“A laudable usage was formerly more prevalent in this Society than it is at present, of recording the merits and services of persons who have conferred honour upon it by the one, or rendered themselves its benefactors by the other. Some very elaborate biographies have thus been communicated; but, in the old “History of the Society” (to which our published “Proceedings” are in some degree parallel), numerous short notices are to be found of a kind imposing less labour on the biographer, and admitting of more extensive application than the larger memoirs just alluded to. In the hope that such notices may be more frequently contributed, I beg now to offer, within the short compass in which the very limited materials now at my disposal enable me to condense my task, a brief notice of the Life of the late Sir John Robison, whose most energetic efforts were, for many years, constantly directed to the promotio of the welfare of this Society; a circumstance which seems to call for more specific notice than was comprised in the thanks and acknowledgment voted by the Society during his lifetime, and which naturally devolves upon me the duty of drawing it up, not only as his successor in office, but as having enjoyed his friendship, and having been, on several occasions, indebted to him, in no common degree, for personal kindness.