Page:Surrey Archaeological Collections Volume 1.djvu/69

 from their own volition. And inasmuch as "tot homines quot sententiæ," so where men combine for archæological discovery, each, like a bee, selects his own flower, and not only thus is no spot unransacked in Time's garden, but accumulated wealth brought to the common store. To this healthful mental exercise, to this gratifying spontaneous combination, we attribute, as well as to a growing appreciation of their value, the rapid increase of archæological societies in the kingdom, and the vast additional light poured, since their establishment, upon the national history. After the more distant limbs of the kingdom have grown into new life, by a somewhat strange but gratifying anomaly the heart of the empire receives the arterial influence it should have primarily dispensed, and we are now assured of the popular establishment of an antiquarian association for London, to which our own society of Surrey stood the proud and willing sponsor. It is impossible to overrate the value of the as yet undeveloped annals contained in the metropolis alone. If Johnson's time was so barren of such record of common life, as that he was fain to commend Henry's history as the best civil, military, and religious narrative extant of Britain, how would he have exulted in the projected labours of a society which promises not to leave even London Stone "unturned," nor unmolested every cupboard in his own scene of motley association, Bolt-court, Fleet-street.

Having then somewhat rescued Archæology from the hitherto prevalent charges against it, we propose to set forth as a proper prefix to this first account of our proceedings as a society, the historical position of the county of Surrey, with some brief notices of an antiquarian character, intending