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no error has ever been widely accepted, save when it contained 
some grains of truth. Experience teaches us that those who 
hold opposite or apparently conflicting beliefs, are, in many 
instances, but looking with too fixed and immovable a gaze 
upon different aspects of the same object. The shield is golden 
on the one side, on the other it is of silver. Above all, trans- 
cendental speculations are not to be lightly entered upon, since 
they are not only barren in themselves, but deserve their self- 
chosen title by wholly transcending the limits of our finite 
faculties. No pseudo-philosophy ought to be allowed to seduce 
us into questioning the validity of our senses, or doubting the 
reality of the external world. Nature is the living garment of 
the Deity, and the veil of the temple — not the mere phantom 
of a diseased imagination. There, we stand on firm and solid 
ground, and there long generations to come will find scope and 
verge enough for the rational employment of those faculties, in 
virtue of which alone man claims the noble and inalienable 
title of “ Homo sapiens.” 
The Chairman (the Master of the Charterhouse) said, he was sure the 
meeting would approve a vote of thanks, both to the Author of the paper 
and the Member who had so kindly read it. 
Mr. T. Harriot adverted to the degrading influences to which this world 
was still subject, in spite of the advances of Science : influences which we 
might suppose would characterize a world in its infancy rather than our own. 
Such a state of things could only be the result of a want of Faith, the absence 
of which prevented man placing himself under the guidance of that Unseen 
Power, Who controlled the Universe and gave true wisdom to people to com- 
prehend His laws and see harmony where there now sometimes appeared 
to be discord. 
Mr. L. T. Dibdin considered that the study of mathematical science would 
be more useful as a training of the mind if it were accompanied by practical 
illustrations. Cambridge University was considered to be the great centre 
of scientific education in England, and when he went through the mathe- 
matical course there, he found that practical Experimental Science was very 
little taught, in fact almost neglected by the great bulk of the under- 
graduates. He was glad to say that the Duke of Devonshire had lately 
founded a splendid laboratory at Cambridge, with the most complete arrange- 
ments for work in experimental science ; but at present the use of the labora- 
tory was virtually restricted to graduates ; hence it could hardly be regarded 
as an Educational Establishment. Professor Challis, who gave an annual 
series of lectures on Magnetism, Electricity, and Practical Astronomy, had 
frequently found it impossible to get together enough men to form a class ; 
