Let us now consider the case of platina. A new process was discovered of rendering it malleable, and the mere circumstance of so large a quantity having been sent into the market, was a positive benefit, of no ordinary magnitude, to many of the arts. The discoverer of this valuable process selected that course for which no reasonable man could blame him; and from some circumstance, or perhaps from accident, he preserved no written record of the manipulations. Had Providence appointed for that disorder, which terminated too fatally, a more rapid career, all the knowledge he had acquired from the long attention he had devoted to the subject, would have been lost to mankind. The hand of a friend recorded the directions of the expiring philosopher, whose anxiety to render useful even his unfinished speculations, proves that the previous omission was most probably accidental. Under such circumstances it was published to the world in the Transactions of the Royal Society. But what could induce that body to bestow on it their medal? To talk of adding lustre to the name of Wollaston by their medal, is to talk idly. They must have done it then as an example, as a stimulus to urge future inquiries in the career of discovery. But did they wish discoveries to be so endangered? The discoveries of Professor Mitscherlick, of Berlin, had long been considered, by a few members of the Society, as having strong claims on one of its honorary rewards; but difficulties had arisen, from so few members of the Council having any knowledge of discoveries which had long been familiar to Europe. The Council were just on the point of doing justice to the merits of the Prussian philosopher, when it was suggested that its medal should be given to Dr. Wollaston, and they immediately altered their intention, and thus enabled themselves to reserve their medal to Professor Mitscherlick for another year; at which period, for aught they knew, his discoveries might possess the additional merit of having been made prior to the limit allowed by their regulations. That medal was, in fact, voted at a meeting, at which no one member present was at all conversant with the subjects rewarded. I shall, however, say no more on this subject. They erred from feeling, an error so very rare with them, that it might be pardoned even for its singularity. I will, however, add one word to those whose censures have been unjustly dealt, to those who have reproached the philosopher for receiving pecuniary advantage from his inventions.