38 Royal Irish Academy. 



tinder the name of the " Dublin Society for promoting Hushandry and 

 other useful Arts in Ireland.' - 



''A supplemental Charter was granted in 1866. JS'othing is 

 enacted in it respecting a change of the objects of the Society, -which 

 is described as the Dublin Society for the Promotion of Husbandry 

 and other useful Arts and Sciences in Ireland. The intention was 

 plainly not to alter the sphere of labour which it had always honour- 

 ably fulfilled, namely, that of advancing the Agricultural and Industrial 

 interests of the country ; and the phrase ' useful Arts and Sciences ' 

 shows that it was meant still, as before, to occupy itself, not with 

 abstract Science (which had been provided for in the Eoyal Irish 

 Academy), but only with Science in relation to its industrial or 

 economic applications. The fact of some Papers not answering to this 

 description having been read at its Meetings in recent years cannot 

 affect the true character of the Society, or the correct interpretation 

 of its Charters and its history. At present, however, as we have 

 reason to know, some of its most active Members entertain the project 

 of diverting it from the objects which it was founded to promote, and 

 embarking it in the cultivation of abstract Science. To enable it to 

 alter its character in this way, a new Charter would be necessary. 



If such a Charter should be sought, it will become the duty of the 

 Hoyal Irish Academy, which was established by Eoyal Charter for 

 the cultivation of Science, in the largest acceptation of the word (a& 

 well as of other studies), and has fully and faithfully discharged its 

 duty in that field, to represent to the Government the impolicy of 

 public resources being used for the establishment in a city like Dublin 

 of a second Society, which would occupy the same intellectual 

 domain, and thus carry on an active competition, with the Eoyal Irish 

 Academy; whilst, on the other hand, Ireland would be deprived of 

 the valuable services, in relation to industrial subjects, which are 

 performed for England by the Society of Arts, aud have hitherto been 

 rendered to this country by the Eoyal Dublin Society. 



" But the point to which the Council desire at present to ask the 

 attention of the Government is a less general one, which, however, 

 requires more immediate notice. 



"In Article 4 of the terms of agreement lately entered into 

 between the Government and the Eoyal Dublin Society, it is stated 

 that the Government will authorise the Stationery Ofiice to continue 



