PROCEEDINGS FOR 1900 XXXIII 
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 
The following is the address of the President, Reverend Professor 
Clark, delivered in the Assembly Hall of the Normal School, Ottawa, on 
the evening of May 30, in the presence of a large audience, with the 
Vice-President, Dr. Fréchette, in the chair : 
It would be impossible for me to begin the few words which I have 
the privilege of addressing to this Society without expressing my deep 
sense of the great, unexpected, and undeserved honour conferred upon 
me by being made President for the year. To say more might savour of 
egotism or servility or unreality. I will therefore only add that I shall 
always regard this honour as the greatest of my life. 
In approaching the subject of my address, “ The Work of the Royal 
Society of Canada,” we naturally think, on the one hand, of the consti- 
tution of our Society, of the sections into which it is divided and the 
work appointed for them to accomplish ; whilst, on the other hand, we 
as naturally look back on the eighteen years of the life of the Society, 
and ask what it has done; and forward to the future, and consider what 
work lies before us. It is possible that we may form a more favourable 
estimate of our own achievements than others do. We cannot be unaware 
that there are those who profess to think little of our Society and its 
work. This need not surprise us: it is nothing new. No association 
can admit everybody to its membership, and, however judicious may be 
its elections, those who are passed by will have their fling and their jibe 
at the bad taste which has neglected them. As we have said, there is 
here nothing new. ‘There is no greater literary society in the world than 
the French Academy; yet we know what Piron tried to think of it, and 
how he showed this in the words designed by him to form his epitaph. 
Well, we can bear such words with equanimity, we can even appre- 
ciate the wit of our critics, when we look upon our comparatively short, 
yet not inglorious history. 
There are many benefits derivable from an association such as that 
to which we belong, and some of them are of a character very real, yet so 
indefinite, that it is not quite easy to describe them. May I not here fall 
back upon the language of the wise man—language which at least has 
stood the test of time ? “ As iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth 
the countenance of his friend.” I think there are some among us who 
will testify that we have derived from these meetings stimulus and sym- 
