To all who revere the naval glory of Britain--to all who duly estimate the commercial greatness of their country, or who profit by its success--to all who feel the humanity and the policy of preserving the brave defenders of the state, and the hardy conductors of that commerce, from those dangers, to which, in the exercise of their arduous duties, they are continually exposed--this Institution cannot appeal in vain.
Every class must feel how deeply it is connected with the national honour, and the maritime interest of their country, that all the means which the bounty of a wealthy and a liberal people can supply, and all the efforts which experience and humanity can prompt, should be devoted to so sacred a cause.
Each in his respective sphere is earnestly solicited to bear a part--the great and the affluent, and those residing in the interior of the kingdom, by their influence and their contributions--the active and the zealous, by their energetic efforts--those on the coasts, by the more hazardous exertions of enterprise and bravery--and all, according to their power and their stations, to promote the success, and to recompense the endeavours of those who voluntarily encounter the greatest perils, for the rescue of the unhappy mariner, of every nation, who may be in danger of shipwreck on our coasts.
The accomplishment of so many and such important objects, on a scale commensurate with the frequency and the extent of the misfortunes they are intended to alleviate, requires the combined efforts of numerous public bodies and zealous individuals--preconcerted arrangements on every dangerous coast, and considerable pecuniary resources.
Under these convictions, I presume most earnestly to recommend, that public meetings should be held in those maritime counties and great sea ports of the united kingdom which have not yet come forward in this cause, for the formation of district or local associations on all our coasts, regulated in their internal concerns by their own committees, as departments of, and in direct communication with, the parent Institution, having an union of funds, of object and of effort, for the most extended adoption of every means which the magnitude of the evil to be averted imperatively demands at our hands.