3C Clinton's introductory discourse. 



more encouragement from the public, and more attention from the 

 members, to become highly useful to the community.* Several works 

 of great usefulness have been published, among which the Medical 

 Repository, the American Medical and Philosophical Register, and the 

 Mineralogical Journal, hold distinguished rank. And we have several 

 intelligent and enterprising booksellers, the natural and efficient patrons 

 of literature in all countries. 



A vast fund, amounting to a million and a half of dollars in value, has 

 been appropriated to the support of common schools, and that wonder- 

 ful improvement, the Lancasterian system, has obtained a firm footing. 

 Our academies and colleges are well endowed, and the blessings of 

 education are generally diffused, and, to a considerable extent, within 

 the reach of the poorest children in the community. 



But, although there is a vast mass of knowledge spread over the 

 state, yet it is, generally speaking, of the common kind : all know the 

 elementary parts of instruction, but few know the higher branches of 

 science ; and there is not so much concentrated knowledge in so many 

 individuals as in Europe. This arises from a number of causes which 

 do not disparage our intellectual character, and which, it is to be hoped, 

 will cease to operate after a short time. 



In the first place, we have, with scarcely any intermission, been dis- 

 tracted by party spirit, in its bitterest forms of exacerbation. Our 

 ingenuity has been employed, not in cultivating a vernacular literature, 

 or in increasing the stock of human knowledge, but in raising up and 

 pulling down the parties which agitate the community. This violent 

 spirit has split society asunder, has poisoned the intercourse of private 

 life, has spread a morbid gloom over our literature, has infected the 



* See Note E. 



