89 



of science which are compreliended in the cycle of the preceding 

 year. 



I trust, Gentlemen, that these laws for the distribution of the 

 Royal Medals, if strictly adhered to, and judiciously administered, 

 will be found to stimulate the exertions of men of science, by se- 

 curing to their labours, when inserted in our Transactions, that cer- 

 tain and periodical revision which they are naturally so anxious to 

 obtain ; and by signalizing any remarkable investigation, or notable 

 discovery, by the marked and prompt approbation of those persons 

 in this country who are mxost likely to be able to judge of its value. 



It was partly for the furtherance of the same great object, which 

 was proposed in framing the statutes for the award of the Royal 

 Medals, so as to secure to each branch of science in succession its 

 due amount of notice and encouragement, that the Council have 

 determined to establish permanent Committees of Science. They 

 are composed of a selection of those Fellows of the Society who 

 are known to have devoted their attention, in a more especial man- 

 ner, to those departments of science to which they are severally 

 assigned, and to whom all questions connected with such branches 

 are proposed to be referred, including the selection of the memoirs 

 to which the Royal Medals shall be given. The Council have 

 thought proper, likewise, in the formation of these committees, to 

 enlarge the number of the sciences, which form the Medallic cycle 

 above referred to, from six to eight, by separating the science of 

 Meteorology from that of Physics, and the science of Botany and 

 the laws of Vegetable Organization and Life, from that of Zoology 

 and Animal Physiology. I sincerely rejoice. Gentlemen, in the 

 adoption of this arrangement, as I think it admirably calculated to 

 give a more marked and specific distinction to those sciences which 

 the Fellows of the Royal Society are bound more especially, by the 

 obligations of the Charter, to cultivate, and as tending, likewise, to 

 bring those persons who are engaged in common pursuits into more 

 frequent intercourse with each other ; and thus to afford them in- 

 creased opportunities of appreciating their mutual labours, of de- 

 vising new and important trains of investigation, as well as of se- 

 curing public aid and general co-operation in the accomplishment 

 of objects which are too costly or too vast for individuals to under- 

 take or to attempt. 



The future developement of many of the sciences is becoming 

 daily more and more dependent upon co-operative labour. We are 

 rapidly approaching great and comprehensive generalizations, which 

 can only be completely established or disproved by very widely 

 distributed and, in many cases, by absolutely simultaneous observa- 

 tions. Major Sabine has lately collected with great labour, and re- 

 duced and analysed with great ability, a vast mass of observations 

 relating to the distribution of the earth's magnetism ; and the result 

 has pointed out not merely the proper fields of our future researches, 

 but likewise their great extent and the enormous amount of labour 

 still required for their cultivation. A society on the continent, headed 

 by the justly celebrated Gauss, to whom the Copley Medal has been 



