INAUGURAL LECTURE, WRITTEN FOR THE OPENING OF THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN INSTITUTE AND DELIVERED, IN AN ABRIDGED FORM, BEFORE THE MEMBERS AND FRIENDS OF THAT ASSOCIATION, On WEDNESDAY, the 2nd of AUGUST, 1843, AT THE HANOVER SQUARE ROOM S. THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF DEVON IN THE CHAIR. LONDON: FISHER, SON, & CO., PREFACE. THE following Lecture was written on the night previous to the First Evening Meeting of the Members and Friends of THE BRITISH and FOREIGN INSTITUTE, proposed to be held in the Hanover Square Rooms, for the purpose of explaining more fully the grounds on which this new Literary Association was formed, and the advantages it would present to those who should honour it with their adhesion. It was intended at first to have been read throughout, as such Lectures usually are. But its length rendering it difficult to compress it within the space of time generally devoted to such Meetings-beyond the limits of which the attention becomes fatigued, and the interest and pleasure of the hearers abate— it was thought best to give the substance of it, with some omissions, and some abridgments, in an oral address. And this determination having been approved, it was so delivered accordingly. This explanation has been thought necessary, to account to the large and brilliant audience of nearly a thousand ladies and gentlemen who honoured this first Meeting with their presence, for such variations as they will perceive between the written and spoken matter-not variations in the sense of difference of sentiment, or opposite statements of fact, but merely in the appearance of some passages in this which were omitted in the other, and the closer connection and greater completeness, which this will, for that reason, exhibit. The main purport and general substance of both will be found to be the same. But never having yet learnt the art or possessed the power of committing set forms of words to memory, and afterwards delivering them in speech, it would not be possible for me, however much I might desire it, to adhere with literal exactness to any previously arranged order of sentences; though, to those who were present at its delivery, the general fidelity of resemblance between the two, will, it is believed, be much more remarkable than the variations. With this explanation it is committed to the press, for the purpose of extending it through a wider circle than it could otherwise reach, and at the same time for the purpose of placing on record the reasons which appear, to me at least, sufficiently powerful to justify the formation of the INSTITUTE which it describes. It may be added, that no share of responsibility for the statements made, the views entertained, or the language in which these are conveyed, attaches to any other than the writer or the utterer of them. To hope that every portion of the Lecture should be equally approved by every hearer or every reader, would be as chimerical as to expect that every member of the numerous auditory before whom it was delivered should be of like mind or like countenance. It will be enough that it receive their general and qualified approbation: and should it be honoured with this-which, from the courteous and |