209 
ORDINARY MEETING, Monday, 4th April, 1870. 
The Rey. George Henslow, M.A., F.L.S., F.G.S., in the 
Chair. 
The Minutes of the previous Meeting having been read and confirmed, 
The Secretary announced that the Rev. William S. Smith, M.A., of Bir- 
kenhead, had been elected a member, and the Rev. H. H. Bourne, F.R.S.L., 
of Ipswich, a 2nd Class Associate of the Institute. 
The Secretary also announced the presentation of the following books to 
the Institute : — 
Christianum Organum.” By the Rev. J. Miller, M.A. From the Author. 
“ Fejee and the Fejeeans.” By the Revs. Thos. Williams and J. Calvert. 
From the Authors. 
The Chairman. — We will now proceed to discuss the paper read by Mr. 
Reddie before the Institute on the 7th March, its title being “ Atheism Con- 
futed by a new Argument ; or, Why Man must believe in God.” 
Rev. Dr. Deane. — I rise to order. It appears to me that the discussion 
of this paper is hardly within the scope of our Society. It may seem bold 
on the part of a private member to suggest such a thing when the Council of 
the Institute have arranged their plans ; but my reasons for doing so are 
these : first of all, the course now adopted displaces the paper which was 
already put down in our programme as the paper to be read and discussed to- 
night — I mean Mr. Morshead’s paper on “ Comparative Psychology.” Many 
people may have been induced to come here to-night in order to hear 
Mr. Morshead’s paper read ; but that paper is suddenly withdrawal, which is 
rather an unusual proceeding, that ought not to be adopted without very 
good reason for it. I do not, however, press that point ; but I venture to 
think that the discussion of atheism does not at all enter into the duties or 
intentions of this Society. I will not trouble you by reading all the objects 
for which the Victoria Institute was formed, but the first object, as printed 
in our Transactions, is — 
“ To investigate fully and impartially the most important questions of phi- 
losophy and science, but more especially those that bear upon the great 
truths revealed in Holy Scripture, with the view of defending those truths 
against the oppositions of science, falsely so called.” 
Now I do not see how this paper does defend these truths against the 
oppositions of science. It does not appear to me to be upon any positive 
subject whatever, because atheism is a negation — it is clearly no science — 
