or boy, eager for knowledge, in that valley twelve miles off, and
should occasionally trudge to meet you, that you may impart your
learning in one branch of acquisition to me, whilst I impart mine
in another to you. Yet this is distinctly a feature, and a most
important feature, of this society.

On the other hand, it is not to be supposed that these honest men,
however zealous, could, as a rule, succeed in establishing and
maintaining their own institutions of themselves. It is obvious
that combination must materially diminish their cost, which is in
time a vital consideration; and it is equally obvious that
experience, essential to the success of all combination, is
especially so when its object is to diffuse the results of
experience and of reflection.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, the student of the present profitable
history of this society does not stop here in his learning; when he
has got so far, he finds with interest and pleasure that the parent
society at certain stated periods invites the more eager and
enterprising members of the local society to submit themselves to
voluntary examination in various branches of useful knowledge, of
which examination it takes the charge and arranges the details, and
invites the successful candidates to come to Manchester to receive
the prizes and certificates of merit which it impartially awards.
The most successful of the competitors in the list of these
examinations are now among us, and these little marks of
recognition and encouragement I shall have the honour presently of
giving them, as they come before you, one by one, for that purpose.

I have looked over a few of those examination papers, which have