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tion on his part, to address any observations to a large company of scientific 
men, such as he saw around him. Had it not been for the peculiar circum- 
stances under which they met that evening, he would have contented him- 
self with acknowledging the toast. He remembered hearing a story at one 
time of a lady who married her groom, and the poor fellow was so confused 
that he did not know how to conduct himself. He went to a friend to ask 
what he should do, and the advice which he received was given in these words 
“My dear fellow, dress in black and hold your tongue. (Laughter.) 
That was precisely the course which he had intended to take that evening. 
(Laughter.) He had dressed in black, and he should have held his tongue, 
but that he felt it necessary to say a word or two with regard to their objects, 
and the lio-ht in which he looked upon the foundation of the Institute. The 
purposes for which it was established were of signal value to all who, like him- 
self, were engaged in numerous important avocations, and had no time to 
apply themselves to scientific pursuits. (Hear, hear.) The Institute would 
be of the utmost importance to those who had no means of access to the 
answers given to the deleterious nonsense published under the name of 
Science, and who were unable to test for themselves the value of the argu- 
ments put forward. It was the object of the founders of the Institute that it 
should fill up a gap for men of science, and men of principle, and men of 
intelligence, and men of research, who would watch the various publications 
as they came out,— some conceived in malignity, some in ignorance, and some 
in mistaken notions that they were adding to the general science of mankind 
—and point out where mistakes arose, and put facts in their true light, or at 
any rate induce people to pause before they pronounced an opinion upon the 
discovery of anything which seemed to be opposed to the truths of revelation. 
He recollected, when he was a young man, that points of this kind 
occasionally arose. A heretical opinion was now and then advanced ; but 
nothing came of it, and it was forgotten. But a very different state of things 
now existed. The mental activity of the age was now so great, that it gave 
them no rest ; so many new discoveries were now made, that it left them no 
time to breathe or to look around them ; so great was the impatience for 
novelty which prevailed, that when men fancied they discovered something, 
nothing satisfied them until they converted it into an Armstrong or a Whit- 
worth gun, and aimed it at revealed truth. It would be the duty of the In- 
stitute to ascertain what were facts, or whether there were any facts at all, 
and to tell the public what ought to be at once rejected, and what ought to 
be put in quarantine for a time, until it was thoroughly sifted. Above all, 
the Society must endeavour to watch the dishonest use of statements appear- 
ing in scientific works, calculated to raise doubts as to the truth of the Bible ; 
and let the world know when theories, that had been brought to bear with 
tremendous force upon the teachings of revealed religion, were exploded 
by more minute inquiry. They had seen great mischief result from the drop- 
ping of a word which implied doubt, when no refutation was given by those 
who heard it ; but what were they to think of the evil produced by a work 
such as Essays and Reviews , which had been read by hundreds who still 
