18 
REPORT OE THE 
niontlily meetings of tlie Society heard always from the Presi¬ 
dent some useful notices of the progress of science, and efforts, 
by no means unsuccessful, were made to spread through Tork- 
shme a sphit of local inquiry, which is stni active in that large 
natm’al district. 
It was fortunate for the British Association that its consti¬ 
tuent meeting was, by advice of Sm David Brewster, arranged 
at York, by the ready zeal of a Society so active and under 
such good auspices. At this meeting (in 1831) the general 
plan of proceeding and the essential basis of the Association 
were drawn up by Mr. Harcourt and proposed on the part of 
the Society which he represented. Discussed and accepted by 
a body of 367 members, among whom Mimchison was conspi- 
' cuous, they have remained practically the same, though in 
many points improved by experience through forty years of 
work. 
Over this increasing enterprise Mr. Harcoui’t, as Greneral 
Secretary, watched with unceasing vigilance for several years, 
and found many occasions for the employment of his personal 
influence in furthering the advancement of science, both by 
consultation with its acknowledged leaders and by appeals to 
the members of the Giovernment. 
Elected President of the Association at Birmingham in 
1839, he took occasion to discuss very fully the history of the 
discovery of the composition of water, supporting the claim of 
Cavendish by original documents, which were published in the 
annual Volume. Not less remarkable in this address was the 
resolute vindication of the claim of science to entme freedom of 
inquiry into the constitution of nature, and a high-minded 
rebuke of the narrow views which refused to accept geological 
and astronomical truths on account of a supposed conflict of 
these with particular passages in the Bible—passages of match¬ 
less grandem* and beauty, but not destined to teach or control 
the teaching of the principles of natural science. Breathing as 
we do now the free aii’ of advancing inquiry, there may be 
some danger of forgetting the obligations we owe to chiuchmen, 
such as Harcourt and Conybeare, who boldly employed their 
great influence to resist the heavy pressure of -well-meaning but 
