453 
THE APRIL MEETING, 1844 . 
It is consolatory to reflect, that the Institute can thus be employed and patronized 
by the Government, without exercising any doubtful powers ; and, while doing it, 
can advance both the public interests and the cause of learning. It is always 
auspicious to that cause, when a government can participate in its glories, so much 
more congenial to the genius of an enlightened people, and so much more enno¬ 
bling to their free institutions, than many of the ephemcron strifes of political 
warfare. Still more will it be a matter of congratulation, if the Institute should 
also be used by the Government in the performance of a sacred trust, which it has 
assumed in relation to the Smithsonian fund. The money for this has been actually 
accepted and placed in the treasury to the extent of more than half a million of 
dollars. The noble task of increasing and diffusing knowledge among men , by 
means of that liberal trust, the General Government has, in the face of the world, 
undertaken to see performed ; and through whom can it more efficiently and cre¬ 
ditably act in executing such a trust, than a body of men, under its own eye, its 
own directions, its own laws—men, also, who, asking nothing but payment of 
the actual expenses incurred in taking care of the public property, are willing to 
labor in this cause without fee or reward, beyond the consciousness of being useful 
to their race and extending wider the dominion of science and sound knowledge ? 
Respectfully, yours, 
LEVI WOODBURY. 
Francis Markoe, Jr., Esq.., 
Corresponding Secretary of the Nationa.1 Institute. 
s 
No. 3, 
3 
