ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 
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give rise to strange and serious thoughts. Even when read in a 
hook, and much more of course when actually seen, each event 
which I have described appears to be the result of deliberate will 
or momentary passion in the actors. And yet if we follow the 
history of a bee-hive for some continuous time, or if we observe 
different bee-hives at the same time, we see that all these things 
which appear to be the result of individual action occur in a 
uniform order and by a fixed rule. Before every swarm, except the 
first, the queen, who is to lead it, tries desperately to destroy the 
young queens in their cells, and is respectfully but firmly prevented 
by her subjects from doing so. Every year and almost on the same 
day there is a massacre of the drones in every hive. After 
considering these things I feel almost inclined to agree with Mr. 
Buckle that human history may perhaps, also, be reduced to fixed 
rules, and that the emigrations and conquests, the rebellions and 
the wars, the massacres and the changes of constitution in different 
countries which compose that history, may occur in accordance with 
some well-ordered plan which we do not see far enough to explain. 
I know that there are other moments in which this seems to be an 
absurdity. When we read the lives of great men like Alexander, 
Csesar, Cromwell, or Napoleon—still more when we find a feeble 
man like Louis the Sixteenth upon the throne at a critical period, 
and think how differently things would have turned out if the man 
had been wise and strong—we come back to the conclusion that 
individual character does affect the course of events. 
In these speculations, as in so many others, there are distinct 
trains of thought, each of which seems to be well founded and to 
lead to a sensible conclusion, but of which the conclusions are 
diametrically opposite. If this were a disquisition upon history I 
should feel tempted to enlarge upon this point, as it is one of most 
absorbing interest. In pursuing my subject I might be led on from 
history to moral philosophy, and from that to theology, till I 
found myself involved in the old and never-ending dispute about 
predestination and free will. I am certainly not going to 
discuss the subject of predestination. The most sensible remark 
that I ever heard about it was one that was made by an 
Oxford under-graduate when asked in an examination paper what 
his views were upon the subject: “Predestination is the thief of 
time.” It has certainly caused great waste of time by those who 
have discussed it. 
I will drift no further into speculation. That I have drifted 
into it as far as I have is from want of anything else to give you. 
If I could have presented you with one single useful result of 
