ords "Conservation," "Social Service," "Social
Justice," and the like, you are apt to dismiss them as mere fads. You
think of the catchwords of ineffective reformers whom you have known
from your youth. But the fact is that they represent to-day the
enthusiasms of a new generation. They are big things, with big men
behind them. They represent the Oregons and Californias toward which
sturdy pioneers are moving, undeterred by obstacles.

The live questions to-day concern not the material so much as the moral
development of the nation. For it is seen that the future welfare of the
people depends on the creation of a finer type of civic life. Is this
still to be a land of opportunity? Ninety millions of people are already
here. What shall be done with the next ninety millions? That wealth is
to increase goes without saying. But how is it to be distributed? Are we
tending to a Plutocracy, or can a real Democracy hold its own? Powerful
machinery has been invented. How can this machinery be controlled and
used for truly human ends? We have learned the economies that result
from organization. Who is to get the benefit of these economies?

So long as such questions were merely academic, practical persons like
yourself paid little attention to them. Now they are being asked by
persons as practical as yourself who are intent on 'getting results.'
And what is more, they employ the instruments of precision furnished by
modern science.

You have been pleased over the millions of dollars which have been
lavished on education. The fruits of this are now being seen. Hosts of
able young men have been studying Government and Sociology and Economics
and History. These have been the most popular courses in all our
colleges. And they have been studied in a new way. The old formulas and
the old methods have been fearlessly criticized. New standards of
efficiency have been presented. The scientific method has been extended
to the sphere of moral relations. It has been demonstrated to these
young men that the resources of the country may be indefinitely
increased by the continuous application of trained intelligence to
definite ends. The old Malthusian doctrine has given way before applied
science. The population may be doubled and the standard of living
increased at the same time, if we plan intelligently. The expert can
serve the public as efficiently as he has served private interests, if
only the public can be educated to appreciate him,