On a loose sheet of paper that I have found, I find the following statement:—
“The objects proposed in arranging the plan of choosing the Committee are:—
“1st. A fair representation (as near as can be) of all the classes of which the general body is composed.
“2nd. Responsibility on the part of the members of the Committee.
“To obtain the first of these objects, it has been provided that each member of the Committee shall be chosen by a section only of the society; and, as will appear upon examination, opportunity is afforded, in forming the sections, for every voter to class himself with those whose views most resemble his own.
“To obtain the second object, frequent elections are appointed, and to every section of the society is secured an undoubted right to the services of one individual member of the Committee. Added to this are the provisions that the proceedings of the Committee may be attended by any member of the society as an auditor, and that a public register is to be kept of the attendance, or non-attendance, of each member of the Committee.”
Some months after the Society had been founded Rowland Hill made the following entry in his Journal:—
“The Society for Scientific and Literary Improvement has gradually increased in numbers and importance ever since its establishment. We have had some excellent lectures, and I always look forward to the night of meeting with pleasure. I am still a member of the Committee. Our time has been very much occupied in revising the Laws, which we have now printed. At the request of the Committee I wrote the Preface which is annexed to the Laws.[32] If the Society should ever become numerous, which now appears probable, I am confident, from the form of its constitution, that it will become a formidable body.”
In the following passage in the Preface, its author was stating, no doubt, the difficulties which he had himself undergone:—
“The experience of almost every one who has passed the time usually devoted to education, but who still feels desirous of improvement, must have convinced him of the difficulty of regularly devoting his leisure hours to the object he has in view, from the want of constantly acting motives, and the absence of regulations which can enforce the observance of stated times. However strong the resolutions he has made, and whatever may be his conviction of the necessity of adhering to them, trivial engagements, which might easily be avoided, will furnish him, from time to time, with excuses to himself for his neglect of study. Thus may he spend year after year, constantly wishing for improvement, but as constantly neglecting the means of it, and old age may come upon him before he has accomplished the object of his desires; then will he look back with regret on the many opportunities he has lost, and acknowledge in despair that the time is gone by.”