"My friends," said he, "a part of you have come here legitimately, to hear a lecture; a part to satisfy the curiosity aroused by rumors to the effect that I am likely to make indecorous and indecent remarks, which your decorum and decency make you wish to hear, and of which you will carry away evil and twisted reports, to gain the reputation of being fearless defenders of the truth. It is a temptation to gratify your desire and shock you--a far greater temptation than to be repentant and reactionary. Only, it occurs to me that this place and time are supposed to be devoted to a lecture by Henry Frazer on his opinions about contemporary drama. It is in no sense to be given to the puling defense of a martyr, nor to the sensational self-advertisement of either myself or any of you. I have no intention of devoting any part of my lecture, aside from these introductory adumbrations, to the astonishing number of new friends whose bright and morning faces I see before me. I shall neither be so insincerely tactful as to welcome you, nor so frightened as to ignore you. Nor shall I invite you to come to me with any complaints you have about me. I am far too busy with my real work! "I am not speaking patiently. I am not patient with you! I am not speaking politely. Truly, I do not think that I shall much longer be polite! "Wait. That sounds now in my ears as rhetorical! Forgive me, and translate my indiscretions into more colloquial language. "Though from rumors I have overheard, I fancy some of you will do that, anyway.... And now, I think, you see where I stand. "Now then. For such of you as have a genuine interest in the brilliant work of Bernard Shaw I shall first continue the animadversions on the importance of his social thought, endeavor to link it with the great and growing vision of H. G. Wells (novelist and not dramatist though he is, because of the significance of his new books, _Kips_ and _Mankind in the Making_), and point out the serious purpose that seems to me to underlie Shaw's sarcastic pictures of life's shams.