13^ president's address — SECTION F. 



All over the civilised world, but especially in English- 

 speaking countries, men find themselves surrounded by con- 

 ditions — placed in an environment— which they instinctively 

 feel to be wrong, to be out of harmony with the boasted 

 advancement of our civilisation. They ask for the cause of 

 these conditions ; they cry for i*elief from them and they can 

 find no one to answer them, or, at least, they receive no 

 answer which satisfies them. Laving the shores of our social, 

 industrial, and national life is a wave of unrest, of disquietude, 

 of anxiety, occasionally ebbing, but ever again flowing with 

 redoubled turbulence, which cannot be dammed back by any 

 frail barriers of expediency, and which can be rendered 

 innocuous only by a diversion into channels which it is the 

 duty of the pohtical economist to dig. The position has been 

 surveyed over and over again, but there is no agreement as 

 to the direction of the channel, and in the multitude of coun- 

 sellors those who are looking for rehef find but little wisdom. 

 Concurrently with this feehng of unrest, if not, indeed, the 

 precursor of it, there has spread over the civilised world a 

 wave of depression, and earnest men of all shades of thought 

 have striven to explain the phenomenon. Mr. Henry George 

 tells us that it is due to the private ownership of land ; others 

 affirm that the supply of gold has fallen short of the demand, 

 and that the remedy is to be found in a bi-metallic currency ; 

 a third school will have it that free trade is largely responsible 

 for the evil, and that the cure is to be effected by putting the 

 manacles upon commerce. 



Let us then endeavour to discover, first, what has caused 

 this conflict between labour and capital ; next, what efforts 

 have been made to settle it; and, lastly, why have they 

 failed ? The arguments of both sides to the discussion are 

 of a recriminatory character. The labourer asserts that 

 the capitalist demands too much profit ; the capitalist retorts 

 that the labourer demands too high wages. Let us clear the 

 ground by defining what is meant by the terms profit and 

 wages. 1 do not propose at this stage to give my own 

 definition, and it would neither assist me in my purpose 

 nor suit your convenience if I were to repeat all the 

 definitions of these terms which political economists have 

 given. I shall sufficiently illustrate the most opposite 

 doctrines on the subject by quoting Ricardo and J. S. Mill on 

 the one hand, and the apostle of the Single Tax, Henry 

 George, on the other. Before Adam Smith gave a new 

 direction and impetus to the study of pohtical economy the 



