X 
PREFACE. 
As regards the work in which the Institute is engaged, it is 
eminently satisfactory to see the important place given to 
Scientific Research during the past two years, and the en- 
couragement it receives from many governments. The pro- 
gress of Science, in the development of scientific facts, is 
the surest mode of preventing that antagonism between the 
Book of Nature and the Book of Revelation which obtains 
when scientific conjecture takes the place of accurate inquiry . 
When writing upon this subject in the Preface to the Fifth 
Volume of the Journal of the Victoria Institute, we quoted 
some valuable remarks by Professor G. Stokes, P.R.S., on 
the distinct provinces of Science and of Revelation, and Dr. 
W. B. Carpenter, F.R.S., when speaking as President of the 
British Association in 1872 (see page xiv., vol. vi.), saw occa- 
sion for uttering the warning which may well be repeated 
h ere: — “When Science, passing beyond its own limits, 
assumes the place of Theology, and sets up its own concep- 
tion of the order of Nature, as a sufficient account of its 
cause, it is invading a province of thought, to which it has 
no claim.” 
F. PETRIE. 
Hon Sec. and Editor. 
81 st December, 1874. 
