PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 1083 
some, a premonition of coming change to others. With its strikes 
and combinations, its fierce party quarrels, its desire for change, 
it recalled in a mild way the state of France before the Revolution, 
This great socialistic movement has curiously affected all recent 
literature. Whoever has a mission now, makes use of fiction to 
preach his creed, to advance his party, to defeat his opponents. 
It seems as if the pulpit has lost its power, and literature has 
usurped its place. Novels like “Tom Jones” and ‘ The Vicar 
of Wakefield” are now unknown. ‘This is the age of subjective 
novels, of novels political, novels religious, novels scientific,—all 
novels with a purpose—disguised and lengthened sermons. 
Literature is seldom now a profession in itself. It is looked 
upon as a means to an end—a weapon to be employed in various 
forms of propaganda—religious, social, political, There is now 
no living English poet or English novelist of the first class—each . 
speaks for a purpose, a party, a fraction of a party, a narrow 
field ; no one is commissioned from the nation at large. 
Tf there has been a time during the last thirty years when the 
minds of Englishmen were in accord, and when their voices 
expressed the greatest unanimity, it was during the late period 
of storm and stress, when Germany, a supposed friend and blood 
relation, took advantage of our difficulties to do us an unfriendly 
act; yet the situation evoked nothing better than Austin’s 
pitiful poem—a possible sign that the inspiration which was 
created by the victorious issue of the long continued struggle 
with Napoleon has spent itself, and literary decadence has set in. 
No. 1.—THE RELATION OF ETHICS TO POLITICAL 
ECONOMY. 
By the Rev. Tos. Rosrsy, M.A., LL.D., F.R.A.S. 
(Read Friday, January 7, 1898.) 
No. 2.—THE ETHICAL ELEMENT IN EDUCATION. 
By the Rev. Gro. LirTLeMore. 
(Read Friday, January 7, 1898.) 
No. 3.—ENGLISH THEORIES OF INDIVIDUAL 
FREEDOM. 
By the Rev. Jas. Hitt, M.A. 
(Read Saturday, January 8, 1898.) 
No. 4.—IDEALISM IN ETHICS AND RELIGION. 
By the Rev. A. J. Grirritn, M.A. 
(Read Saturday, January 8, 1898.) 
