharged the important duties intrusted 

 to us should meet with your Excellency's approval, we doubt 

 not that you will take a lively interest in our proceedings, 

 and extend to us that support which the efforts we have made 

 for the advancement of science and learning in this country 

 may seem to your Excellency to deserve. 



" By the constitution of the Academy, we are incorpo- 

 rated for the threefold object of promoting Science, Polite 

 Literature, and Antiquities, and the Council of the Academy 

 consists of three Committees, each charged with the direction 

 of the Academy's labours in one of these departments of 

 learning. 



" That we have not been unsuccessful in the cultivation 

 of these studies is evidenced, we trust, by the Transactions we 

 have published, which are already well and widely known. 



" Through the favour shown to us by your Excellency's 

 predecessor, the Earl of Clarendon, the Academy has become 

 possessed of a house, provided for us by Government, to which 

 we have only removed during the last week. 



" In these more enlarged and suitable premises we hope 

 in a short time to arrange and display our^Museum and Li- 

 brary, so as to make them more accessible to Students, as well 

 as more attractive and instructive to the Public. 



" Amidst the unhappy divisions which have unfortunately 

 distracted this country for so many years, the Royal Irish 

 Academy has always been neutral ground ; and it is with pride 

 and pleasure we reflect, that even if we had directly done no- 

 thing for the advancement of learning in Ireland, the labours 

 of the Academy would not have been vain were it only for 

 the evidence they afford, that in the cultivation of intellectual 

 pursuits it is possible to unite in a harmony, which has never 

 been disturbed, those who differ, notwithstanding, upon the 

 most momentous subjects. 



