Gentlemen, the history of this grant exhibits to us the picture of a most healthy national progress: the ruder arts connected with the necessaries of life first gaining strength; then education and science supervening and directing further exertions; and lastly, the arts which only adorn life becoming longed for by a prosperous and educated people.
May nothing disturb this progress, and may, by God’s blessing, that peace and prosperity be preserved to the nation, which will insure to it a long continuance of moral and intellectual enjoyment!
AT THE BANQUET GIVEN BY
THE LORD MAYOR OF YORK,
AND THE MAYORS OF THE CHIEF CITIES AND TOWNS
OF THE UNITED KINGDOM,
TO THE LORD MAYOR OF LONDON.
[OCTOBER 25th, 1850.]
My Lord Mayor,—
I am very sensible of your kindness in proposing my health, and I beg you, gentlemen, to believe that I feel very deeply your demonstrations of good will and cordiality towards myself. I can assure you that I fully reciprocate these sentiments, and that it has given me sincere pleasure to meet you, the representatives of all the important towns of the kingdom, again assembled at a festive board, in token of the unity and harmony of feeling which prevails amongst those whom you represent, and on which, I am persuaded, the happiness and well-being of the country so materially depends.
It was an idea honourable at once to the liberality and the discernment of the Lord Mayor of London to invite you to assemble under his hospitable roof before you started in the important undertaking upon which you were going to enter; and when, according to ancient custom, the loving-cup went round, it was a pledge you gave each other, that, whatever the rivalries of your different localities might be, you would, in the approaching contest, all act and appear as one, representing your country at the gathering of the products of the nations of the earth.
I see by your anxiety to return, before your terms of office shall have expired, the compliment which London has paid you, that you personally appreciate, to its full extent, the intention of its chief magistrate; and you could not have selected a better place for your meeting than this venerable city, which is so much connected with the recollections and the history of the empire, and is now pre-eminent as the centre of a district in which a high state of agriculture is blended with a most extensive production of manufactures.
But I see, likewise, in your anxiety to meet us, Her Majesty’s Commissioners, again, a proof of your earnest and continued zeal in the cause of the approaching Exhibition. It could not be by the impetus of a momentary enthusiasm, but only by a steady perseverance and sustained effort, that you could hope to carry out your great undertaking, and ensure for yourselves and the nation an honourable position in the comparison which you have invited.
If, to cheer you on in your labours, by no means terminated, you should require an assurance that that spirit of activity and perseverance is abroad in the country, I can give you that assurance on the ground of the information which reaches us from all quarters, and I can add to it our personal conviction, that the works in preparation will be such as to dispel any apprehension for the position which British industry will maintain.