10 
REPORT OF 
State of the Museum and the expectations of the contributors 
so imperiously demand. But such a state of inaction would 
be a virtual abandonment of all the objects which have been 
so warmly cherished and so successfully prosecuted, and 
repugnant to the spirit of the Institution. If the Society 
had been accustomed to rely entirely or chiefly on its own 
pecuniary resources for the storing of its Museum, if its 
objects were confined within a narrow sphere, and no particular 
interest were felt in its prosperity beyond the neighbourhood 
of its establishment, it might remain in a state of languor, 
without exciting general disappointment; it would have only 
to abstain from fresh purchases, and to make the best use it 
could of what it already possessed. But such is not the 
character or the condition of this Society. It is, as its first 
excellent President has emphatically and justly described it, 
a County Institution, destined for active and increasing 
exertion. Its objects are most comprehensive; and with these 
the interest excited in its welfare is fully commensurate. Por 
the rich treasures of its Museum, it is indebted almost 
entirely to the zeal and liberality of its Members and its 
friends : what it has received is only an earnest of much more 
to come. As its various collections increase, and their value 
and importance in aiding the pursuit of science are more 
generally experienced, the zeal and liberality of contributors 
will increase in proportion, and nothing can check them but 
the inability of the Society to provide proper receptacles for 
the contributions poured in upon it, not only from the County 
of York, but from the most distant regions of the globe, and 
to dispose of them in such a manner as shall secure the 
attainment of the end for which they are bestowed. To that 
inability, which cannot but prove highly detrimental, the In¬ 
stitution will be reduced, if the difficulties under which it now 
labours be not removed. Under this conviction, the Council 
earnestly call upon the Annual Meeting to adopt such means 
as may appear most advisable for immediately diminishing that 
