51 
The President went on to recount some evidences of the 
usefulness of the Club, and complimented the Ladies Literary 
Society on the spirit they had shown in giving Burnley the 
benefits of the Oxford University Extension Scheme. ‘‘ We trust,”’ 
he added, ‘‘that you, Mr. Mayor, may never regret that the 
members of the Burnley Literary and Scientific Club and their 
friends were the first body to whom was accorded the honour of 
a reception in this splendid building, of which every inhabitant 
of the town is justly proud.” 
After a vote of thanks to the Mayor had been passed and 
acknowledged, the company dispersed themselves through the 
rooms to inspect the objects of interest furnished by the kind- 
ness of numerous friends; during this time the Police Band 
played a number of instrumental selections, and refreshments 
were served. Shortly after 10 the enjoyable gathering was 
brought to a close. The number present at this meeting was 75 
members and 97 friends. 
SOME DOUBTFUL TENDENCIES IN MODERN 
POETRY. 
By THOMAS LEYLAND. October 8th, 1889. 
When Andrew Fletcher, of Saltoun, wrote in a letter to the 
Marquis of Montrose, that ‘‘if a man were permitted to make 
all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a 
nation,” he recognised the demand that above all things else, 
the poet should be more than a mere entertainer, and that his 
poetry ought to be a teaching and a sustaining power. It is the 
highest function of the poet to soothe and uplift. But he does 
not always make those the marks of his high calling; nay, on 
the contrary, he not seldom makes his poetry the vehicle for 
puerile conceits, or a pander to questionable ends, or a medium 
of melancholy moodiness, or of maudlin sentimentality, or of 
despair of life and the world. Only a few of them in any 
quantity give us what Sir Philip Sidney called ‘“ sweet food of 
sweetly uttered knowledge,’’ and we may have to wait a con- 
siderable time before that is the characteristic of the many. 
When they have in possession a clearer knowledge, and a con- 
sequently strengthened faith, they will give us a stronger and a 
far richer poetry, for all such work is the fruit of confidence 
rather than confusion, of firm trust rather than of yielding 
despair. Sympathetic interpretation, discerning minds, and 
feeling hearts only are needed, for, as all true seers testify, 
