Inaugural Address. 23 



occasionally, for a time, from the every- day labours of professional 

 employment to objects of a higher and more ennobling kind. 

 Let no worker in this Association ever forget the words of Milton, 

 which I once before quoted in this room on a less public occasion 

 than the present — " Let me fit audience find, though few !" 



If this Society, as constituted, is doomed to experience no 

 great patronage and no universal sympathy, if the mass of those 

 whose intelligence and capabilities, sagacity and acquirements, 

 would be useful to us, prefer to withdraw from our fellowship, we 

 must be content to remain a small, but we may still hope, a zealous 

 body, anxious to turn to account for the public good such oppor- 

 tunities as may be afforded us. 



Whilst not " wise above what is written," but humble searchers 

 into the ways of Providence, we must be content to contemplate 

 and examine the material things which we are allowed to explore ; 

 and, witB an earnest wish to discharge the important duty which 

 every man owes to his brother, we must, so far as in us lies, en- 

 deavour to point out that he also has his assigned position in the 

 Universe, since every thing proves design and skill and universal 

 goodness in the Creator, and nothing that is created is without 

 an appropriate use and office. 



Keeping this in mind, we shall not go far astray. The theories 

 of such Philosophers as tell us, that " the material heavens do not 

 declare the glory of God, but only the glory of Hipparchus, 

 Kepler, and Newton," (which is the assertion of that Philosopher 

 of the present day whose system is praised as perfect,) will have 

 no influence on such as believe that man is not descended from 

 brutes to whom reason was not given, but was "formed in the image 

 of God," and will warn us against endeavouring to prove Gfod to be 

 only the image of ourselves. These will admit that all our merely 

 human inquiries must in the end be found insufficient and vain, 

 because no finite mind can comprehend the Infinite mind or find 

 out Grod to perfection. 



This being the aim of Philosophy, let us content ourselves with 

 less presumptuous objects. Let us perform our own proper work, 

 not caring whether we ever arrive at complete knowledge of the 

 methods by which the Universe was formed and perfected — by 

 which light is produced — how solid matter has resulted from 

 gases — how attraction and repulsion are mutually balanced — how 



