THE CENTENNIAL OF HOBART COLLEGE 1822 - 1922 m^.^ — %* THE CENTENNIAL OF HOBART COLLEGE 1822-1922 EXERCISES IN CONNECTION WITH THE CELEBRATION OF THE ONE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY TUESDAY, JUNE 13, 1922 GENEVA, NEW YORK 1922 H^^ l> t i'^\ -^ V "n INVOCATION BY THE REV. CALEB ROCHFORD STETSON, D.D., RECTOR OF TRINITY CHURCH, NEW YORK Almighty God, and Heavenly Father, our rock and our defence, our Saviour and our might, in whom we trust, who hast been our refuge from one generation to another: we give Thee humble and hearty thanks for all the bless- ings, temporal and spiritual, bestowed upon this Insti- tution of sound learning, for lo, these many years; and especially for its continued prosperity, and preservation, through years of ever growing service to Thy Church, to this memorial day. We thank Thee for the light of the Everiasting Gospel, which hath shined and still doth shine in this place; for those faithful Bishops, Priests and Doctors, to whose far sighted wisdom and Godly counsel, under the guidance of Thy Holy Spirit, this College owes its foundation. Help us to hold them ever in grateful remembrance, and grant them a place before Thy throne, where they may continue to serve Thee in the Heavenly Places. We thank Thee that Thou didst raise up devout and faithful la^Tnen, to devote themselves and their means to the temporahties of this Institution, and we pray that Thou wilt grant them that reward which Thou hast promised to those who have been faithful stewards. And we beseech Thee to guide and prosper those upon whom is now laid the responsibility for the welfare of this College, and grant that all things may be so ordered and settled by their endeavours, upon the best and surest foundations, that peace and happiness, truth and justice. 4 HoBART College religion and sound learning may be established here for all generations. Bless our undertaking to commemorate on this Cen- tennial Day the founding of Hobart College, one hundred years ago; and as we recall the past with joy and pride, help us to look to the future with courage and confi- dence, for we know that without Thee our labour is but lost, and that with Thee we shall go forth as the mighty; and we beseech Thee to grant that when we shall have served Thee in our generation, we may be gathered imto our fathers, having the testimony of a good conscience, in the confidence of a certain faith, in favour with Thee our God and in perfect charity with the world; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom with Thee and the Holy Spirit, be all honour and glory, world without end. Amen. ADDRESS OF WELCOME BY BEVERLY CHEW, L.H.D., HONORARY CHAIRMAN OF THE HOBART CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION COMMITTEE This is a proud day for Hobart College. We are as- sembled here to celebrate the one hundredth year of our beloved institution. We have invited to rejoice with us our friends, our neighbors, representatives of sister uni- versities and colleges, and members of learned societies. In the name of the Trustees, the President and Faculty of Hobart College, I bid you a hearty welcome. Your presence here testifies to us your sympathy for what our college stands for, and your approval of what has been accomplished in the past one hundred years. I welcome the presence of the Bishop of the Diocese, ChanceUor of the College, who has proved himself our fervent friend, and we thank him for his earnest zeal in behalf of Hobart. I welcome the Reverend Clergy, many of them gradu- ates of Hobart, who have ever proved faithful, and who to- day rejoice with us in the brighter future that is before us. I welcome the Alumni and former students who in the magnificent efiForts to attain the '^Million for Hobart" have manifested their love for the college in an unmis- takable manner. Finally, I welcome the citizens of Geneva who have shown the deepest interest in the welfare of Hobart and have generously contributed to the Centennial Fund. It is a matter of the greatest satisfaction that the re- lations between the city and the college have always been cordial and friendly, and never more so than at the present time. Hobart has never been a large college, nor has it ever been a richly endowed institution. Neverthe- less, it has always believed in and taught sound learning 6 IIoBART College and genuine culture and has ever striven to send forth from its halls men well equipped to take their places in thie world among cultivated and high-minded citizens, devoted to all that constitutes a patriotic American. Loyal to the coimtry, her sons went forth in defense of the flag at the time of the Civil War and not a few in the recent World War oflFered the supreme sacrifice of their lives. The memorial to these young heroes will be dedi- cated today. We graduates owe more to her for whatever success we have made in life, than we are perhaps aware of. In my own case, I freely acknowledge my indebtedness and here humbly express my grateful thanks. The love of literature has been fostered in Hobart, both the ancient classics, the "Humanities" of our forefathers, and the literature of modern times. The demand of science was early recognized and Hobart was among the first to confer the B. S. Degree. As one of the older Alumni, I feel I must reverently mention the names of those learned men who gave their lives to building up the reputation of Hobart and in maintaining the standard of scholarship of which we are so justly proud: Dr. Benjamin Hale, Dr. Abner Jackson, Presidents; Dr. Horace Webster, Dr. William D. Wilson, Dr. Kendrick Metcalf, Dr. John Towler, Dr. Francis P. Nash, Dr. Hamilton L. Smith and Dr. Charles D. Vail. The mere mention of these names of our former instructors cannot fail to awaken in us the feelings of sincere aflFection. Fortunately, one of that elder line is with us today and I salute with reverent respect Dr. Joseph H. McDaniels. With larger resources and increased equipment and enlarged faculty, can we not confidently look forward to more glorious results in the coming years .^^ The working out of many problems we can safely entrust to our Trustees and our beloved President, Dr. Murray Bartlett. THE CENTENNIAL ADDRESS BY PROFESSOR MILTON HAIGHT TURK, PH.D., OF HOBART COLLEGE Mr, President: It is not, I think, without a certain hesitancy that we look back today upon our origin and source. In the pres- ence of the honored representatives of great and famous institutions we are reminded of om* slender roll and modest achievement, and confession rather than rejoicing springs to our lips. Yet we may reflect that these are our friends about us, that they are not gathered here to measure fames or match deservings. And while as sober-minded, honest men we remember our short-comings, we believe that we have striven towards the same high end» have subscribed the same covenant, with our more distinguished brethren. When the shrine of education is the goal of the pilgrimage, knight and yeoman may travel side by side. I rejoice. Sir, that I may confine my remarks to the beginnings of our College and am dispensed from tracing its history. I am sure that this act of benignancy on your part will greatly commend you to my audience, as it has endeared you to me. Of the founding of the College I will speak, then, and of its founder, whose name the College bears. If we could go back a little more than a century, and stand by the lakeside on a lovely September morning, we might see a little knot of gentlemen surrounding a sturdy clerical figure. There is some talk among them, and at last the Bishop strikes his cane upon the ground. '*Here, gentlemen," he says, "is the spot for the College." The man who thus settled not the least imi>ortant question for our College had been raising and settling 8 HoBAKT College great questions all his life. John Henry Hobart was at this time about forty-five years old; he had already served for a decade as Rector of Trinity Church, New York, and Bishop of the whole State. He was accustomed to travel by coach one or two thousand miles in his episcopal visitations, not only covering this State, but heeding Macedonian cries from Connecticut and New Jersey, and on one occasion, Michigan. He preached countless sermons; he wrote many books; he indefatigably created and headed organizations, religious and educational. He was a general officer in the anny of the Lord, and he was a fighting general. Hobart was of Pilgrim ancestry, being the great-great- grandson of Edmund Hobart of Hingham, Massachusetts. The ori^al Hobarts are honorably distinguished by Cotton Mather, because of a zeal rendered "more con- spicuous by the impiety of that nei^borhood." Our bishop's father, Enoch by name, was a sea-captain, a respected citizen of Philadelphia and a regular attendant of Christ Church. Dying in middle life, he left an infant son to the care of a most competent mother. This son, bom September 14, 1775, was christened John Henry by the Reverend William White, who afterwards as Bishop of Pennsylvania confirmed him, assisted in his conse- cration and hved to mouim his loss. Hobart 's first school was the newly established Episco- pal Academy, where at nine years he began to excel. The earnest fluency of speech which later distinguished him, marked him even then. If a row was on, he was apt before plunging into the fray, to plead his cause with many ardent words. The combat stayed; sometimes his eloquence prevailed. If not, though small he was well made, and he was never known to turn his back upon a foe. The Centennial 9 Hobart was not singular in his love of eloquence. A stripling nationality in those days gave frequent voice to its hopes and desires: a certain sensitiveness to expected criticism, perchance, found vent in much self-defense and not a little self-assertion; we blushed in words. And our John Henry, it must be remembered, had breathed from infancy capitoline air, which is known quite automat- ically to take on articulate forms. At all events our hero in his tenth year organized in the Episcopal Academy "A Society for the Advancement of its Members in Useful Literature. ' ' The means of advancement in this case were essay and debate, all proceedings being conducted with high decorum. "Mr. W. presents his compliments to Mr. H.," begins one communication addressed to the foxmder and president. In Hobart's thirteenth year, in 1788, he entered the University of Pennsylvania. At once appeared there the Philomathean Society, whose business again was oratory and debate, and whose strenuous rules, framed by the founder, provided fines for every sort of dereliction from duty. Perhaps this organization proved too expensive; at all events the Ciceronian Society soon took its place. Its regulations also are preserved in the future Bishop's hand; so likewise are the articles of impeachment of the Ciceronian president, one Bolton, signed by J. H. Hobart, wherein the said officer is styled a usurper, his offence having consisted evidently in fining and otherwise oppres- sively using one J. H. Hobart. The president, we learn, has "tyrannically obstructed the freedom of debate," interrupting the members frequently and calling them to order without cause. The President's defense, though a masterpiece, availed him nothing. He was convicted on three counts and solemnly reprimanded, whereupon he resigned his office, to which very soon succeeded the said J. H. Hobart. 10 Hob ART College In the autumn of 1791, at the age of sixteen, Hobart entered Princeton as a Junior. He had not here to found his debating society. The two great Princeton bodies, Whig and Cho, were already flourishing, and Hobart at once became an ardent member of the Whigs. An earnest and efficient student in every branch, as well as a brilliant speaker, he soon stood forth as the leading repre- sentative of the Whigs in the struggle for college honors. Clio had, however, also an able contender, and when the end came, the Faculty divided equally as to the award of the highest Commencement honor. After much debate it was agreed to toss a coin. "Heads for Hobart, tails for Taylor," were the euphonious calls, and the Latin Salu- tatory was duly awarded to John Henry Hobart. But — and let this be a warning to all wayward faculties — on account of the epidemic of yellow fever at Philadelphia, Princeton was unable to hold a Commencement in 1793. The Senatus Academicus had tossed its coin, and tossed away its dignity, in vain. Hobart's stay at Princeton was a period of great happi- ness. Those who knew him then speak of his unusual gayety of temper, his untiring zeal, his social habits, his powerful influence in composing differences. Certainly his friendships, arising in these years, were of unusual number, warmth and duration. His correspondence with these friends is extraordinarily ardent and voluminous. The untimely death of two of them he mourned intensely; with many he maintained close relations throughout his busy life. The saddest duty he had ever to perform was the deposition from the ministry of one of these life- long friends; and perhaps his most touching sermon is the letter in which he strove to comfort this friend and re- establish his shattered life. The Centennial 11 It is related of his student days that the famous Dr. Benjamin Rush, glancing up one evening at the light of Hobart's candle, exclaimed, "Ah, that Johnny Hobart will one day be a great man." But in his own circle he was a great man then. At eighteen he had already proved himself as a scholar, an organizer and leader, a lover of human beings — even a rescuer of human souls. Those who knew him heard and followed him as gladly and com- pletely then as ever; only their number and their years were to increase. Thus Hobart at the age of eighteen became a Bachelor of Arts of Princeton. As to his next step he was for a time xmcertain — ^the only period of doubt in his career. He entered the counting-house of his brother-in-law for a while, but business did not attract him. In the spring he returned to Princeton to take up, under Bishop White's direction, his work of general reading and special prepara- tion for the ministry. He was the only theological stu- dent who had the Episcopal ministry in view. All the rest were Presbyterians. He came to realize then what a hardship it was for his own Church that she had made no provision for the education of her clergy. That was one of the things to be done. There were great arguments in these days — one-sided in numbers at least. Hobart was as strong a Churchman at eighteen as at fifty. But these were his friends, and as one student of that time remarked, the "place was full of his fame." Perhaps he gained now his notion of true liberality. "Christian charity," he said once, "is violated not by contending for what each individual deems the truth, but by conducting the contest under the in- fluence of an improper spirit." Nor were the discussions confined to theology. The United States had but re- cently adopted her Constitution; Washington was presi- 12 HoBART College dent; and Philadelphia was the capital. Hobart appears as a strong defender of ordered liberty. Writing of some disturbances in the South in 1794, he says: * 'They are for tarring and feathering everyone who does not approve of every violent measure which hot-headed demagogues may advocate. Freedom of opinion. . . .is destroyed among them. . . .If I am not allowed to think as I please and profess my sentiments, as long as I supp>ort the constitu- tion and laws of my country, it is of little consequence who prevents me, whether the Empress of Russia, or one of these democratic societies." In January 1796 he finally accepted the tutorship at Princeton which had been offered to him shortly after his graduation; continuing, of course, his theological studies. By the testimony of many contemporaries, he succeeded admirably in this new calling. "He was," we are told, "as an instructor ardent, industrious and faithful; prompt in action and expression; sometimes vehement and in danger of a little transport, but ready afterward to admit it." He evidently had admirers among the undergradu- ates. With a high reputation for fluency and vigor as an orator, he was in great request when speeches were needed. Nor was it considered necessary that he should deliver all his speeches himself. "I depend upon you for a speech," wrote one friend. Another life-long correspondent re- quested assistance on his ordination sermon, to be used in his induction into the Presbyterian ministry. But the following at once explains and commends the writer and the recipient, who kept it as long as he lived. "Respected Tutor: — I take the liberty to address you on a subject of the greatest importance to me. It is to re- quest you to prepare my Commencement oration. I am sensible, Sir, that I ask a great favor, but the necessity of the occasion urges me to it. Ever since examination I The Centennial IS have been thinkiiig to write it myself: my health, how- ever, being impaired by a sedentary life, I found it neces- sary to employ my time in liding, and visiting my friends; and thus deferred it, from time to time, until this late hour. And now I am so indisposed from a bad cold, that I find it impossible to write the oration myself. I there- fore make my first request to you. Sir, in whom I have always found the strictest sincerity. I wish only a short one. A few leisure moments in your hands will amply suflBce. Choose a subject most agreeable to yourself; it will not fail to please me. If finished one week or four days before Commencement, I shall think myself ex- ceedingly favored. In the course of ten or twelve days I hope to be in Princeton. If you can, consistently with duty, obUge me at this time, I know it will be done. If you do write my oration, I shall consider myself bound to you by the strongest ties of gratitude and friendship." Hobart left Princeton in the spring of 1798, and having been found well-grounded in theology and in the dis- cipline and worship of the Episcopal Church, he was on June 8d, 1798, ordained deacon by Bishop White in his home chm-ch, Christ Church, Philadelphia. He at once assimied charge of two small churches near that city; in 1799 he took over for a year Christ Church, New Brunswick; three months later he was called to the ex- cellent coimtry parish of Hempstead, Long Island, and in June 1800 he removed thither with his bride, Mary Goodin Chandler. His reputation still grew. On August 27th he was called to St. Mark's in the Bowery, but declined, to accept the call, given him twelve days later, to be an assistant minister of Trinity Church, New York. Hobart was then a Uttle under twenty-five years of age; he had been in the ministry two years, and was still in deacon's orders. 14 HoBART College Arriving in New York in December 1800, he settled in a modest two-story dwelling on the river side of Greenwich Street. Here in his attic study overlooking the river he worked as few men can work. He was already a noted preacher, it would seem, and especially distinguished by the fact that he preached from memory, while his brother clergy almost always read from manuscript. He spoke with less elegance than some others, but with intense feeling and energy. He was most zealous in his parish work. He began immediately the long series of re- ligious publications — books and periodicals — of which the mere titles fill many pages. He likewise became the co-founder or originator of almost innumerable church organizations. Thus it came to pass that when in 1811 Bishop Moore became disabled and asked for an assistant Bishop, Hobart was elected by a decisive majority. He was not yet thirty- six years of age when he thus assumed the actual though not titular control of both Trinity Parish and the Diocese of New York. The election had not been unanimous. The Bishop's rise had been too rapid, and his character and opinions were too marked in every way, to leave him without opponents. But he emerged from every con- troversy stronger than before. Of Bishop Hobart 's work for the American Episcopal Church let Bishop Coxe, his brilliant successor in Western New York, speak. "At the time of Hobart 's consecration," he writes, "the Church was at a low ebb of vitality, though perhaps not at the lowest. The old clergy were dying out, few had come forward to take their places; in the country at large the Church was little known, and generally looked upon as antiquated, effete and ready to perish. In Virginia Chief Justice Marshall was astonished, in 1811, to hear of a young man who proposed to enter its The Centennial 15 ministry; he had supposed it dead and buried." "Look then, at the epoch which Hobart created. He rescued the Church from a fossilized positioQ in this coimtry; brought it into contact with the actual Ufe and thought of his day, and Kfted it into the sphere of commanding dignity, where under his moulding and directing hand it became a power in the nation." We cannot speak at length of this great undertaking. It was a work of education. The laity had to be taught what their Church meant and what she stood for in the world. In colonial days, supported by ancient grants or by EngUsh missionary funds, the Church had had no need of a working lay-people, and it had had no such people. The clergy, likewise, independent of their parishioners, were only too apt to be indiflFerent to their opinions and to their needs. The Church wanted a new body and a new spirit. Young Hobart had indeed shouldered a giant's load. He was prepared. His mind was trained by long study and constant thought; his heart was schooled by a very honest piety; his very soul was aflame with ardor for his glorious cause. He had great tenderness; it was said he could never pass a little child without a word or a smile. He had perfect courage. "Unpopularity," he said once to a remonstrant, "God knows I have do need to increase the burthen of that, and foreseeing it as I clearly do, I would that I could view the matter as you view it; but I cannot." And withal he had extraordinary practical talent. At the age of twenty-six he was called to a trustee- ship in Columbia College, where Robert Troup, Brock- hoist Livingston, DeWitt Clinton and Alexander Hamilton were fellow trustees; immediately Hobart became one of the prominent members of the Board. When Judge Livingston was asked to vote for^an additional Episcopal 16 HoBART College representative on the Board, be replied: "Sir, the Church needs no abler representative than the young man she has already given us. Mr. Hobart has all the talents of a leader, he is the most parliamentary speaker I ever met with; he is equally prompt, logical and practical. I never yet saw that man thrown off his centre." And he added on some further urging: *'Sir, you imderrate that young man's talents; nature has fitted him for a leader; had he studied law he would have been upon the bench; in the army a major-general at the least, and in the state nothing under prime-minister." Bishop Hobart had been a student and teacher up to the time he entered the ministry; he remained a teacher as well as a student to the end of his crowded days. At Princeton he had known what difficulties beset the can- didate. The Church did indeed in 1804 provide for the examination of candidates, but not for their instruction. That was still left, as in Hobart's student days, to indi- vidual effort imder more or less remote clerical supervision. In a word, the candidate reached ordination, if indeed he reached it, in the face of every hindrance that mere negligence could place in his way. As his first educational move, Hobart organized the Protestant Episcopal Theological Society, to fit its young members for the ministry. The constitution and rules are once more of Hobart's devising, and the process is that, in the main, of his old literary societies — ^reading and dis~ cussion. To this association — ^perhaps the embryo of the General Theological Seminary — ^many prominent clergy- men owed their chief preparation for their life work. At the same time he sought the instruction of the laity at large by taking over the Churchman's Magazine, which he edited till 1811. He was undaimted by lack of support. The Centennial 17 The less willing the people were to subscribe to the maga- zine, the more, he contended, they evidently needed it. When at the age of thirty-five Hobart became bishop, his responsibility as well as his opportunity in the matter of Church education greatly increased. He had now to determine the fitness of candidates, and the duty of en- larging the numbers of the clergy became specifically his. The matter appeared at once as a prominent feature of his diocesan policy. In 1813 his Convention address con- tained an urgent plea for ''the attainment of a learned as well as a pious ministry." *T trust it will not be long," he says, "before a theological school is established." In the same year, in a private letter to Mrs. Startin, he writes, "I have been long firmly convinced a theological school at least, if not a college, is essential to the ultimate prosperity of our Church." This is, I believe, the Bishop's first reference to the need of a Church college in the State of New York. It is high]y characteristic of his methods and achievements that the first gun of his campaign was no shot in the dark. From the bequest of this same lady came part of the original endowment of Hobart College. While the great Hobart was at work in New York, however, a lesser Hobart was engaged in twisting another strand elsewhere. The Reverend Amos G. Baldwin had come in 1806 as a missionary to Utica and the surrounding towns. There were then but two Episcopal missionaries in the State west of that point, Judd in Central New York, and Davenport Phelps in Geneva, where in that year he founded Trinity Church. Baldwin, like Hobart, saw- that the Church was starving for lack of education for her laity and especially for her clergy. Fairfield, near Utica, was one of his mission stations, and it had a well-estab- lished academy. As early as 1812 Baldwin tried to per- 18 HoBART College suade the Vestry of Trinity Church, New York — ^the source of all missionary blessings in those days — ^to grant funds to turn Fairfield Academy into an Episcopal college, or at least to support an Episcopal clergyman as its principal. This proposal having failed, a fresh plan occurred to him. The Academy Trustees again were willing; this time the Trinity Vestry also, and it was arranged that Trinity Church should grant $750 a year, on condition that an Episcopal clergyman, as Principal of Fairfield Academy, should with an assistant provide eight candidates for the ministry with both literary and theological training. Bishop Hobart supported this scheme, and took an active part in the selection of the principal. In 1813 the work was taken up by the Rev- erend Virgil H. Barber, who relinquished it in January 1817 to the Reverend Daniel McDonald. And now at last we may return to Geneva, where all this time our Bishop and his friends have been enjoying that beautiful September morning. In 1813, while Hobart was writing pointed letters to Mrs. Startin, and our indefatigable progenitor in partibus was manipulating trustees in Fairfield, Geneva Academy, which had been in existence for several years, was acquiring a charter, con- tributions to an endowment fund having been made by a group of public-spirited citizens, with James Rees, de- voted Churchman and leader in all good works, at its head. Geneva Academy thereafter throve until 1817, when its work was suspended without date. The time, if not yet ripe, was certainly ripening, and our Bishop, as usual, was prepared. In the next year Hobart, during one of his first missionary journeys, opened his mind to Rees and other friends in Geneva on the subject of a theological school and college in this place. In 1819 apparently no progress was made, but in 1820 the Bishop devoted his Con- The Centennial 19 vention address largely to the matter of education for the ministry. Referring to the excellent work accomplished by Dr. McDonald at Fairfield, he continued significantly: ''The grant to the Academy at Fairfield may be trans- ferred to an institution in any other situation that may present greater advantages." His purpose was, as he had already stated in Geneva, to '*build up a stronghold for the Church in the west" (this was the west then): immediately the Protestant Episcopal Education Society, created by this Convention, located two diocesan theological schools, the main insti- tution in New York, and the Interior School, or Branch Theological School, at Geneva. To give effect to this arrangement, the Bishop secured the transfer of the Trinity grant from Fairfield to Geneva Academy, Dr. McDonald and his eight theologians following the grant hither; while at the same time, the Academy Trustees here, their numbers enlarged so as to assure Episcopal control, not only contributed the Academy Endowment, but under- took the prompt erection of a building for the combined academy and theological school, ''with an intent," how- ever, as the subscription paper states, "to use all prac- ticable means to raise the Academy to the highly useful station of a college." The choice of the site of the new building was left by the Trustees to the Bishop, and thus, on that lovely September morning, he struck his cane to the ground and located Greneva Academy, afterwards Geneva College, and now Geneva Hall. In this matter Hobart's guiding hand is clearly seen. The subscription paper is dated February 15, 1821, when the Bishop was in Geneva, having been induced, as he says, "to this journey at this unfavourable season principal- ly with a view to consecrate the churches at Rochester and Buffalo (St. Luke's and St. Paul's, of course), and to 20 HoBART College make arrangements with respect to the Branch Theolog- ical School, which had been fixed at Geneva." The Bishop was here again, on his visitation, August 30th to September 1st, and in his Convention address of this year he spoke at length of the advantage expected from the union of the Branch Theological School with the Academy, of the handsome stone building then going up, and of ''in- dulging the reasonable expectation, that the Academy will, at some future period, be advanced to the privileges of a college." *'At some futm*e period" — ^such language does not point to a very early efiFort to secure a College charter. The Bishop meant to have a college as well as a seminary here; but apparently, his immediate objective having been reached, he proposed no further step. A reason for this may possibly be found in the financial stiuation of his own parish. Trinity, at that time. "The condition of the funds of that corporation," he says in October, 1822, "has compelled them to withhold those liberal grants by which, in various parts of the state, the congregations and the clergy, previously to the period of my Episcopal administration, were aided." At all events, the Bishop apparently was not yet ready for a further initiative with regard to a college at Geneva. The care of the whole Church throughout the State was his. That was not true, of course, of the Genevans who were interested in the project of a Church college in their own town. Almost at once, while the new building was still far from completion, McDonald, the Academy principal, and Clark, the Geneva Rector, wrote to Hobart urging that a college charter be secured forthwith. They feel that the life of the Branch Theological School is un- certain, because it depends solely upon the Bishop's support; should the Branch be withdrawn, the Trinity The Centennial 21 grant must cease, the reopened Academy close and the whole plan fail. Within a month, January 22, 1822, the petition for a college charter was made; on April 10th, 1822, the application was granted by the Regents, on the condition that an assured income of $4,000 a year should be secured within three years' time. This application had enjoyed Hobart's energetic support. "The moment I heard of it," he wrote McDonald five days after the action of the Regents, ''I took all the measures in my power to promote its success, and ad- dressed letters to several of the Regents, and in some cases, I believe, with effect. . . .You, who know how much I have thought, and how much I have planned and labored for this object, can readily conceive my gratifica- tion at seeing it thus far accomplished, — sooner indeed, than I could have expected." He clearly intends to take an active part in the further developments of the project. "The organization of the college," he continues, "par- ticularly with regard to the trustees who are to be ap- pointed, and other matters, will require a great deal of deliberation, as much will depend on these measures. I expect, God willing, to be at the westward this summer, and conclude it will be well for me to spend some days in Geneva." Of the raising of $4,000 a year he remarks, "I am afraid this will be a difficulty with you. Means, however, must be devised for surmounting it." Illness prevented the Bishop's visit to Geneva in 1822, and again in 1823, when he was forced to give up work and go abroad for two years. To the last he maintained as far as possible his efforts for the new college. In his Convention address of October 1822 he described at length the great advantages the Church might expect from the new institution. Of the scarcity of Church colleges he speaks in terms that a communion now wealthy 22 HoBART College and powerful may well ponder: "The fact is an alarming one," be proclaims, "and were it not for the very pecuhar circumstances of depression and difficulty under which she has labored, would be a disgraceful one to our church." The Convention empowered the Bishop and StandingCom- mittee to "carry into eflFect a plan . . . . for the endowment of the College." Finally, in his letter to the Convention of 1823, held after he sailed, he reports that "exertions are making for collecting funds for the college," and reiterates his "increasing sense" of its importance to the Church. I The Bishop's insistence and persistence in urging the cause of Church education in general and of Geneva in particular are highly characteristic. Almost no one in New York agreed with him. "I am the more gratified," he writes to McDonald after the granting of the conditional charter, "I am the more gratified, inasmuch as I have found it difficult to make the clergy and others in this quarter feel as I have felt on the subject. And even now M. and W., etc., seem to care little about it." This condition in our Church has never changed. The Hobarts have always been outnumbered by the M's and W's. This being the situation in New York, all depended there upon the Bishop alone. Unhappily, throughout the critical three years in which the endowment had to be raised, Hobart was a very sick man or was out of the country. The amount expected from corporation sources in New York was secured, also the Startin bequest and a few private subscriptions. The burden of gathering the rest of the necessary funds fell upon the shoulders of the clergy and laity of Geneva. "Exertions unparalleled in this State," to use the language of a committee of the Assembly, were the result. Two features mark this effort. First the offer — said to be the first of its kind in this coimtry — of an English Course, in which the place of Greek and Latin should be taken by Science and Modem The Centennial 23 Languages. The avowed object was to bestow upon "the education of farmers, mechanics, manufacturers and merchants" some of the attention which heretofore had been confined to "our divines, our physicians, and lawyers." Secondly, the certificate plan, by which subscribers of $100 secured the right, transferrable at will, to send one student to Geneva College free of charge for tuition, for a period of twenty years, to begin at any time. A large number of these certificates were issued, and over two hundred were in force twenty-five years later. A few are probably still alive, though none has been used, I think, since 1890. It is easy to point out that the issuance of these certifi- cates, while it secured the charter, bankrupted the in- stitution, and that the necessity of resorting to such means stamped the effort to secure a charter as premature. The imdertaking was certainly bold in the extreme, but it was a case of unavoidable hazard. The Branch Theological School, with its Trinity grant, was certainly doomed; it was discontinued very soon after the General Seminary absorbed both diocesan institutions. And most important of all considerations — ^if the Episcopal Church had not set up a college in Geneva some other commimion would certainly have done so, aud Hobart's plan for a strong- hold of the Church in this place would have failed for all time. Doubtless the effort had to be made; at all events it was made. For the first time in this state a college was founded without the use of a lottery. More than one- half the amount was gathered in this district, and most of that portion by the issuance of certificates. In conse- quence the Trustees of Geneva Academy, with James Rees at their head, were able on January 1st, 1825, to ask for a permanent college charter. On February 8th it was granted, and Geneva Academy became Geneva College. 24 HoBART College Although Hobart was in Europe when this charter was granted, its provisions in matters ecclesiastical clearly fulfil his intentions. In the first place, the Board of Trustees, though clergy as well as laymen of other denominations were members of it, contained a decisive majority of Churchmen. This was not only a part of the Bishop's plan, as announced in 1818; it applied a principle that he had enunciated long before as a trustee of Columbia, when that board was torn by disagreements between two denominations of almost equal strength in its membership. The evidence is complete and conclusive that Hobart never intended any organic control of the college by the Church. Indeed, he spoke with emphasis on the subject of re- ligious freedom within the College. The well known provision of our charter, which prohibits the exclusion of "any person of any religious denomination whatever from equal liberty and advantage of education. . . on account of his particular tenets in religion," strong as it is, is much less sweeping than Hobart's statement to his Diocesan Convention nearly three years before. **Not that," he says, referring to Geneva College and the proposed Methodist institution at Ithaca, **Not that there is to be exacted any religious test for office, or any exclusion from the benefit of these institutions of those of other denomi- nations, or any restraint imposed on the religious principles of the students, or any obstacles to their worshiping where they may think proper." "The principal control," as the Bishop expressed it, would remain in the hands of a certain denomination, whose interests would be protected without infringing the rights of others. This was Hobart's doc- trine, as he had developed it before this college was thought of; in this way of faithfulness to its own and liberality toward others, Hobart College was set by its great founder, and in this way, without any shadow of turning, it has continued ever since. The Centennial 25 Although corporate powers as a college were not secured till 1825, the combined academy and theological school, as the Academy announcement for 1822 states, had been doing college work since the granting of the conditional charter. In 1826, therefore. Dr. McDonald, as Acting President, was able to hold his first public examination of candidates for degrees, and on August 2d, in Trinity Church, after many orations which, we are assured by the Geneva Gazette, held the "deep attention of a fashionable and enUghtened audience," though they lasted all day, the first class was graduated. Bishop Hobart was able to visit the College in this year and again two years later. In 1830, on the occasion of a third journey to western New York, he died at the Rectory of St. Peter's, Auburn. It is fitting, I think, that we should join a certain tribute to him with the commemoration of our first hundred years. It is suitable not only because he founded this college, because it was once a part of his purpose, a thought of his mind, but for this reason — more compelling perhaps — ^that he exemplified very fully the education for which this college was meant to stand. Doubtless he was a genius. Judge Livingston prophesied that in the State, Hobart would be ''nothing under prime minister." In reading his life, one is struck by his likeness to a great man who actually became the head of this nation. Before the great Theodore was, this was Roosevelt — keen, vivid, fascinating. All who touched him assumed some relation toward him; once known, he could never be ignored. He was indeed a genius, and because he was a genius we know that he was an educated man. Genius may have a great capacity for taking pains; it seems to have also a supreme capacity for producing and exhibit- ing the results of much painstaking to the world. 26 HoBAKT College Many a man who has gone from this college may have been as truly educated as he; only rarely does the fact appear; only now and then can the world see that the man is not merely instructed; not only trained for this or that; but fully educated, completely created, made into what God meant him to be. If that first class of ours could return now and look about them, our little Hobart would loom gigantic in their eyes. As for one of the great universities, they might regard it as a city — ^they could hardly think of it as a college : so much have the means of instruction been extended in our day. And yet, if we speak of education, the ancient problem waits. Education is so difficult because it is so intimate. It is not like the clothes a man wears; it is not his possession at all, but rather his possessor. Young men come to us to get an education; and all the while it is the business of education to get them. One has taught, perhaps, for a long time and thought a little — ^not very much, of course, because in our beloved country somebody is always shouting, ''Let's have action," and so one goes on acting, which is much easier than think- ing. But one thinks a little, and then perhaps one reads the life of a man like Hobart, and thinks a little more. Lives of great men do not remind us we can make our lives sublime; they strongly remind me of the exact opposite. But lives like his in whose thought was our beginning do convince me that there is such a thing as education. He had the root of the matter in him, therefore it has a root. His mind had a home, therefore there is a cure for the intellectual vagrancy which is our besetting sin. And our little Hobart — ^how has she fulfilled her founder's purpose; how has she lived up to the high destiny for which he designed her.f^ Well enough for our love, surely; not too ill for our pride. She has not had her namesake's The Ceisttennial 27 brilliancy; she has not attained his eminence; but I think she has enjoyed no small measure of his great courage. She was born, you remember, of stern travail — of "exertions unparalleled in this state;" for a gener- ation she faced extremity from day to day. If her lot in this respect is not singular, it has been more than common hard. And with her courage in the struggle for sub- sistence she has joined, I dare maintain, a real constancy of purpose. She has moved quietly through the years, drawing her sons about her, learning to know and remem- ber them, striving to fulfil her purpose in teaching them their own. There is one glory of the sun, and another of the stars. Let us beUeve that in this her first century Hobart has known the glory of a constant and kindly star; let us beUeve that if her great founder could return to us, if her long roll of vanished sons could emerge from the mists in which their youth is hid — ^he and they would call down blessings upon her head, as we do this day. THE CHALLENGE TO THE COLLEGES BY PRESIDENT LIVINGSTON FARRAND, LL.D., OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY Mr. President^ Members and Friends of Hobart College: While I am not at this moment charged specifically with the agreeable duty of bringing official greetings I cannot forego the pleasure of expressing, on behalf of your younger sister on the neighboring lake, the warmest and heartiest congratulations to Hobart on the completion of a century of distinguished academic service. An occasion such as that which calls us together this morning is, of course, of far more than local significance. These celebrations of achievement, however, whether in the fives of individuals or of institutions, are worthless unless they are made opportimities of assessment not only of the past and of the present but of the future. For this reason I venture to call your attention to certain impor- tant considerations which face every American college today. I hesitate to indulge in the use of such words as "crisis" as being liable to cause certain misapprehension. It is true, however, that the situation in which the world finds itself does in many ways justify the use of a term of such extreme significance. A crisis, and notably a crisis in world affairs such as that presented by the late war in 1914 and again for us as Americans in 1917, served a great and useful purpose in stripping away extraneous consideration from the problem at issue and forcing the fimdamental principles involved into bold and sharp relief. It was the clear recognition of the principles at stake which brought that stirring response from all corners of our wideflung territory. The Centennial 29 The war has passed in so far as actual hostiUties are concerned, but unfortunately there has ensued a period of world confusion which has again obscured the situation. All thinking minds agree that the problem today is far more complex than that presented by the war itself. Making all allowance for the natural reaction which in- evitably follows strenuous effort, it is discouraging to realize that certain basic principles of democracy with all their implications of personal service to the nation and to the world, which had been clearly apprehended by our people, are again in danger of submergence. Never was there a time when clear thinking, unselfish action and civic devotion were more needed than at present. It is also evident that, in addition to a disheartening reaction towards personal and national material advantage, pro- found ignorance and loose thinking is wide-spread and well nigh universal. The lesson of contemporary Russia is obvious to whomever will read. Rehabilitation and progress are impossible imless ignorance is dispelled. We have been accustomed to think of the principles upon which our democracy is based as being simple and easily grasped. Self-government is a term which appeals by the apparent simplicity of its implications. Those impli- cations are, in fact, extraordinarily complex. We have but to review the development of our own American nation from the little self-governing colonies of New England to the complicated civic organization that we see today to realize that truth. In a word, my theme this morning is simply that im- less ignorance be removed, unless a sense of responsibility be instilled, unless we have a public ready to give the required service, and that intelligently, our democracy eaimot survive. 80 HoBART College The implication of this condition is obvious. The responsibility involved must necessarily rest most heavily upon that institution charged primarily with the duty of the discovery and spread of knowledge, and that is our educational system. For us today it is one aspect of this responsibility which engages our attention. It is clear that a prime essential to the successful oper- ation of democracy is an informed and devoted citizenship. The experience of centuries has shown, however, that, no matter what the level of intelligence, leadership in a de- mocracy is as essential as in any other form of political organization. In the long run it is to our colleges and imiversities that we must look for the production of leaders of a type equipped not only by inherent quality but by training for the discharge of this fundamental fimction. The complexities of our modern life with the special- ization of knowledge has made necessary the development of professional training of the type which we see in our so called universities of today both here and abroad. That there are dangers in an over development in tech- nical training no thoughtful educator will deny. That there remains a place for broad generalized education is a statement far short of the actual situation. Such train- ing is not only admissible, — ^it is the insistent demand of the times and indispensable in our modern life. There is often a tendency to regard technical equipment as incompatible with more general educational preparation. This is, to my mind, a pernicious error in our contemporary educational thought. The fundamental problem is not the supremacy of one or the other conceptions of education but rather an adaptation of technical demands to the indis- pensable generalized equipment without which no man is a competent citizen. The Centennial 31 Further, there is grave danger of a loss of clear ap- prehension of certain simple ideals of citizenship and life in the hnrly burly of our modern industrial existence. In all this confusion there stands out as one of the most encouraging signs the sturdy adherence to fundamental ideals of religion, citizenship and education which has been exhibited by that splendid group of American institutions of which Hobart is a shining example. It is because the coimtry and the worid need as never before men and women inspired by these very ideals and produced by just such institutions as this that we, from other places and from varying points of view, bring to Hobart this morning our tributes of admiration, congratulation and confidence. Mr. President, the coimtry needs Hobart College. Uni- versities are indispensable but colleges also we must have. We cannot do without you and I hope and beheve that the close of another century will find Hobart College holding aloft and undimmed the torch of those sound ideals which have been her inspiration during the hundred years just ended. GREETINGS FROM THE UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES OF NEW ENGLAND BY PKESIDENT KENNETH CHARLES MORTON SILLS, LL.D., OF BOWDOIN COLLEGE At the Centennial of Bowdoin College in 1894 a wise and witty judge, himself a graduate of Yale, remarked that at a large university a boy went through more college, but that at a small college more college went through him. There is very much truth in that statement. The College of Liberal Arts, whether it be in the center of a university or as at Hobart a unit in itself, is the heart of higher education. It sends life and vigor into all the other departments of learning. As the years go by, as a people we are more willing to recognize that the function of the college is to prepare not merely for making a living but for living. Consequently liberal teaching is coming into its own. In bringing to you. Sir, and to Hobart College the greet- ings and congratulations of her sister colleges in the East and particularly of those institutions in New England that are akin to her in tradition and ideals, I desire to empha- size if only for a moment two or three points from your own distinguished history. In the first place you have always had a scholarly faculty. In the long list it would be hard to make many individual comments. Still on such an occasion as this it may be well to recall that Benjamin Hale, a graduate of Bowdoin in the class of 1818 and President of Hobart from 1836 to 1858, himself a classical scholar of unusual attainments, was the founder of technical education in this country, having instituted at Gardiner, Maine, the first American trade school. And 32 The Centennial 33 nearly every one who thinks of Hobart in our day re- members the vivid cultm-e and scholarship of the late Professor Nash, and the wide learning of his comrade Professor McDaniels : Honor and reverence and the good repute, That follows faithful service as its fruit Be unto him whom living we salute. Much of the strength of Hobart has come from its Faculty. She has proved that men, not buildings, brains not bricks, make a college. It is a good thing to have adequate equipment and generous endowments; but it is essential for a college to possess and to have possessed scholars and men. Then we think of the churchly atmosphere of Hobart. We are not a pagan nation nor a Mohammedan nation nor a Jewish nation nor a Parsee nation. We are a Christian nation aud it is also well to remember that American higher education is still, thank God, Christian and Ho- bart has graduated so many Christian gentlemen. If you will pardon the personal note, I clearly recall in the days of my youth what a force in Maine was that sturdy and lovable son of Hobart, Bishop Henry A. Neely. And it was because of the very great contribution which Ho- bart had made and is making to the leadership of our branch of the church that the Commission on Church Colleges over which I have had the honor to preside urged upon all the authorities and to the best of their ability upon all the people of the Episcopal Church, to help support and maintain her. Scholarship in a Christian atmosphere bears much lovely fruit. Today as always we need in our American life men and women who have learned from Plato that life without the spirit of inquiry is not worth li\dng; and from Christian teachers that such intellectual activity must lead to 34 HoBART College service for mankind. An institution of learning that ful- fils both these functions cannot spring up over night. A fairly good university, Dr. Farrand, can be made in fifty years : but it takes a hundred years to make a college. In a century a college may begin to show its worth, to feel the force of its traditions, to be sure of the type of grad- uate it turns out. A college stands serene amid changes of society, overturn of governments, passing of men. Like Tithonus in the old Greek myth it has the gift of immortality. And if its graduates and friends are loyal they may confer upon it also the gift of eternal youth. That such a precious and useful immortality may fall to the lot of Hobart in this fair ground is, I know, the earnest wish of all the colleges and universities of the East. Floreat Collegium Semper, in aeternum. GREETINGS FROM THE UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES OF NEW YORK STATE BY PRESIDENT RUSH RHEES, D.D., OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER I am sure you can appreciate the peculiarly poignant character of my regret at the iUness of President Ferry, to whom you were to have hstened at this time. To my great sorrow that my friend is prevented from attendance here by his state of health you must add my appreciation of your disappointment, which none can measure correctly who does not know him and his singularly fehcitous qual- ities of thought and utterance, coupled with friendhness that rises to the level of genius. But I cannot conceal the fact that, if this disappoint- ment had to be, I welcome the opportunity which it gives me to express the hearty godspeed which Hobart's nearest neighbor wishes her on this happy day, and to join the host of friends who congratulate her president, whom I have known and honored now for twenty-two years, the first ten of which we passed as neighbors and friends in Rochester. As the temporary representative of a better spokesman I bring to you, President Bartlett, and to the noble in- stitution which you so effectively serve, the warm con- gratulations and greetings of your sister institutions large and small. It is a great thing to have served your country by offering to her young men the privileges of higher education for a hundred years. It is a greater thing to come to the threshold of your second century with every promise of more full and rich service in the coming time. 35 86 HoBART College Inasmuch as it has been given to me to be the bearer of these congratulations, I am glad that I can speak as a representative of the smaller institutions in our sister- hood; for my experience has made me acquainted with some of the dangers that beset our work, as well as with its satisfactions. The first of those dangers comes when we scan the voluminous bulletins of our noble universities, which set forth in alluring variety the opportunities for study in all branches of learning. We of the smaller colleges are not seldom tempted to enter the race in hopeless competition with such wealth of opportunity. Our professors of History, or Economics, or Geology, or what not, feel that we cannot aflFord to deny to students who come to us the nearest possible approach to the wide range of opportunity which they would find at Cornell or at Harvard. And this is fatal folly. For it cannot honestly be done. Either we announce offerings that we cannot and do not expect to have taken, or we spread our- selves out so thin over an impossible range of subjects that none of the work can be done with the thoroughness that alone serves educational ends. The second danger that assails us comes from the desire that seems just now to be epidemic, to save our colleges from utter uselessness of endeavor by exploiting them in the interest of this or that vocation— to make our work practical ! We are asked to give courses in business English, in applied Psychology, in industrial Chemistry, or ag- ricultural Biology. We are urged to make our depart- ments of Economics into schools of Business Adminis- tration, and sometimes are tempted to turn our institu- tions bodily into Teachers' Colleges. Now I would not be misunderstood. I believe that there is room and need for all these several forms of special vocational training. The Centennial 37 The great increase of numbers in our colleges and uni- versities accentuates these needs. Faculties know well, and often to their sorrow, that many students who seek and gain admission to our classes do not belong in college. Yet they want and should have educational opportunity above the high school grade. WTiat gives me concern — I had almost said what irritates me — is the unconcealed sohcitude which our tempters evince, lest the college should pass into an antiquated uselessness, for the lack of an understanding of the nemesis that is facing it ! Now both of these dangers call us to a clearer understand- ing of the task which we have on our hands as Colleges of Liberal Arts. In simple words I would say that that task is training youth to think intelligently and logically and independently, whatever the problem that engages their thoughts — ^whether professional, or commercial, or po- litical, or the vast complex problem of social relations. And precisely because the range of such problems is so wide there can be no specific training that will fit men to deal with them by the use of any technical formulas or duly authorized methods. And this traiaiag for intelligent thinking, as I under- stand the matter, is precisely what our colleges of Hberal arts have demonstrated their ability to give. We need find no embarrassment from the assertion often flung at us by the advocates of vocational education, that the tradi- tional college was vocational in its aim at the beginning, because it was conducted to fit men for the older so-called learned professions — ^the ministry, or law, or medicine. True, the students of the older day were looking forward to one or other of these professions, and they and their teachers recognized that this or that study might have special value for the practical work that was to come later. But Hobart, though founded chiefly in the interest of 38 HoBART College raising up educated clergymen for the church to which she owed her estabhshment, did not — unless I mistake great- ly — undertake to graduate clergymen from her classes. And none of our colleges, from the mediaeval beginnings in the Faculty of Arts to the dawning of the day of emanci- pation from traditional curricula, has pretended to fit youth for the professions to which they aspired. After they had won their bachelor degrees these youths had before them a period of apprenticeship to some master in the chosen profession. From such masters they learned their practical technique and the special knowledge essen- tial to the intelligent use of such technique. The college then as now sought to train its students to think, and now as then that function is needed and requires no apologia. If we keep this objective in mind we may escape the double danger that confronts the college. To train youth to think intelligently it is not necessary to emulate the varied offerings of interesting knowledge that our great universities of necessity set before their varied clien- tele. If we will insist that each student keep at work on one or two fields of knowledge for not less than three years, at the same time that he is introduced to other forms of knowledge in quite different fields, and will insist that his work in his major studies shall be really progressive, there is no necessity for great variety of offerings in history, or economics, or chemistry, or biology, or any other subject. The sole necessity is teachers that know their subjects thoroughly and are able to teach them, and time to keep each student at one thing long enough to insure his getting below the surface in his knowledge of it. If we examine the old discredited classical curriculum, we shall find that it had this one thing needful. And it did without question train men who knew how to think logically and intelligently — however narrow the range of their knowl- edge. The Centennial S9 Moreover if we keep clearly in mind the true objective of our college work, we shall not be disturbed by the appeals or the demands of the apostles ofvocational training. We will agree with them at the outset that the community needs higher schools which wHl train youth in varied forms of professional or commercial or industrial technique; and we will welcome the multiplication of such schools, not only as an advance in educational policy, but as a means of relief of our colleges from an overcrowding which may be a serious menace. But at the same time we will confidently insist that there is still room and need for in- stitutions whose object it is to help youth learn how to think logically and intelligently in a variety of different subjects, simply because that will enable them to be better citizens and to live more satisfying lives. This assertion of our object in college teaching will help us also to escape from all who desire to exploit our colleges for any other end than that of the culture of intelligence. Amongst these are the propagandists of myriad shades of conviction. Colleges as colleges are interested in the imparting of sound knowledge and the development ol: intelligent and independent thinking. Those who seek to* make them the platforms for propaganda, however ex- cellent, are consciously or unconsciously seeking to exploit them for ends foreign to their purpose. In teaching science we seek to give students the essential facts of science and to train them in correct scientific thinking. I once asked our revered Professor Lattimore whether we were teaching any Industrial Chemistry in Rochester. He replied in his formal manner: "Mr. President we are doing our best to teach our students Chemistry; and we are convinced that when they enter industrial life they will be able to apply their knowledge to their industrial needs.'* 40 HoBART College His position may have been extreme; but it was certainly true to the college aim and purpose. So it is with History, or Economics. \^Tiat we are set to do is to give our stu- dents the knowledge requisite for intelligent thinking and to give them sufficient exercise in such thinking to devel- op independence therein. And we are sure that the com- munity needs such intelligence and independence, and that if we will continue true to our task, ready to listen to all suggestions for its betterment, but resolute in resistance of all efforts to exploit our work for other ends, the commu- nity will recognize and welcome and support our work. I have spoken particularly of the work of our colleges because that is the work that Hobart has been doing for now one hundred years. That we exalt it here does not indicate blindness to the wider tasks of our universities or to the value of the newer and assuredly valuable tech- nical schools that the community is providing for youth who wish or need to proceed with no delay to some prac- tical training for some specific task. So great is the need just now, however, for clear and intelligent and indepen- dent thinking on many problems that do not fall within the boundaries of any technical training, that Hobart's cen- tennial gives timely opportunity for fresh recognition of the importance of Hobart's special task. Therefore I welcome this unexpected opportunity to speak for your neighbors and colleagues, Mr. President, and on their behalf to wish for Hobart under your leader- ship a most auspicious entry on her second century of noble service. GREETINGS FROM THE UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES OF THE MIDDLE WEST BY PROFESSOR WARREN PLIMPTON LOMBARD, SC.D., OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Nine years ago I came to Geneva to be the recipient of a great honor from Hobart College. It was then that I received the degree of Doctor of Science from the hands of the most sincere, straight thinking man I have ever known, your former President, Langdon C. Stewardson. It is a rare man, whose presence is an intellectual and moral stimulus, and who arouses in others the best of which they are capable. Such a man is Stewardson — ^no one dares to have a mean thought in his presence. I now come as one of your honorary alumni, and have the pleasure of being the bearer of greetings and congratula- tions from the Colleges of the Middle West, and especially from the University of Michigan. These messages would have been presented in more suitable form by President Burton, had not previous engagements prevented him from coining to Geneva. It is particularly fitting that the Colleges of the Middle West should have a part in this celebration. They owe their existence largely to the foresight, the vision of the men of western New York, who came to join the pioneers in the frontier towns of what was first the North West Ter- ritory, and later the States of the Middle West. Just as the sons of New England spread through New York, so they and their sons migrated into the North West Territory. These men carried with them, not only their conviction of the importance of education, but that optimism which has done so much toward the development of this country. Is it not marvelous that, at the time when Hobart was f oimded 41 42 HoBART College one hundred years ago, when Ohio, Indiana and Michigan were in the process of forming, and there was only a handful of people scattered in sparse settlements in the wilderness or in the beginnings of towns, those men had the dream of a thriving population, and foresaw not only the need of schools but of universities. Think of General Cass, when he made the treaty with the Indians of the North West in 1817, arranging that there should be set aside three sections of land for a college; think of the one week- ly paper of the territory having articles dealing with higher education, and of an act arranging for a university being passed in 1817 by the Governor and Judges of the newly formed territory of Michigan, when it had a population of only 7,000 inhabitants. The University of Michigan in its present form did not come into being until Hobart was fifteen years old. We can think of Hobart and Michigan as belonging to the same family of colleges, and there is another more intimate tie connecting us. The founder of your College, Bishop Hobart, also played a large part in the founding of St. Andrews church in Ann Arbor, and a guild of that church, in which many succeeding generations of Michigan students have been active, is known as Hobart Guild. There is still another, and very vital tie, and one of which Michigan is proud. ''By their fruits ye shall know them." If character building is the most important work of an institution whose business is to train men for their life work, a university is to be judged by the type of men it gives to the world. Michigan has pride in many of her sons, and claims with especial pride one whom you of Hobart all know well and love, — Dean William P. Durfee. He received his degree of A. B. at Michigan in 1876. Those were the days when Michigan University had an enroll- ment of 1,200 students, instead of the present number of The Centennial 4S nearly 12,000. Hobart is rejoicing in its growth while Michigan is having it forced upon her that a large number of students entails many disadvantages. When William Durfee was at Michigan, it was still possible for members of the faculty to know many of the students personally, and for a student to know at least the members of his own class. Today much of the former personal contact is lacking, and the loss of this contact is a serious matter. Many men are recognizing this fact, and are saying — *T would prefer to send my son to a small college rather than to a large univer- sity." It being more and more felt that much of the work that is now being done at the large universities will have to be done in the colleges, and that they must play a part of ever increasing importance in the educational life of the country. Certainly the value of institutions of learning is not to be judged from their size but by the men that they develop. Hobart has only to look at her alumni, to mirror her own worth. Not only can Hobart look to her past with pride, but she can look forward to ever increasing usefulness in the future. She is so fortunate as to have as her President, Murray Bartlett, who, through the training of the College and of the Chiu'ch, of being the head of a new University, of organizing a Graduate School of Tropical Medicine and Public Hygiene, of playing a man's part in the World War and finally of being the President of this College, has acquired a breadth of view which enables him to recognize the importance of both the Liberal Arts and the Sciences. Before I close I wish to emphasize that which you all must feel, that the men of the rising generation will need far more than those who preceded them, a training in Physics, Chemistry and Biology. They will live in a world which will undergo untold changes through the advances of sci- ence. They must be familiar with the fundamental facts of 44 HoBART College science if they are to keep pace with their times. The hberal arts, reHgion and the sciences must work side by side to develop a better and a stronger race of men. A striking phrase is a lever to turn the balance of thought and too often to throw the weight of prejudice against reason. We used to hear of "The Conflict of Science and Religion." If the sentence stops there, one sees them as enemies; finish the line, — ''The Conflict of Science and Religion with Ignorance and Evil," and they are allies in the fight against the forces which work to keep men down, physically and morally. The sciences which are fundamental to hygiene and medicine should be especially strengthened. The teach- ing of hygiene and physical training in our schools must be improved. Our people must be made to recognize the importance of the care of the health and physical devel- opment of our youth, if we are not to have the humil- iating picture of physical unfitness, revealed at the time of the war draft, remain as shameful evidence of our neglect. Think of it, in a new country, blessed with all that nature could provide for the health of men, thirty-nine per cent were found unfit and had to be refused the privilege of serving their country in its time of need. The modern teaching of sciences is expensive, both because of the lab- oratory space which is required, and the cost of the in- dispensable instrumental equipment; nevertheless this expense must be carried. Let me in closing again express on behalf of the Colleges of the Middle West their congratulations on the record Hobart has made during the past one hundred years, and their confidence that the next hundred will be no less successful. GREETINGS FROM THE CHURCH COLLEGES BY PRESIDEXT REMSEX BRIXCKERHOFF OGILBY, LL.D., OF TRINITY COLLEGE The dearest birthday presents we receive are those from the members of our own family. So Trinity today with great affection gives, in the name of the Church Colleges of our coimtr^', Kenyon, St. Stephens', University of the South and Trinity, her greeting to her elder sister Hobart. Not so much elder after all — a single year. Close be- hind stands another younger sister — Kenyon. The fact that these three church colleges celebrate their Centennials within one year of each other is not a mere matter of coincidence but is a definite witness to the history' of the Church and education in America. In the early days of the American Colonies, the trans- planting to these shores of the worship of the mother church of England was not an eas^" task. The lack of a local Episcopate made it difficult if not almost impossible to recruit the ministn' from among the young men of the church here, as a long perilous voyage stood between them and Holy Orders. Li New England also the estab- lishments of local church organizations not altogether friendly to the Church of England made it difficult for those who wished to adhere to the mother church of their own country. The Venerable Association for the Propaga- tion of the Gospel in Foreign Parts did much to maintain a supply of men of a fine type. Then came the Revolu- tion. In some parts of our country the fact that the clerg^^men fled to Canada gave the church a Torv^ label and placed the people under a certain amount of suspicion. The union of the Colonies, however, brought to the church in New England the prestige of Virginia and other colonies, 45 i 46 HoBART College and most certainly the faith of our first President and of many other leaders in the Federal Government who were loyal in their allegiance to the Church of England restored the respect to which the church was entitled. When a local Episcopate was secured and the church organized upon a national basis, great expansion followed. The war of 1812 removed any doubt that might be still left in the minds of any New England Puritans and patriots as to the loyalty of the Episcopal church, and the opposition, which up to that time had hindered the development of the institutional life of the Church, disappeared. The natural result was an intense social self -consciousness which showed itself in the growth of educational institutions. Schools and colleges were founded in response to the definite demand for an educated ministry and the Missionary Society came into being. So the birth of these three sisters within a year of each other bears witness to the awakened life of the Church of these shores. The tie that biuds Hobart and Trinity is yet more close by reason of the breadth of their charters. Other colleges one hundred years ago were still bound by restrictions of adherence to religious platforms, and all through the last century colleges have been founded in the conviction that it was good to segregate students of a siQgle denomination within academic walls. The minds of the founders of Hobart and Trinity ran along different channels. Their loyalty to the Church was definite, and as a result the contribution made by these colleges to the life of the Church has been great ; but it has been their purpose to offer an education, fundamentally religious, to young men of America upon a basis of absolute catholicity. The fear- lessness of the charter of Hobart is characteristic of the fearlessness of the contribution of our communion to I The Centennial 47 church unity, and the completion of these one hundred years serves to demonstrate the wisdom of the founders of this college. One might mention at great length the personal ties that have bound together Hobart and Trinity but at this time two names will suffice — George Williamson Smith, now President Emeritus of Trinity, graduated from Hobart in 1857 and after a career which included service of his country as a Chaplain in the Navy, he came to Trinity as president of that College. Of an earlier generation was Abner Jackson, who graduated from Trinity in 1837 and served Hobart as tutor and professor for twenty-one years, finally being elected president of that institution, which office he held until he was called back in his last years to be president of Trinity. It is not necessary to multiply other examples of aca- demic interchange, but the greetings of Trinity on this occasion would not be complete without the personal word of friendship between the heads of the two institutions who in other years bore the burden and heat of the tropic day on the other side of the world. May the coming century give to Hobart still greater opportunities to continue the service to the Church which has made her name honored and loved wherever known. GREETINGS FROM THE BOARD OF REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK BY CHARLES BE ATT Y ALEXANDER, LITT.D., LL.D., REGENT Mr, Chancellor, Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: The University of the State of New York is the greatest and most far-reaching institution in the world, and Hobart College is an important integral part thereof. The Regents of the University have instructed the Vice-Chancellor, Adel- bert Moot, President Graves and myself to appear here and present to you this parchment document which conveys to the Trustees, Faculty, Alumni and students of Hobart College their warm felicitations upon this eventful occasion and their recognition of the great work which Hobart has performed during the century which has passed. The Vice-Chancellor is unfortunately prevented from being present. When he requested me to take his place in presenting the greeting of the Regents, he laid upon me two injunctions. One was, under no circumstances to make any preparation on this occasion, and the second was to give a sportive effect to my greetings. I told him that while I would not venture to compare myself to Sam- son, nor this cultured, distinguished body of people to Philistines, at the same time I would remind him that the only recorded case of anyone being called to make sport before an audience was one in which the chief actor took hold of the pillars of the building and pulled the roof down on the heads of the audience. I furthermore intimated that I had no wish to come to make a Geneva holiday. As I see that President Graves is reserved as a kind of dessert for the forthcoming banquet, I do not undertake to speak further for the Regents on this occasion, but would 48 The Centennial 4^ like to allude to the relation which Bishop Hobart had to Princeton. I do this with more satisfaction, as I am not only a Princeton graduate, but a Doctor of Laws of that institution. I have listened with interest and satisfaction to what the learned Dean of the College has said in regard to Bishop Hobart's relation to Princeton. It has struck me that perhaps the tone, while entirely cordial and friendly, might be slightly tinctured by its Episcopal source and audience, reminding me in a pleasant way of a catechism which was printed in Oxford about 1833, wherein the question was asked, "How should we treat Presbyterians .f^", and the answer was, "We should treat them with kindness, but should pay no attention to their idle prattle." Should this anecdote tend to give any offense to any present, I would add another one. There was a colonel in South Carolina who said he was an Episcopalian, and that while he believed a person could be saved in the Methodist Episcopal or Roman Catholic churches, a gentleman would think twice before he permitted himself to be saved by any such irregular methods. In saying this, I make no reflection upon the Dean's address, which I think was one of the best academic discourses I have ever heard. It is delightful to recall the great company which sur- rounded the young Hobart in Princeton. The President of the institution was John Witherspoon, scholar, sage, patriot, signer of the Declaration of Independence, just preparing to retire to his rural seat, "Tusculum," amid the plaudits of a grateful nation. There was Samuel Stanhope Smith, Vice-President of the College, one of the most cultured and learned educators of his day, an elegant scholar, and I use the word elegant in the eighteenth cen- tury sense. He was an intimate friend of Hobart as long as both lived. There was Richard Rush, and many others. 50 HoBART College This was the time when Princeton was beginning its great work of training men to be Episcopal Bishops. One €an recall Bishop Johns, of Virginia, moving with stately- step through the shades of the eighteenth ceatury. There was Mcllvaine, who carried the banner of the Cross into what were then the wild regions of Ohio. There was the ■cultured and polished Littlejohn of Long Island, and if I should go outside the Bishopric, I would refer to the fact that Nicholas Murray, the ancestor of Nicholas Murray- Butler, was a Princeton graduate, as well as the brilliant and witty Dr. Coxe, father of Bishop Coxe. Young Hobart made his determination while in Prince- ton to become one of the soldiers of the Cross. The Lord revealed Himself in his plain little room in Nassau Hall, just as He revealed Himself to St. Francis of Assisi, who saw his Savior's image limned upon the wall of his bare cell; just as He appeared to St. Paul on the road to Da- mascus, and I might say to young Samuel ere the light of the lamp had gone out in the temple of the Lord where the Ark of God was, and Hobart obeyed the call. One of the results of his obedience is this great institution of learning. Would that such apparitions might come to our young men of the present day in our institutions of learning, and to students who are wondering how best they can serve their nation, mankind and their Master. Note: The College regrets that a copy of the address, **The Future of Hobart," delivered by the Rt. Rev. Charles Henry Brent, LL.D., is not available for publication. CONFERRING OF HONORARY DEGREES The candidates were presented by Professor H. H. Yeames, A.M., as follows: "Mr. President: For the honorary degree of Doctor of Sacred Theology I present to you the Rev. Caleb Rochford Stetson, Rector of Trinity Church, New York, Bachelor of Arts of Harvard University, Bachelor of Divinity of the General Theological Seminary, Doctor of Divinity of St. Stephen's College and of Columbia University. Preacher, pastor, and organizer of good works, devoted and efficient servant of the Church, in this year of Hobart's Centennial, he has been called to the ministry of one of the oldest and greatest parishes in the country, a parish with which our college has from its beginning been intimately and grate- fully associated, to which it has always looked as in truth an Alma Mater. As rector of Trinity Church he stands in apostolic succession to the great Bishop Hobart, whose honored name we are proud to bear, and represents a parish that came to the rescue of Hobart College in its darkest hour and that for seventy years has given generous support to the work of the college. As a teacher of righteousness and vigorous example of Christian citizen- ship and leadership, Hobart on her Centennial Day gladly welcomes him among her adopted sons." "Mr. President: For the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws, I present to you George Woodward Wickersham, lawyer, statesman, patriot, churchman, sometime Attorney- General of the United States, delegate to the Hobart Centennial from the University of Pennsylvania, and our Phi Beta Kappa orator in this Centennial year. Chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the New York Constitu- tional Convention, president of the Bar Association of the 51 59 HoBART College City of New York, trustee and vice-president of the New York Association for Improving the Conditions of the Poor, and of the Carnegie Institute at Washington, trustee of the University of Pennsylvania, he has loyally served the Church as well as the State and has sustained amid the stress of public afifairs the interests of a scholar and the love of literature. Hobart College warmly welcomes to her Centennial so distinguished a representative of a great and venerable University and is proud to do honor to one so eminent in the State and Church which this College has tried to serve during one hundred years." *'Mr. President: I present to you for the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws Frank Pierrepont Graves, Presi- dent of the University of the State of New York, whose widely varied and highly distinguished career in the pro- fession of education has led him, in this our Centennial Year, to one of the most influential and responsible positions in that profession. In him we greet the leader of the vast and complex educational system of which Hobart College is but a small though not, we trust, an altogether insignificant part, and we rejoice to honor one so admirably equipped for his great office by successful experience as Professor of Greek at Tufts College, as President of the University of Washington, as Professor of the History of Education at the University of Missouri and at the Ohio State University, as Dean of the School of Education of the University of Pennsylvania, and as author of many books in his wide field of study. To such guidance as his the cause of education for democracy is safely entrusted, for none better than he understands the importance to thepresentof lessons of the past, the value to the State of good teaching and the dangers of bad teaching. Ho- bart College which has long been faithful to the best traditions of classical education, particularly delights to The Centennial 53 honor as a leader of the educational system of this State a classical scholar, a historian of classical ideals, an ex- ponent of the practical value in modern life of the priceless heritage of Greek civilization." "Mr. President: I present to you for the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, Livingston Farrand, scientist, educator, philanthropist, who in this year of our Centennial has been called from a great and honorable work of public service to the presidency of our neighbor institution of learning, our younger, though bigger brother, (or should I say sister.^) Cornell University. Professor of Psychology and Anthropology at Columbia University, treasurer of the American Health Association, editor of the American Journal of Public Health, president of the University of Colorado, executive secretary of the National Association for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis; during and after the war, director of the tuberculosis work in France of the International Health Board and chairman of the Central Committee of the American Red Cross and director of its work in Europe, he brings to American education a vision of world-wide service, and stands as few men can for the humanities in the truest and widest sense of the word. In him Hobart College gives her modest recognition to a great leader in the great allied causes of humane education and the promotion of human welfare." In awarding the degree of Doctor of Laws to William Pitt Durfee, Dean of Hobart College, President Bartlett spoke as follows : "William Pitt Durfee, mathematician, teacher, adminis- trator: Bachelor of Arts of Michigan University, Doctor of Philosophy of Johns Hopkins University, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Professor of Mathematics and Dean of Hobart College; 54 HoBART College You are presented for the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, not by formal speech but by the loving devotion of forty classes of Hobart men to whom you have been counselor and friend." THE CENTENNIAL LUNCHEON The principal address at the Centennial Luncheon, held in the New York State Armory, was delivered by President Frank Pierrepont Graves, LL.D., Commissioner of Education for the State of New York. Among the other speakers called upon by the toastmaster, the Rev. Alexander Mann, '81, were Professor Dana Carlton Munro, L.H.D., of Princeton University, the Very Rev. H. E. Fosbroke, D.D., Dean of the General Theological Sem- inary, Frederick Scheetz Jones, LL.D., Dean of Yale College, Henry A. Prince, '82, Trustee of Hobart College, and Frederick W. Herendeen, '92, Chairman of the Hobart Centennial Fund Committee. DEDICATION OF THE WAR MEMORIAL Special dedication exercises were held on the campus on the afternoon of June 13th in connection with the unveiling of a memorial bench erected in honor of the Hobart men who died in the war. The names of the men, the memory of whose devotion and sacrifice is thus per- petuated, are: William Swift Martm, '93 Rev. Harry P. Seymour, '94 John Rumsey Sanford, '97 Frank Wakefield Koch, '98 Horace Albert Chouinard, '99 Robert Douglas Meacham, '07 Randall Crawford, '07 Wilhelmus Mynderse Rice, '09 Merritt Cole Rogers, '10 Edwin Douglas Roberts, '11 Oliver Phelps Jackson, '12 Kenneth Cleveland Hyde, '16 William D'Orville Doty, '19 Arthur Cleveland Coxe, '19 Morton Altice Way, '19 Harold Cullinan Smith, '20 After the invocation by the Rev. John B. Hubbs, Chap- lain of the College, and the reading of the names by Lewis W. Gracey, '19, the presentation of the bench to the College was made by Mandeville J. Barker, '13 and accep- ted by President Bartlett. Bishop Brent then made a brief address and the ceremonies were brought to a close with military honors appropriate to the occasion. 65 DELEGATES IN ATTENDANCE Harvard University ^ P^FfF^^ Joseph Hetherington McDaniels, A.M., LL.D., Professor Emeritus of the Greek Language and Literature, Hobart College Yale University Frederick Scheetz Jones, LL.D., Dean of Yale College University of Pennsylvania George Woodward Wickersham, LL.D., Alumnus and Trustee Princeton University Dana Carleton Munro, A.M., L.H.D., Dodge Profes- sor of Mediaeval History Columbia University Herbert E. Hawkes, A.M., Ph.D., Professor of Mathematics, Dean of Columbia College Brown University Wilfred Harold Munro, A.M., L.H.D., Professor Emeritus of European History Rutgers College Rev. Livingston L. Taylor, A.B., A.M., Alumnus Dartmouth College Wilbur Marshall Urban, A.M., Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy University of Maryland Eugene Curtis Auchter, B.S., M.S., Head of the Department of Horticulture University of the State of New York Frank Pierrepont Graves, Ph.D., Litt.D., L.H.D., LL.D., President of the University and Commissioner of Education Charles Beatty Alexander, Litt.D., LL.D., Regent University of Vermont Dennie Hammond Udall, D.V.M., Professor of Vet- erinary Medicine and Hygiene, Cornell University 67 58 HoBART College Bowdoin College Kenneth Charles Morton Sills, LL.D., President Union College John Brewster Hubbs, A.B., B.D., D.D., D.C.L., Chaplain, Hobart College General Theological Seminary Very Rev. Hughell Fosbroke, D.D., Dean Auburn Theological Seminary Rev. George B. Stewart, D.D., LL.D., S.T.D., President University of Pittsburgh Lawrence I. MacQueen, A.M., Assistant Professor of Finance Rev. Fredrick G. Budlong, D.D. Indiana University Frank Snyder, M.D., Alumnus Amherst College Rev. E. H. Dickinson, D.D., Alumnus Trinity College, Hartford Rev. Remsen Brinckerhoff Ogilby, A.M., LL.D., President Kenyon College Henry Titus West, A.M., Professor of German Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute William P. Mason, M.D., Sc.D., LL. D., Head of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical En- gineering Western Reserve University Harold North Fowler, Ph.D., Professor of Greek Wesleyan University Watson Thomas Dunmore, LL.B., A.M., Alumnus Lafayette College Rev. W. W. Weller, D.D., Alumnus Haverford College William Lloyd Garrison Williams, A.M., Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Mathematics, Cornell Uni- versity The Centennial 59 Oherlin College Edwin Fauver, M.D., Physical Director, University of Rochester Norwich University Charles C. Brill, A.M., Ph.D., Alumnus Alfred University Charles Fergus Binns, Sc.M., Director of New York State School of Clay-Working and Ceramics at Alfred University Mount Holyoke College Ada L. F. Snell, Ph.D., Professor of EngHsh University of Michigan Warren P. Lombard, M.D., Sc.D., Professor of Physiology Notre Dame University Francis T. McGrain, LL.B., Alumnus University of Toronto Rev. George Cross, M.A., Ph.D., D.D., Professor of Systematic Theology, Rochester Theological Sem- inary New York State College for Teachers Rev. Leonard Woods Richardson, A.M., LL.D., Pro- fessor of Latin University of Buffalo Julian Park, Ph.D., Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences The College of the City of New York Herbert R. Moody, A.M., Ph.D., Professor of Chem- istry University of Wisconsin Charles W. Cabeen, M.L., A.M., Docteur de I'uni- versite, Grenoble, Professor of Romance Languages, Syracuse University DeLancey Divinity School Rev. George Sherman Burrows, D.D., Warden University of Rochester Rev. Rush Rhees, D.D., LL.D., President Annette G. Munro, A.M., Dean of Women 60 HoBART College Rochester Theological Seminary Rev. Joseph William Alexander Stewart, D.D., LL.D., Dean University of Minnesota George M. B. Hawley, LL.B., LL.M., Alumnus Washington University John Randolph Lindsay, A.B., Instructor in English Berkeley Divinity School Rev. Fleming James, Ph.D., Professor of the Litera- ture and Interpretation of the Old Testament Elmira College Hollister Adelbert Hamilton, Ph.D., Professor of Classical Philology and Vice-President Pennsylvania State College James Davis Harlan, B.S., Assistant Agronomist, New York State Agricultural Experiment Station St Lawrence University Arthur H. Van Brocklin, B.S., Alumnus Divinity School of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Phila- delphia Rev. George C. Foley, D.D., Church of the Holy Trinity, Professor of Systematic Divinity Seahury Divinity School Rev. William Austin Smith, S.D., Alumnus, Editor of the ** Churchman" Massachusetts Institute of Technology Martin Herbert Eisenhart, B.S., S.B., Alumnus St. Stephen's College Rev. Charles A. Jessup, D.D., Alumnus Vassar College Mrs. Claude C. Lytic, A.B., Alumna Robert College Constantinople Bertram V. D. Post, M. D., Professor of Biology, College Physician Cornell University Livingston Farrand, A.M., M.D., LL.D., President University of Kentucky Charles Hoeing, A.B., Dean of Men, University of Rochester The Centennial 61 Lehigh University David R. Smith, M.E., Alumnus Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge Rev. Max Kellner, A.M., D.D., Professor of the Lit- erature and Interpretation of the Old Testament University of Illinois Hugh Glasgow, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Ento- mology, New York State Agricultural Experiment Station Boston University Rev. Josiah H. Slutz, S.T.B., A.B., Alumnus University of Nebraska Roscoe Wilfred Thatcher, A.M., Ph.D., Director of the New York State Agricultural Experiment Sta- tion Canisius College Rev. Michael J. Ahem, S.J., President Hunter College of the City of New York Margaret A. Graham, A.M., Ph.D., Professor of Biology Ohio State University Joseph A. Leighton, Ph. D., Professor of Philosophy Smith College Howard RoUin Patch, Ph.D., Associate Professor of English Vanderbilt University John Pickett Turner, A.M., Ph.D., Professor of Phi- losophy, The College of the City of New York Colorado College Rev. J. B. Kettle, A.B., B.D., Alumnus Johns Hopkins University Albert B. Faust, Ph.D., Professor of German, Cor- nell University Lake Forest College Rev. E. Lloyd Jones, A.B., B.D., Alumnus University of Colorado Robert S. Breed, M.S., Ph.D., Chief in Research, Division of Bacteriology, New York State Agri- cultural Experiment Station 62 HoBART College Radcliffe College Mrs. Horace A. Eaton, A.B., Alumna Alma College Lester W. Sharp, Ph.D., Professor of Botany, Cor- nell University Occidental College Lowell Chawner, A.B., Alumnus. Teachers College Isabelle L. Pratt, Recorder Clark University Ernest William Rettger, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Applied Mechanics, Cornell University University of Chicago Edward John Williamson, Ph.D., Professor of Modem Languages, Hobart College Stanford University Bristow Adams, A. B., Professor, State College of Ag- riculture, Cornell University Keuka College Rev. Homer C. Lyman, A.M., D.D., Vice-President Carnegie Institute of Technology Cleveland Beach Coe, B.S., Alumnus Sweet Briar College Katharine Lummis, A.M., Ph.D., Dean American Association for the Advancement of Science Percival John Parrott, A.B., A.M., Entomologist, New York State Agricultural Experiment Station American Chemical Society William Ridgeley Orndorff, Ph.D., Professor of Or- ganic Chemistry, Cornell University American Mathematical Society John Henry Tanner, Ph.D., Professor of Mathe- matics, Cornell University American Philological Association Theodore A. Miller, A.M., Assistant Professor of Classics, University of Rochester American Psychological Association Karl M. Dallenbach, A.M., Ph.D., Assistant Pro- fessor of Psychology, Cornell University The Centennial 63 American Society of Mechanical Engineers Harte Cooke, Honorary Vice-President New York Academy of Sciences Elon Howard Eaton, A.B., A.M., Professor of Biol- ogy, Hobart College American Historical Society Leonard Axtelle Lawson, Ph.D., Professor of Hist- ory, Hobart College New York State Agricultural Experiment Station Ulysses Prentiss Hedrick, Ph.D., Vice-Director United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa Clark S. Northup, Ph.D., Member of Senate of Phi Beta Kappa, Professor of English, Cornell Univer- sity Department of Religious Education of the Presiding Bishop and Council Rev. Paul Micou, A.M., Secretary for Work in Col- leges and Universities. Department of Religious Edux^ation of the Diocese of Western New York Rev. Charles A. Jessup, D.D., President DeVeaux School Rev. William Stanley Barrows, A.M., Headmaster Geneva High School A. J. Merrell, A.B., A.M., Superintendent of Schools St, Francis de Sales High School Rt. Rev. Monsignor Joseph W. Hendrick City of Geneva Robert A. Catchpole, Mayor Board of Education, Geneva Claude C. Lytic, M.D., Member Geneva Chamber of Commerce J. P. Rice, President THE PHI BETA KAPPA ORATION DELIVEEED AT COMMENCEMENT BY THE HON. GEORGE W. WICKERSHAM, LL.D. That was a charming phrase which President Elliot was accustomed to use in conferring the degree of Bachelor of Arts upon the graduates of Harvard College: "I admit you to the society of educated men." Perhaps the expression is somewhat ambiguous. It might be interpreted to signify admission to full membership in a brotherhood of cultivated folk. But I doubt if that great teacher meant to confer complete fellowship upon the mere winners of certificates of compliance with under- graduate student requirements alone. It appears to me to be more consonant with his profound scholarship and proved sagacity to assume that he certified to the attain- ment of the first stage in intellectual progress as that which entitled the student to the privilege of association with those who had earned the distinction of being ed- ucated men. What is education and when can a man truly be said to have become educated .^^ The question is as old as human history and is susceptible of many answers as varying as the speakers. Yet there must be some sure criterion by which to test the problem. The power of knowledge controlled by dis- cretion, which is wisdom, has been extolled by philosophers from the earliest days of recorded history. '*Every pru- dent man worketh with knowledge." '^Knowledge is easy to him that hath understanding." * 'Understanding is a well-spring of life unto him that hath it." Through wisdom is an house builded. And by understanding it is established, And by knowledge are the chambers filled With all precious and pleasant riches. These are some of the aphorisms by which wisdom, as the object of knowledge, is extolled in the book of the Proverbs of Solomon. Generations later, Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "For the Jews require a sign, and th^ 6.6 66 HoBART College Greeks seek after wisdom." But the Jewish quest for a sign was that they might have the assurance of knowledge. True, this degenerated into a looking for "signs and por- tents," abnormal happenings, so that when certain of the scribes and Pharisees came to the Master demanding of him a sign from Heaven, he answered: *'When it is evening ye say, It will be fair weather; for the heaven is red. And in the morning, it will be foul weather today: for the heaven is red and lowering. Ye know how to discern the face of the heaven; but ye cannot discern the signs of the times." It is far harder to read the hearts of men and to foresee the tendencies of human action than it is to forecast the weather, or to solve a problem in chemistry or physics. A knowledge of material things, even the discovery of the operations of the material forces of nature, their control and application to the service of mankind, which lies within the domain of science, is not so difficult as it is to ex- plore and to learn the heart and the spirit of mankind and to comprehend the infinite variety, the subtle workings and the hidden tendencies of the human mind. Through- out the ages, *'The proper study of mankind, is man." Hence it is that education, in the truest sense, is the study and acquisition of a sympathetic knowledge of human thought, human institutions, human expression and human tendencies. Emerson says: ''There is one mind common to all in- dividual men. . . Who hath access to this universal mind, is a party to all that is or can be done." The clue to the future of humanity, therefore, is to be found in the history of its past. ''Of the universal mind," again says Emerson, "each individual man is one more incarnation." The society of educated men, therefore, is made up of those who through sympathy, tolerance and knowledge of the history of man, have come to understand humanity. The first step to the attainment of these qualifications is fellowship with the great ones who have plumbed the depths of human nature and have for the guidance of generations to come mapped out the ways of human thought and action and spirit. Through this association, we are led to realize the oneness of humanity The Centennial 67 of all time — that humanity which is the same in every successive generation, and yet which always is capable of new forms of expression. Browning writes: In man's self arise August anticipations, symbols, types Of a dim splendor ever on before, In that eternal circle run of life; For men begin to pass their nature's bound. And find new hopes and cares which fast supplant Their proper joys and griefs, and outgrow all The narrow creeds of right and wrong, which fade Before the unmeasured thirst for good; while peace Rises within them even more and more. Lowell once wrote an essay on what he termed '*The Five Indispensable Authors" — Homer, Dante, Milton, Shakspere and Cervantes. Last year all Italy united in commemorating the six hundredth anniversary of the death of one of these — Dante Alighieri. During the entire year, eulogies of him were pronounced in schools and col- leges and in public places. Special editions of his works of all kinds were issued from editions de luxe, at prices available only to the rich, to those at figures within reach of the most humble. Newspapers published readable edi- tions at merely nominal prices. Italians of every class united in manifold expressions of a common appreciation of this fourteenth century writer who, first to use the common Italian tongue, made it the vehicle of the ex- pression of thought, so universal, that the entire civilized world throughout six centuries has claimed him as its own, and every people has made him, who was exiled from his own fatherland, an adopted and honored citizen of theirs. In other lands, too, like tributes were paid to this great poet. For once democracy forsook its congenial occupation of detraction of the great, and united in un- broken praise. Even if the object of this uplifting ex- ercise were dead six hundred years, it is none the less heartening that an entire people should unite in laudation of the life and work of a man who had been as one of them. What is it that has preserved the Florentine poet and philosopher through all these centuries so real, so human, so vital to men of different races .^^ Whole libraries of ex- position, of criticism of Dante and his works have been 68 HoBART College written, all of which together prove the universal character of his genius. Professor Grandgent of Harvard gives three reasons for the fact that Dante is such a living pres- ence today, and after six centuries and all the changes they have brought, still "holds the reader with such an un- relaxing grip." These three are, his character, his liter- ary power, his relation to his age. "We love him," he says, "for his healthy manly vigor, for the intensity of his emotions, for his positiveness, his fixed moral standards, his unswerving faith. We admire his soaring imagination, his strong union of mystic ideal- ism with clear vision of reality in all its details, his con- structive skill, his deftness in portraiture, his command of the resources of diction and of verse. We are fascinated by his exhibition of the deeds, the thoughts, the beliefs, the passions of a far distant day." Francesco De Sanctis, one of the most distinguished of contemporary commentators of Dante, in a recent work, Pagine Dantesche, says that "Dante's system of philos- ophy was not a pure and serene speculation, like the Re- public of Plato, but it had entire possession of the man. It was not only his conviction, but his abiding faith. And faith is not only to believe, but to will, to love, to work; it is not only reflection but sentiment and action. Dante had faith. He had faith in God, in virtue, in country, in love, in glory, in the destiny of the human race. His faith was so active that misfortime and deceptions could not weaken it." Dante's knowledge was limited by his time. The science of his day was elementary in comparison with that of ours. The world has long outgrown his astronomical conceptions and the material limitations of his theology. But the fateful love of Paolo and Francesca, whose greatest sorrow was to remember the happy days in their misery; the tragic story of Count Ugolino and his sons' patriotism; of Sordello, who merely at the sweet sound of his city's name fell upon Virgil's neck and would have made a festival for him even there in Purgatory; the picture of the frosty morning, when the ragged peasant looks out upon the fields whitened with hoar frost and paces his hut as a mouse in a trap, beating his fianks for The Centennial 69 warmth, until he laughs with hope to see the snow melting away under the waxing sun, then seizing his staff drives forth his flock to pasture — these things touch the hearts of men of all the ages, as does all great art which reveals the universality of human thought and experience. *'What seekest thou?" a friar asked of Dante. The reply was, "Peace." "This," De Sanctis says,"all his con- temporaries sought. Peace was the concord of the earth- ly kingdom with the heavenly kingdom, of the soul with God. Adveniat regnum tuum." Despite the obsolete ecclesiastical conceptions of Dante's great poem, despite the intense personal hatreds which led him to depict his enemies as undergoing the refinements of torture in the material hell he painted, Dante is of every age and nation. He is cosmopolitan and immortal because he read rightly the hearts of men; because of his faith in the providence of God and the high destiny of man and because he has expressed that faith in inspired and enthralling verse. It was well for the whole civilized world to unite, as it did last year, with Italy in celebrating the life of this man. On orate Taltissimo poeta; L'ombra sua torna, ch'era dipartita. Again, this year, France is celebrating the three hun- dredth anniversary of the birth of its greatest dramatic poet, Moliere. He is not one of those whom Lowell se- lected as the indispensable authors. But, in a high de- gree, he was the personification of the peculiar genius of French character and intellect. His life and thought were remote from those of the great Florentine. Unlike him, he did not tread the high reaches of human in- spiration, with his eyes fixed upon the celestial stars. More like our English Shakspere, he was of humble origin, and like him, he was an actor before he was an author, writing his plays — ^all of them — ^for presentation on the stage. He remained an actor to the end of his life. But in an age when the morals of the stage were proverbially loose, it is recorded that his private character was remarkable for gentleness, probity, generosity and delicacy." In very few instances has any one of the great society of educated men been lacking in that sincerity 70 HoBAET College of character which commands respect for his judgment. The example of Bacon, **The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind," is so exceptional, as to prove the imiversality of the rule. Molidre was a writer of comedy. He held the mirror up to nature. He satirized the foibles and follies of his day. He lacked the universality of Dante or Shaks- pere. His characters, the most widely known of them, are essentially French. His writing is markedly idiomatic. His plays do not translate well into English. They are known but superficially to those who are unfamiliar with the French language. Yet he is the object of the pride and veneration of all Frenchmen. The theatre which he founded has been continued since his death, as the temple of the highest dramatic art in the world today. He cre- ated some great characters, who have become familiar acquaintances even with English-speaking people: Tar- tuff e, the personification of hyprocisy; Harpagon, the miser, who had such an aversion to the word give that he never said, *T give you good day," but "I lend you good day;" Mascarille, the cunning, roguish lackey; Alceste, perfect type of the lover whose jealous passion carries him to the point of desiring that no one should find his mistress loveable; that she should be reduced to a lot of wretched- ness, that Heaven should have given her nothing at birth, that she should have had neither rank, nor station, nor wealth — Afin que de mon coeur Feclatant sacrifice Vous p