structure will go far to give the impress of a vivid reality to the 
landscape he delineates, when, abhorring conventional forms of 
rock and mountain, he, in his compositions, bearing in mind the 
actual value and relation of all the parts of a landscape as com- 
posed by nature, transfers to his canvas the truthful impressions 
of a well stored and cultivated mind. It is this perfect truth- 
fulness that often lends so exquisite a charm to the works of the 
greatest English landscape painters of modern times, whose 
mountains and rocks are so true that the geologist can often 
pronounce their very nature and their names. 
I must now close. In succeeding Lectures it will be one of 
my aims to inculcate that a sound knowledge of theory is indis- 
pensable towards all the applications of geology, whether economic 
or otherwise. Let not any man consider that when he has 
mastered the few facts that may be immediately turned to 
account in money getting, that his geological education is com- 
plete. The men who first educed all our great results were 
mainly actuated by the love of truth alone ; and the applications 
are an accidental fruit of that love. On every possible ground 
it is, therefore, worse than impolitic to undervalue any truly 
philosophical work of the geologist, whether it be shown in the 
unravelment of geological intricacies in the mountains, or in 
abstract studies in the closet. As a point of conscience actuated 
by these principles, it has been the aim of those engaged on the 
geological survey to carry accuracy of scientific detail to the 
extremest possible limit ; and (independently of any immediate 
benefit to science and to the owners of the soil) who can predict 
what may yet arise to further the arts of peace from such 
labours, even in districts apparently the most unprofitable? 
Let no geologist, therefore, be discouraged because of the 
sneering cry cui bono. The true man of science will not 
heed it ; and hitherto geologists have pursued their ends un- 
scared. 
No people has produced so many men eminent in geology 
as the British Isles. Though not the birth-place of geology, it 
is here that it has been principally fostered and reared to its 
present goodly stature, within the memory of many yet living. 
Of the illustrious men who aided in this work some have 
