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After comparing the gold reserves of the various countries involved in 
the war, the lecturer gave an account of the Bank crisis of August, 1914, re- 
counting the steps which were taken to meet it, and then spoke of the financial 
preparations of the Germans, which shewed they had anticipated war. A 
comparison of our own and our Allies financial ability to carry on the War was 
made with that of Germany and Austria, and an explanation given as to how 
each nation will have to meet its obligations. The need of gold to adjust 
final differences between imports and exports was emphasized, and great stress 
was laid upon the dangers of inconvertible paper money, which is one of the 
expedients adopted by Germany. Several historical examples were given of 
the evils following the use of such paper, and the lecture concluded with 
reasons for supposing that our greatest financial crisis is past while that of 
Germany lies in front of her. 
MICROSCOPICAL SECTION. 
Only one Meeting of this Section has been held during the Session, viz., 
on January 28th, 1915, when Mr. H. G. Willis, M.A., of Manchester, gave a 
most interesting and instructive Lecture on ‘“ Spiders.”” The lecture~ was 
profusely illustrated by numerous lantern slides, &e. The members’ interest 
in this section is increasingly sustained. 
LITERATURE SECTION. 
Of the three Lectures delivered in the past Session the first and second 
were more or less coloured by the immersion of all minds in the present un- 
exampled War of the Nations. The Rev. Hendrik Chignell, M.A., of Chester 
Cathedral, began the series with a masterly address on ‘‘ Frederick the Great.” 
Mr. Chignell, from the outset, while careful not to ignore an occasional 
attractiveness amid the darker qualities of the hero of his discourse, distinctly 
conveyed a general view of Frederick the Great as one of the founders of the 
most cynical and remorseless of all organizations of government—the school 
of ‘realistic’ politicians. As a minor detail in the methods of duplicity, 
Frederick inaugurated the endless crudities of his literary activity by issuing @ 
denunciation of Machiavelli, much as that model of religious fervour, of over- 
flowing humanity, of stainless domesticity, of universal unselfishness, Henry 
the Eighth, had, in a previous age, undertaken to champion the Pope by a 
solemn condemnation of Luther. The first experiment in practical statecraft 
with which Frederick duly followed was a light-hearted improvisation in 
harmony with his whole career. He had visions of his own respecting the 
splendid province of Silesia, in those times under the rule of Maria Theresa. 
He warned her with gravity that certain adjoining powers were, with shameless 
cupidity, interesting themselves in the future of the province, and he affably 
proposed to occupy it himself and safeguard it against all comers—entirely in 
Maria Theresa’s own interests. The Princess was in her twenty-fourth year, 
sympathetic in manner, beautiful and majestic in face and form, and with 
gifts of intellect and character which lent an additional grace to her other 
charms. Yet Frederick was profoundly disappointed in her. In answer to his 
proposal to enter Silesia she evinced an incredible obstinacy, an utter want cf 
imagination. She actually regarded his offer—expressed in the characteristic 
spirit of Prussian chivalry—as a piece of incomparable effrontery. She wholly 
failed to perceive how a man who meant to rob her of the richest possession 
under the Austrian Crown could be acting in pure self-denial and entirely 
for her own good. Frederick delicately refrained from disturbing her in her 
meditations on political ethics. He poured his troops over the Silesian frontier, 
wrested the rich province from an entirely unprepared antagonist, and first 
revealed to the world the nature of the man who was afterwards to bring on 
the Seven Years’ War, to take a prominent part in the dismemberment of 
Poland, to share in every scheme of territorial plunder, to revel in bloodshed, 
for the mere purpose of being ‘‘ talked about in the gazettes.”” All through 
Mr. Chignell’s engrossing address the thoughts of the listener might well have 
