"Gentlemen,--In presenting myself before you this day, at the request of my friend and colleague, Dr. Southwood Smith, I can assure you I do so strongly impressed with the high importance of the duty I have undertaken, and the responsibility I have thus assumed. Gentlemen, it is no ordinary occasion on which we are assembled. We are here collected to carry into execution the last wishes of one whose mortal career, prolonged far beyond the usual limits of man's existence, has been devoted with almost unexampled energy and perseverance to the establishment of those great moral and political truths, on which the happiness and the enlightenment of the human race are founded. Ill would it become me, however, to dwell on the genius, the philanthropy, or the integrity of the illustrious deceased. His eulogium has already been eloquently pronounced by one more fitted to do justice to such an undertaking than the humble individual who now addresses you. It would be more suitable to the object of the present meeting that I should consider in what manner the intentions of the late Mr. Bentham, regarding the disposition of his remains, can best be carried into effect. But before I do this, it may be proper to inform some of my auditors what those intentions were. This great man was an ardent admirer of the science of medicine, and his penetrating mind was not slow in perceiving that the safe and successful practice of the healing art entirely rests on a thorough knowledge of the natural structure and functions of the human body. He also perceived that there was but one method of obtaining such knowledge, viz., dissection. In proceeding to inquire how it came to happen that in a country like England, justly proud of those numerous institutions in which science is so successfully cultivated, so little encouragement, or more correctly speaking, so much opposition, was offered to the advancement of so indispensable a branch of knowledge, Mr. Bentham discovered that this repugnance to dissection sprang from a feeling strongly implanted in the human breast--a feeling of reverence towards the dead. Far be it from me to condemn such a sentiment, for it has its source in some of the purest principles of our nature. But if it can be shown that an undue indulgence in this feeling produces incalculable mischief in society, it becomes the duty of all who are interested in the happiness of mankind to oppose the progress of such injurious opinions. Mr. Bentham, impressed with this idea, and thinking it unjust that the humbler classes of the community should alone be called upon to sacrifice those feelings which are cherished alike by the rich and poor, determined to devote his own body to the public good. He knew that this determination would inflict pain on many of his dearest friends. An example of this character, emanating from a person so talented, so influential, and so esteemed, is calculated to operate a most beneficial