204 
by endeavouring superficially to " cram " — to use a common 
phrase — the most recent knowledge upon these questions, 
for the purpose of addressing them, he should have really 
been presenting himself before them, to a certain extent, 
under false pretences. It was quite true that he had 
been for many years a student of natural science in 
several of its branches, and to some extent of Geological 
Science ; but his various avocations. Parliamentary and 
official, during the last quarter of a century, had so much 
taken up his time as to have rendered it impossible for him 
to pursue those delightful studies in any solid or continuous 
manner, and consequently, he felt that it would be an imper- 
tinence on his part, being but an humble student of these 
sciences, to attempt to speak to those who had studied them 
so long, and many of them so carefully, in any degree in the 
position of a teacher. Consequently he abandoned that idea, 
because he had always had a very great dislike to people 
talking about what they did not thoroughly and completely un- 
derstand ; and he was quite sure that if there were any branch 
of knowledge in which that was undesirable it was in the vari- 
ous branches of natural science ; for, surely, it was of the first 
importance for any student of those sciences that, as he made 
step by step in pursuit of them, he should keep constantly 
before him the recollection of the limits of the knowledge he 
had made his own, and that in each step he took, before he took 
a new one, he should be confident that he had really firmly 
established himself upon the ground which he occupied. 
Therefore he would confine himself to the more modest, 
but, as it seemed to him, far more fitting position of 
heartily welcoming the members of the Society to the 
city of E-ipon, and expressing the great satisfaction which it 
gave him that they should have visited it, and to say one or 
two words to those who, like himself, were only students of 
those interesting and attractive sciences, to which many of 
