an association for diffusing useful and scientific information, none is so unworthy, so sordid, or so mean as that commonest of excuses, “_It does me no good_.” Such an allegation can only arise from a most short-sighted policy. For, let individual preference be what it may, the time is past for saying to the advancing tide of scientific inquisition, “Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther.” The incessant discoveries and inventions of modern years have quickened with the throes of mental energy the masses of the nation. Its strong sense is alive to the power of knowledge, and circulates from the head to the extremities of the social body. The magnetic experiments, to which the whole philosophical world is looking with the most intense curiosity, are conducted by one who entered life a shop-boy. The solution of deep metaphysical propositions is not without attraction to the hard-headed ratiocination of the operatives of Lancashire. There are those who have wrestled out; by abstract reasoning, the cardinal verity of the immortality of the soul. The mechanics of London number in their ranks many ardent thinkers. When the recent lecture on cohesion and gravitation was delivered at the Museum of Practical Geology, so large an audience of working men was collected, that, though the issue of tickets had been purposely increased, upwards of two hundred persons were refused admission at the door. Now it is folly to ignore this spirit of investigation. You may guide, you may control, but can neither deny nor crush it. Wisely, therefore, has the government recognised its prevalence; wisely has the Queen recommended in her speech from the throne, its association with practical art; and wisely will those towns and cities act which avail themselves of whatever facilities the legislature may decide upon offering, to give it salutary scope and exercise. In a circular forwarded from the Society of Arts to the different Institutes of England, a series of questions was proposed in reference to this end. The answers returned by the Council will be found in the Appendix, for the information of members and others, who will then understand how real the movement is, and how great is the expediency of frankly and heartily ensuring its success. Should the suggestions contained in this document be approved and carried into execution, they can hardly fail to give an impulse to self-instruction; while the annual exhibition of models, inventions, and machinery, would afford an opportunity for the social intercourse and mutual improvement ordinarily attached to the pleasant enjoyment of an evening conversazione.