^O U 7/5 



1855.] 



MEETING OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT GLASGOW. 



369 



C(je CinmHint |0iinniL 



TORONTO, NOVEMBER, 1855. 



Meeting of the British Assoeiatiou at Glasgow. 



THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 



Gentlemen of the British Association, — I know, that the 

 duty of presiding over this Meeting of the British Associa- 

 tion for the Advancement of Science, has been assigned to 

 me mainly in consequence of my local connexion with the 

 district and city in which we are now assembled. It cannot 

 therefore be departing from the special duty of that position 

 if I address you in the first place as one of those who are re- 

 ceiving the honour of your visit. I am sure I cannot express 

 in terms too warm the feelings of this great community. It 

 would be strange, indeed, if Glasgow did not hold out to you 

 a cordial reception. Here, if anywhere, we have reason to ho- 

 nour Science, and to welcome the men whose lives are devo- 

 ted to its pursuit. The West of Scotland has itself contributed 

 not a few illustrious names to the number of those who have 

 enlarged the boundaries of knowledge, or have given fruitful 

 application to principles already known. I need not dwell on 

 the fact that it was in this valley of the Clyde that the patient 

 genius of Watt perfected the mechanism which first gave com- 

 plete control over the powers of steam ; and that it was on 

 these waters too that those powers were first applied in a man- 

 ner which has given new wings to commerce, and is now affec- 

 ting not less decisively the terrible operations of war. These 

 are but single examples, more striking and palpable than others 

 of the dependence of the Arts upon the advance of Science. 

 This, however, is a dependence which I am sure the citizens 

 of Glasgow would be the first to acknowledge, and which no 

 doubt, with them as with all men, must be an important ele- 

 ment in the value which they set upon physical research. But 

 I am sure I should deeply wrong the intelligence of the people 

 of Glasgow, if I were to represent them as mea.suring the value 

 of science by no other standard than its immediate applicability 

 to commercial purposes. They seek to honour science for its 

 own sake, and to encourage the desire of knowledge as in itself 

 one of the noblest instincts of our nature. 



It is my duty also, Gentlemen, to speak on behalf of a spe- 

 cial body — one of which Glasgow has so much reason to be 

 proud— I mean its ancient and venerable University. If the 

 mechanical arts owe to this district of Scotland, the greatest 

 impulse they have ever yet received, it is not less true that our 

 knowledge of the laws which regulate the pursuits of industry, 

 and determine the distribution of the "wealth of nations," has 

 been almost founded on the researches of one whose name is 

 indissolubly associated with this seat of learning. Here again 

 we have an illustrious example of the mutual relations between 

 science and politics in its best and highest definition. But, 

 indeed, our convictions arc independent of such examples. It 

 is impossible to appreciate too highly the influence which 

 science is evidently destined to have on the prospects of educa- 

 tion ; and we look for the time when its methods, as well as 

 its results, will form the subject of teaching, not only as parti- 

 ally it has long done in our colleges, but also in the humblest 

 of our schools. I feci it to be no small privilege arising out ofj 

 the academical ofiice which this year I have the honour of 

 Vol. III., No 16, November, 1855. 



holding, to be able to assure you, on behalf of the University 

 of Glasgow, of the deep interest with which we regard your 

 visit, and of our high appreciation of the ends which it is your 

 object to promote. 



It is now fifteen years since the last Meeting of the British 

 Association here. There are probably few, even annual, meet- 

 ings of any considerable body of men, which are not marked 

 by some melancholy recollections. Still more must this be the 

 case after the lapse of so long an interval, — one which measures, 

 as is usually reckoned, full half a generation in the life of man. 

 Among the many vacancies in your ranks which that period 

 has occasioned there are some which, from local association or 

 from other causes, are naturally impressed more deeply on the 

 mind than others. I am sure that one venerable name will 

 rise to the memory of all who took any interest in the proceed- 

 ings of 1840 ; — of one whose early tastes for natural science 

 had only yielded before his devotion to a yet higher service ; 

 but whose powerful mind still sought to found all his efforts in 

 the cause of religion and humanity on obedience to the eternal 

 laws, which are as sure and steady in their operation over the 

 minds of men, and over the progress of society, as are other 

 laws over the subjects of material change. Who can forget 

 the zeal and more than youthful eagerness with which Dr. 

 Chalmers entered into the discussions of the Statistical Section ; 

 and how he saw in those discussions the means of spreading 

 the knowledge of principles which are of vital interest to the 

 welfare of the State ! 



But that name, though the lapse of years has not carried it 

 beyond the region of regret, is one with which we have at least 

 become familiar as belonging to the number of the departed 

 great. Such is not the case with other vacancies, and especi- 

 ally with one which is still affecting us with almost bewildered 

 sorrow, and an abiding sense of irreparable loss. Who shall 

 take up the torch which has fallen from the hand of Edward 

 Forbes ? Who shall hold it as he held it to those dark places 

 in the history of life which science is striving, perhaps in vain, 

 to penetrate, but which seemed already opening their treasures 

 to his fine and advancing genius ? 



But whilst sad recollections are thus forced upon us as re- 

 gards the life of individual men, we have every reason to be 

 satisfied with the inheritance they have left. Many labourers 

 are gone, but the cause in which they laboured has been steadily 

 "•aining ground. Long as fifteen years may be as a period in 

 human life, it is generally but a fraction in the history of men- 

 tal progress. Yet since the last Meeting of the British Asso- 

 ciation here, I am greatly mistaken if we cannot mark great 

 strides in the advance of science. I wish, Gentlemen, you 

 had a President more competent than I am to chronicle that 

 advance, and direct the retrospect to a practical and useful end. 

 There are, however, some features so remarkable that I cannot 

 omit referring to them, as well calculated to raise our hopes 

 and stimulate our exertions. In that science which is the 

 oldest and most venerable of all, I mean Astronomy, if there 

 had been nothing else to mark the progress of discovery, the 

 construction and application of Lord Rossc's Great llellcctor 

 would have been enough to constitute an important epoch. 

 Its systematic operations may be said to be still only in the 

 first stages of their progress ; yet already how often do we see 

 reference had to the mysterious revelations it has made in dis- 

 cussions on the principles of that science, and in not a few of 

 the speculations to which they arc giving birth ! My distin- 

 guished friend Sir D. Brewster, in his recent Life of Newton, 

 has desicnatcd that telescope as "one of the most wonderful 

 combinations of art and science which the world has yet seen." 



