318 What Made the Institute Possible. ■ 



In now offering, as it seems becoming that I should, a few remarks 

 of my own, as an introduction to this short series of papers, I design 

 not to enter into any scheme of elaborate research or critical examina- 

 tion, but merely to throw into connected form a few- ideas that I have 

 long entertained, respecting the value and purposes of the Institute; 

 treating the matter, as is necessary, upon something of a historical 

 plane, and apart from that, attempting to deduce from it some 

 thoughts which may tend to awaken us to a fair conception of our real 

 importance. In an association of the character of the Albany Insti- 

 tute, whose course is so uniform and monotonous as sometimes to grow 

 almost sluggish, it is very easy at times to sink into an apathetic state, 

 whereby we may become habituated to take up the tone of outside 

 critics, and seeminglj learn to depreciate the excellence that really 

 belongs to us. If we would be comprehended aright by others, we 

 must resolve to comprehend ourselves; and I question whether at this 

 moment there may not be many of our members who are inclined to 

 yield to the seductive languor w hich leads to the contemplation of 

 mere continued dull existence rather than of occasional results, and in 

 this spirit give tacit assent to those outside utterances which speak only 

 in our depreciation and discredit. 



This tendency to belittle may, perhaps, be realized, as well as in 

 any other way by noting the expression with which the heading to this 

 paper would be received, if given our as a question. What made the 

 Institute possible? What is the meaning of such a question? — would, 

 perhaps, be responded. .Vie I what is there about the Institute which 

 should make its existence impossible under any circumstances or among 

 any people? In the eye- of many, it is merely a collection of some 

 twenty or thirty quiet gentlemen of more or less scientific taste or cul- 

 ture, as the case may he, who amuse themselves by meeting together 

 at stated periods, and reading papers — over which many yawn, but of 

 which all politely approve at the end; — which papers are then pub- 

 lished and at once relegated to obscure places upon high shelves in 

 public libraries, from whence they are never again lifted. Why should 

 not the Institute easily exist in perpetuity, if it should be the taste of 

 its members to continue so to meet? And why cannot similar associ- 

 ations be formed any and everywhere, as long as in this or that village 

 or city, twenty or thirty complacent gentlemen can be found, to call 

 themselves a scientific society? But to the more comprehensive and 

 far-reaching mind there must be something different from this. There 

 must be the basis of three or four hundred members, who, if seldom 



