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 "THE GOLLE&E AP THE OLD COLLE&E CURRICULUM; 
 
 AN ORATION 
 
 Delivered at the Centennial Celebration of Franklin 
 AND Marshall College, June 15, 1887. 
 
 BY 
 
 LEWIS H. STEINER, M.D., LL.D., Litt.D., 
 
 LiBKABiAN, Enoch Pkatt Free Library. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 REFORMED CHURCH PUBLICATION BOARD, 
 
 No. 907 Arch Street. 
 1887. 
 
"THE COLLE&E AND THE OLE COLLE&E CURRICULUM." 
 
 AN ORATION 
 
 Delivered at the Centennial Celebration of Franklin 
 AND Marshall College, June 15, 1887. 
 
 BY 
 
 LEWIS HySTEINER, M.D., LLD., Litt.D., 
 
 LiBKAEiAN, Enoch Pratt Free Library. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA : 
 
 REFORMED CHURCH PUBLICATION BOARD, 
 
 No. 907 Arch Street. 
 
 1887. 
 
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 16Ja'(W 
 
THE 
 
 One hundred years ago the corner-stone of a building for the 
 use of a college, created by the authority of the Legislature of 
 Pennsylvania, was laid in this city by Benjamin Franklin. 
 The names of the trustees, to whom were entrusted its interests, 
 show that they were chiefly of German nativity. 
 
 Fifty years thereafter, in a small village nestling at the base 
 of the hills of Franklin County, one solitary student — the sole 
 representative of the highest class of an institution there lo- 
 cated — took his baccalaureate degree and became the first-fruits 
 of another college, also authorized by the Legislature of the 
 same commonwealth. 
 
 Both of these colleges were established by men of German birth, 
 or by those who boasted ancestry that came to these shores from 
 Germany. Whatever vitality they manifested, whatever spirit 
 was shown in their subsequent history, was the result of Ger- 
 man earnestness and German piety. Their support, in most 
 cases, came from those who had toiled to gain a meagre sub- 
 sistence for themselves, but who were animated with an earnest 
 desire to establish institutions where their descendants could fit 
 themselves for any duty in life, and contribute to the welfare of 
 the new country in which their lot had been cast. They prayed 
 and labored, fought against a mighty array of adverse circum- 
 stances, sacrificed much, but still kept prominently before them 
 their main object — to give their children and their descendants 
 
 3 
 
opportunities to secure a good spiritual and intellectual outfit 
 for the work of life. 
 
 Time passed, and the friends of these two colleges, seeing 
 how much more effectively they could perform their duties as 
 institutions for training young Americans, under the influence 
 of what were precious legacies of German thought and German 
 piety, wisely determined to merge their separate and somewhat 
 rival relations into one college, which should challenge the 
 respect and support of the people from whom their students 
 were to be drawn. The united college bore the names of the two 
 out of which it was formed, and, from the very day of the union, 
 started off on a career which, while it has not been marked 
 with the flashy success of a meteor dashing across the sky, has 
 shown how faithfully its ofiicers have striven to realize the ideal 
 of a liberal Christian education. 
 
 To-day we meet under the auspices of the united institutions 
 to return our sincere thanks to Him who has been its buckler 
 and shield, to scan the extent of the work it has done and is now 
 doing, and to bring such help and inspiration to its faculty and 
 trustees as may enable them to take fresh courage and push for- 
 ward still more vigorously in the path they have hewn out for 
 themselves among the colleges of these United States. 
 
 Of those who were honored with degrees by the college whose 
 birthday was one hundred years ago, none are with us in the 
 flesh to-day; some have come from that located at the base of 
 Parnell, whose years amid the struggles of life have been nearly 
 as numerous as those claimed for their alma mater, and whose 
 care-worn brows show that they have been toilers in the world 
 and earnest advocates of the right and the true ; still more are 
 here from the united institution, full of the traditions of the 
 past, but like young giants eager for the work before them, 
 proud of the reputations gained by their predecessors, but full 
 of determination to show themselves worthy of it, and ambitious 
 to secure still greater triumphs. These three classes are all 
 represented here to-day, — the sainted dead who struggled in 
 the early years of Franklin, accomplishing but little beyond 
 
the preservation of the potentiality of the idea of an Anglo- 
 German college ; the vigorous, hardy sons of Marshall, who, 
 after earnest preparation for the work of life under the inspira- 
 tion of the sainted genius whose teachings were their pride and 
 veneration, plunged into the conflict, are also here with grateful 
 hearts and renewed vigor, although marked with many scars 
 indicative of the earnest combats through which they have 
 passed ; and along with these are their successors of Franklin 
 and Marshall — the fair flower of which the others were 
 the promise — upon whom we, the hoys of an earlier day, and 
 our predecessors from the shadow-land, invoke the blessings of 
 Heaven as the hope of the nation we love. Hail, fathers and 
 brothers! ^^ma ma^er has invited us to the feast. Learning, 
 Beauty and Religion have entreated that they might be hand- 
 maidens to welcome the wandering sons to the home fireside. 
 We are not strangers to one another, even if our faces are un- 
 familiar and our voices secure no recognition from attentive 
 ears. Do not our hearts beat in unison ? has not the same love 
 fired our youthful souls ? have we not drawn inspiration alike 
 from the lips or the writings of the Christian philosopher to 
 whom we owe so much for those mighty truths that have proven 
 themselves the mainsprings of our usefulness in life ? We come 
 responsive to her call, prepared to lay whatever of honor and 
 distinction we may have gained at her feet, prepared to ignore 
 for the time the years that have accumulated upon our heads, 
 and ready to be boys once more — subject to her orders and 
 obedient to her discipline. We know that it is good for us to be 
 here, because we hope to secure such a fresh consecration for 
 the work that may still be before us in life that will enable us 
 to put new energy and zeal into all our future efforts, — to 
 acquire additional power in the struggle in behalf of the good 
 and the true, and to go forth from this home-visit with the com- 
 forting feeling that we are fighting no battle alone, but in 
 intelligent sympathy with hundreds of brothers trained as we 
 were, armed as we are, and ready for vigorous contests under 
 the same banner. 
 
Amid, however, the joy and exultation of this meeting, the 
 fact that many are not with us, who, having finished their tasks, 
 have passed from the toils of earth to the triumphs of paradise, 
 spreads a cloud of sorrow between us and the sun, and for a mo- 
 ment hides the brightness of the present with a renewal of the 
 gloom that so thickly enshrouded us when they were called 
 away. Familiar faces, beaming and glowing with the freshness 
 of youth, — voices whose friendly tones once sounded more 
 sweetly to our ears than any ever produced by musical instru- 
 ment, — sympathizing hearts and gentle spirits, — friends of our 
 college days, with whom we loved to mingle in closest com- 
 munion ; may we not pause and drop a tear of affectionate 
 regret as memory brings you all before us ! And there, in 
 your midst, the grand figure of that Christian Gamaliel at whose 
 feet we loved to sit, whose earnest and profound spirit stripped 
 with ease from the superficial and specious philosophies of the 
 schools the gaudy, meretricious ornaments that were calculated 
 to excite the admiration and bewilder the spirits of the young, 
 whose noble soul found its loftiest ambition only fully 
 satisfied when at the feet of the lowly Jesus, whose teach- 
 ings to his pupils were so many inspirations that have 
 never been wholly obscured in any of our souls, but have 
 blessed us whenever we have sufi'ered them to light our paths 
 and guide us in the solution of the various problems of life. 
 May we not pause and, with the deep reverence we feel for the 
 memory of our old master, as the eyes grow moist and the lips 
 become tremulous, thank the Giver of all that is good for the 
 rich legacy of ethical and theological teachings that were left 
 the sons of Franklin and Marshall and the Reformed Church 
 when John Williamson Nevin, ripe in years and full of 
 earthly honors, was gathered to his fathers ! Are we untrue to 
 his teachings when we assert as our fond belief that, in the 
 clouds of witnesses from the spirit-land around us to-day, there 
 is none more in sympathy with the occasion than he who struggled 
 and toiled so many years for the welfare of our institutions, 
 bore obloquy and reproach from little souls who failed to catch 
 
even a glimpse of his unselfish greatness, and at the last, when 
 success was assured, laid aside the honors he had secured, re- 
 tired from the post of authority whence his utterances would 
 have been ex-cathedra to his disciples, and spent the remaining 
 years of his life in retirement ? If any human being should be 
 remembered most gratefully on this occasion, surely it is he 
 who, coming into our midst, gathered up all the educational 
 prophecies of the past with reference to the college, made it 
 possible that they could be realized, and gave an inspiration to 
 his pupils which became stronger and more effective as they 
 grew in years. True, others contributed to the results secured 
 whose names and deeds will be duly honored by those in charge 
 of the details of this Centennial. They were grand assistants 
 to the master-spirit, but he was grander and mightier than all, 
 and as such I pause to drop the tear of affection over his grave! 
 It has been incidentally mentioned that the founders of the 
 institution, and, it might be added, its principal supporters, were 
 men through whose veins coursed German blood. Their ances- 
 tors had but little sympathy with the superficial in the ma- 
 terial, intellectual or spiritual world. Their love for the 
 beautiful might not have been as pronounced as that of some 
 others, but their devotion to the useful and the good was 
 second to none. In their old home they had built their castles, 
 their churches, their houses, not for the passing moment, but 
 as though for all time ; and, similarly, all their material con- 
 structions were not made for show, but to endure, were made 
 not to please the eye, but to serve some useful purpose, and 
 could always be relied upon. Their education had no toleration 
 for the superficial. It must lead the student deep under the 
 surface, where the primal causes were to be found. Its students 
 were never satisfied with a mere plausible reason. They de- 
 manded something profound and absolutely relevant. In the 
 search for this they threw aside the thought of gain and the 
 hope of worldly aggrandizement. It was truth they wanted, 
 and in their opinion no labor was wasted that would make its 
 quest a complete success. In spiritual matters the same idea 
 
prevailed ; the German religious life was not the turbulent 
 babbling of a shallow stream over rocks, pebbles or other ob- 
 stacles that might fill up its bed and obstruct its course, but it 
 was the almost noiseless flow of the mighty river, which, having 
 cut its way through all obstacles, had made a channel free 
 from all obstruction, through which it could bear its freight on 
 to the mighty ocean. 
 
 With such marked peculiarities on the part of its founders, 
 the college must have grown up to maturity, abhorring a super- 
 ficial curriculum, and detesting the shams and makeshifts 
 which are not unusual in the enterprises of the age. Its cur- 
 riculum must have been designed for a full, rounded culture of 
 the student, not pretending to fit him fully for an}? special pro- 
 fession or pursuit in life, but so training all his mental powers 
 that, when he should be deemed worthy of baccalaureate hon- 
 ort-', he might go forth apt and ready to enter upon a special 
 preparation for the duties of his future life. Its faculty set 
 forth this idea with all proper emphasis in their annual circu- 
 lars, and evidently felt that, whatever might be the future fate 
 of the college, it should be true to the course laid down for 
 ages as that best fitted for the careful training of the young. 
 All this was in such strong contrast to the tendency of the 
 times to permit each student to study such subjects only as 
 might be peculiarly apposite to his future calling, that the 
 conservatism which it manifested soon made it obnoxious to the 
 epithet of " fogyish " from the advocates of the " new " educa- 
 tion. 
 
 It requires some courage in the individual not to move with 
 the tidal wave of fashion, and a great deal for him to breast 
 that wave and endeavor to pursue his course in direct antago- 
 nism to its movements. It is so easy to harmonize with the 
 tendencies of the day, whether the results of deliberate thought 
 or the momentary impulses of mere whim. Moreover, one's 
 reputation for amiability is thereby established and strength- 
 ened. He who participates in the popular movement becomes 
 necessarily a popular man, and may stand a chance to get the 
 
uncertain honor of an election to the State Legislature or the 
 National Congress. But he who sturdily refuses to yield to 
 popular clamor, clings to what has been tried in the years that 
 have preceded him, unless the weightiest reasons are assigned 
 for the transfer of his allegiance, is progressive so far and so far 
 only as that which is good and has been severely tried can be 
 carried forward in the front rank with him, — he may not 
 achieve popularity, indeed may be taunted as a conservative to 
 whom the epithet " Fogy " is justly applicable ; but his con- 
 temporaries will never deny him the character of a strong and 
 useful man, whose life is a precious tower of safety to the com- 
 munity, while those who come after him will delight to hold 
 him up to their children as a model worthy of their imitation. 
 The world has long since discovered that popularity is no 
 proof of greatness or wisdom, or talent, or goodness, but, in 
 many cases, is rather suggestive of a travesty of all these, and 
 bears with it the suspicion that success has been secured at the 
 cost of calm consideration and earnest conviction. 
 
 Similarly, it requires courage for a corporation to decline 
 . taking a position in a movement that has involved other corpor- 
 ations organized for the same purpose, and this especially 
 when such action would give it the glamour of popularity and 
 possibly bring it, for the time being, great prosperity and pecuni- 
 ary reward. The smaller the corporation, the more limited its 
 resources, the greater its need for money — the more striking will 
 be its position and more entitled to respect, if it clings to its 
 own convictions and declines to move adverse to them. 
 
 Many of the smaller colleges of the land have acquired such a 
 record in their struggles against the popular tide in education, 
 which seems to have influenced some of our larger colleges to 
 recognize but little as worthy of a place in the curriculum of 
 studies that cannot be made of pecuniary profit to the student. 
 True, such a course was based upon an utter disregard of the 
 idea that certain studies are specially advantageous for the devel- 
 opment of all the faculties of the mind, and that their employ- 
 ment as a whole prevents the abnormal development of some at 
 
10 
 
 the expense of others, — an idea which has had the sanction of 
 centuries. But the age was so prolific in wondrous scientific dis- 
 coveries and still more wondrous application of the same, that a 
 restiveness under the slow and sure methods of training speedily 
 made itself manifest. The question was bluntly addressed to our 
 educators — what use can we make in our daily mercantile and 
 mechanical lines of business of Latin or Greek roots, of the dry 
 details of Logic and Metaphysics, or slow methods of fitting 
 youths for active participation in the business of life? Our mo- 
 tors are not the same as those used by our ancestors. The horse 
 was supplanted by steam when rapid transmission became a ne- 
 cessity, and we are now only impatiently awaiting the discovery 
 of methods by which electricity may be used as the motor of the 
 world. Why shall we be content with the tallow-candle as a 
 source of light, when gas or, better still, the Edison incandescent 
 burner can be employed to illuminate our path by night with its 
 bright, dazzling, far-penetrating light ? The age is one of steam 
 and electricity. Our teachers must present nothing to our chil- 
 dren that will make them pause and cast a longing look at the 
 past 1 That is only useful which treats of the pr^Btmt or prophet 
 sies of the future! We must break with the past P We want 
 none of the so-called culture of the dead languages. Teach us 
 the living, with which we can buy, and sell, and get great gain. 
 Teach us only the things that are practical ! The age is not one 
 for dreamers, but for active, busy, wide-awake men of practical 
 bent I Questions such as these and arguments of a similar char- 
 acter began to be largely employed, possibly not so free from 
 the drapery of rhetorical attractions as I have stated them, but 
 showing, however expressed and richly draped, Jhat a spirit of 
 utilitarianism^ demanding a definite statement of the monied 
 value of their studies, was invading our colleges and striving to 
 overturn the wise conclusions, which centuries of experience had 
 reached, as to the best course of studies for fitting a young man 
 for life. Many shrank from this method of viewing the subject, 
 but still felt that changes must be made in order to satisfy what 
 was fast being developed from "a tendency" to " a movement," 
 
11 
 
 and it was their business to court the popular favor, because that 
 was tantamount to prosperity. But how could they show some, 
 if only the slightest, apparent reverence for the verdict of ac- 
 ademic history, and yet satisfy the Zeitgeist ? And the plan 
 was speedily devised, by taking this theory as its foundation, 
 viz., certain studies have a direct value in the special life-calling 
 which the youth proposes to undertake, — therefore let him take 
 up these and devote his entire energies to them. Let him elect 
 what he will study. He ought to know best. There must be no 
 intellectual procrustean bed upon which he shall be stretched. A 
 free country demands, quite as much as the necessity of special 
 preparation for his future calling, that he shall have no hin- 
 drance to the study of any subject that he may think desirable. or 
 necessary. And so, ignoring the idea that the early training of 
 the mind, body and spirit of the young must really be the same, 
 that there are certain similar kinds of food required by all three 
 ^ so that they shall become suflficiently strong to do manly work 
 in accordance with the bent, inclination or taste that may select 
 or control their life-work,^ignoring this idea, the movement was 
 made to break up all fixed curricula, and to leave the whole 
 subject of training in its details to the judgment or whim of the 
 "X^^ youth to be trained. 
 
 Some of'the large colleges appeared so anxious to encourage 
 this tendency as to make the whole curriculum subject to the 
 individual choice, to throw aside all that had been approved as 
 best fitted to give a round, equable mental developmenil- which 
 should eventuate in fitness for fair, intelligent, special work, 
 whether professional or technical, whenever the time would 
 come for taking it up. Electives became the prominent feature 
 of the college curriculum, and a fixed course of studies a singu- 
 larly rare feature. The smaller institutions, carried away by 
 the example of the larger, or influenced by the hope of securing 
 an increase of students for themselves through marching in the 
 front rank of this movement, became more radical in their prac- 
 tices than their exemplars and more inimical to the system of 
 education which tries to train, to furnish mental discipline and 
 
12 
 
 to fit for life in all parts, so that the individual maj find useful 
 results of infinitely greater value than can be estimated in 
 money. The fashion was established. The hobby or fetich 
 which our colleges delighted to worship was named " the use- 
 ful," meaning by the name that which has a value that can be 
 expressed in dollars and cents. For this they shouted vivat, 
 while they muttered, with angry emphasis, pereat, at the men- 
 tion of any study that savored of pure intellectual training or 
 gradual development for the ambitious youth. Of course there 
 Avas a semblance of propriety in this plan of submitting electives 
 to the student, so that he might direct his attention towards the 
 pursuit which was to be his own in the future, but the egregious 
 error with those who were honestly connected with the move- 
 ment was the ignoring the fact that the choice was permitted 
 before sufiicient knowledge had been acquired by the youth to 
 make it intelligently, that the cool deliberations of a full-grown 
 man, bodily, mentally and spiritually, had been taken for granted 
 in cases where there existed great necessity for tarrying much 
 longer at an academic Jericho until the growth of the intellec- 
 tual beard would give evidence of full adult manhood. Electives 
 were offered to the Freshman long before he could possibly so 
 command the whole of the intellectual field as to know where 
 his mental energies would find their most congenial home. The 
 power of choice was granted before he had attained his intellect- 
 ual majority. The laws of the land denied him the right of the 
 elective franchise before he had reached the age of twenty-one, 
 and yet, although unable to exercise this in a country where 
 even young children are conversant with politics and the 
 records of politicians, the youth of sixteen or seventeen was 
 supposed to be able to determine much more important ques- 
 tions for himself, individually, and to exercise the right of an 
 election of the highest personal value. 
 
 The result of this movement was not confined to the mere 
 matter of choice of studies. It was still more comprehensive. 
 Its legitimate tendency was the removal of all limitations upon 
 youth, and the obliteration of all college regulations and at- 
 
13 
 
 tempts at discipline. In the movement to put the youthful in- 
 dividual whim beyond the control of the judgment of the ex- 
 perienced and the uniform conclusions of the past, the principle 
 of no restrictions, save those which the laws of the land impose 
 for their infraction, asserted itself. College discipline had been 
 based either upon a code of laws consisting largely of " thou 
 shalt nots," with penalties annexed, which at times became 
 wearisome and obnoxious to the youth who was to be trained in 
 the college to the accurate performance of his tasks from a 
 high sense of duty, or upon an enumeration of tasks and a 
 statement of regulations which were laid down with appeals to 
 a gentlemanly sense of honor for their observance, and whose 
 persistent violations could only be punished by a removal of the 
 diseased member from the otherwise healthy body. The latter 
 was the favorite method with the best educators. The student 
 while at the school required detailed regulations involving pro- 
 hibitions and probable petty penalties, but there was to be 
 somewhat larger liberty so as to fit him for the future, when he 
 Avas to be a law to himself. He was not to understand his 
 college liberty as implying no recognition of law, but rather as 
 that which could only be fully enjoyed in and under its pro- 
 tection. There were fewer penalties, but these were more 
 grievous in their nature. Hours for recitation and other pur- 
 poses were to be preserved, because system and order and dis- 
 cipline had not yet completed their work, and this work was 
 that at which the whole curriculum was aiming. 
 
 The new system, however, removed all restrictions. The 
 individual will should not be restrained. Attendance upon rec- 
 itations must be absolutely voluntary. All the minor details, 
 supposed to be necessary to every well-ordered household, were 
 to be discarded. The majority of the individual, intellectual 
 and moral, was to be anticipated. Professors were to be freed 
 from any special care for the habits and morals of their pupils, 
 while their duties were to be confined solely to imparting intel- 
 lectual instruction, at certain definite hours, to those who chose 
 to attend at the time specified. 
 
14 
 
 One step further was taken. The question arose quite natur- 
 ally, If no fixed course is required of the youth, why shall he 
 be compelled to attend daily prayers and Sunday services ? Is 
 it not better that attendance on these should be left to his own 
 volition — to his own spiritual longings? And so, instead of the 
 college being of service, as in former days, to strengthen the 
 intellect, the will, the spiritual fibre by the gradual withdrawal 
 of the props that the child demanded — which were lovingly fur- 
 nished at home and judiciously provided at school — it is made 
 the arena where all these are thrown aside and the youth is 
 called upon to bear the burdens and undergo the temptations of 
 manhood with little, if any, assistance whatever. That the risk 
 to be undergone is great, no one can deny; that it is unneces- 
 sary, at the age and under the circumstances, I have no hesita- 
 tion to declare. 
 
 Let me sum up what the tendencies of the popular college 
 education of the day involve. First, the ignoring of the study 
 of the so-called dead languages — Latin and Greek — which, in- 
 stead of being dead, are really manifesting a perennial life 
 throughout the literature of all countries, because they are the 
 custodians of the thought and beauty that belonged to the human 
 mind, when it was untrammeled by traditions and reveled in 
 close contact with the truths of nature. Second, the lowering 
 of liberal culture, while a money-estimate is placed upon the 
 studies of the college course, according to which those only are 
 of value to the individual student that seem to have some direct 
 connection with his future calling. Third, the removal of all dis- 
 ciplinary agencies which were intended, in an educational way, to 
 strengthen the moral and spiritual nature of the young, and to 
 lead them along so that they may gradually learn to think and 
 act as well-trained, strong, self-reliant men, fitted in all respects 
 to assume the general duties of life or to enter upon special 
 preparation for any subsequent professional or technical pur- 
 suit. These results antagonize the work which was formerly 
 assigned to the college. The sphere of the college was well- 
 defined as " the discipline and cultivation of all the powers of 
 
15 
 
 the individual, so that bodily " — and it must be admitted that 
 there is strong reason for the introduction of athletics into our 
 colleges — " mentally and spiritually he may be trained for the 
 warfare of life." 
 
 A recent utterance from the University of Berlin shows how 
 the scientists of its Faculty recognized this order of training 
 as that best adapted to fit students even for special scientific 
 work. For a quarter of a century the graduates of the gym- 
 nasia — somewhat corresponding to our colleges — and those of 
 the Real Schule have been admitted on a like plane to the 
 University. But, after this long experience, the declaration 
 has been made that the students from the Gymnasia, who 
 have been closely and carefully trained in the old classical 
 curriculum, have been found better equipped, even for the 
 scientific studies, than those whose preparation was made in 
 the Real Schule, where the practical or technical idea pre- 
 vailed. And this declaration was signed by Hoffmann, one of 
 the greatest chemists of the day. 
 
 Now, the requirements of the age may demand of some, who 
 are impatient to enter upon practical pursuits, that their edu- 
 cation should be so specially conducted as to give business- 
 knowledge and business-fitness, and of others that they should 
 pursue technic studies in order that they may be able to plunge 
 into the duties of life. We have no controversy with this 
 fact. Some technological study may possibly be beneficial at 
 every stage of education — if for no other purpose, certainly for 
 the completion of mental discipline — but the experience of the 
 past accords perfectly with the conclusions of the Berlin 
 savans tTiat the best preparation for that which requires a 
 thoroughly cultivated and well-disciplined mind is the old col- 
 lege course of studies pursued under the direction of honest, 
 earnest, industrious, able professors, whose lives are devoted 
 to their duties, and that he who has conscientiously completed 
 it is thereby ordinarily much better prepared to take up the 
 pursuit of special studies thereafter than one who has not had 
 the advantages it furnishes. 
 
16 i 
 
 With these views, acquired when a boy in the early days of 
 Marshall College, strengthened by contact with the world and 
 the experiences it brings to every one who strives to perform 
 his duty, I turn with pleasure to the General Regist^^r of 
 Franklin and Marshall, and find these utterances from its 
 faculty : 
 
 " Franklin and Marshall has remained firm in its adherence to what it 
 conceives to be the true end and aim of a college. While it freely con- 
 cedes the legitimate calling of institutions that lay themselves out specially 
 for a business education, and the pursuit of technic studies, it does not be- 
 lieve that such purposes can be advantageously joined with a vigorous and 
 successful attempt to make a full classical course." 
 
 I read, also, that Divine service is held on Sundays, that a 
 Biblical or catechetical course of instruction is given on Sunday 
 morning, that a daily morning service is held in the chapel, 
 and 
 
 "That these provisions are such as parents usually wish their sons to 
 enjoy at home, and they are designed to throw around them the strongest 
 agencies for good in the midst of the dangers and perils by which they are 
 surrounded during this most interesting period of their lives." 
 
 Bravely said, Mater Carissima! you have remained firm and 
 true to the ideal set before you in the days of your youth, have 
 striven to realize it all these years, and are still true to your 
 convictions and earnest in your endeavors to bring up your 
 sons in accordance with the traditions of the past and the ex- 
 perience of its most faithful educators. And while doing this, 
 you have shown yourself not unmindful of the fact that the 
 age is one of wondrous developments in science and art. Your 
 observatory, your efforts after more elaborate means of illus- 
 trating the scientific progress of the present, all show how 
 faithfulness to the past can be connected with a hearty recog- 
 nition of progress. Conservatism is not necessarily antago- 
 nistic to progress, but can so beautifully blend with it as to 
 demonstrate the continuity of all human effort and all mental 
 life. With truth it can be said of alma mater, that " your 
 children arise up and call you blessed." 
 
17 
 
 Vivat Academia 
 Et qui illam regit. 
 Vivat membrum quodlibet, 
 _ Vivant membra quselibet, 
 
 Semper sint in flore. 
 
 Another error which the college has avoided is the tendency 
 to masquerade as a university, while striving to carry out the 
 idea of a college. The spheres and methods of the two insti- 
 tutions are widely different. The one is intended for general 
 training to intellectual work, the other to fit the student for 
 the specialty which his mature mind has selected. The one has 
 little or nothing to do with electives, the other must furnish 
 these in abundance, so that the student can acquire the special 
 knowledge that will be of value in his life-work. The one has 
 to do with a fixed course and with restrictions that gradually 
 diminish as the college-life draws to a close ; the other recog- 
 nizes the individual as having passed beyond the restraints 
 needed by youth and now ready to forge out the weapons which 
 will be required in the special arm of the service in which he has 
 enlisted for the coming battle. In the university he is to be a 
 law to himself as regards his bodily, intellectual and spiritual 
 conduct. Here his personal bent and inclination are of the 
 first importance. They must shape his studies, determine the 
 courses of lectures most necessary, and cause him to avail him- 
 self of everything that will give his adult powers and well- 
 trained mind such mastery over the truths which specialists 
 have gathered in the past, that he can take his place among 
 them and, by original work, make additional contributions to 
 their stores. Having learned the advantage of discipline in 
 the ranks, he has become fitted to take a place with those who 
 are to exercise authority and demand recognition for their 
 special knowledge. 
 
 The university insures the grand efilorescence of the plant, 
 which having sprouted forth from the seed sown in childhood in 
 the school, has undergone nurture in youth in the college, and 
 has been placed under conditions, in a suitable environment, that 
 will give it free course to show forth its peculiar characteristics. 
 
18 
 
 Such an institution must have a liberal foundation, since its 
 teachers should all be proficients — recognized experts or mas- 
 ters ; its illustrations should be of the best, and, therefore, of 
 the costliest character ; its libraries should be large, and com- 
 prehending the written conclusions of the wisest men who have 
 labored in the domain of human knowledge ; and its means for 
 fresh and original investigation should be such as to invite the 
 ambitious to work in untrodden fields with great probability of 
 success. Without a liberal foundation it will fail to realize the 
 ideal involved in its simplest form, and prove a delusion to 
 those who have been enrolled among its members. Hence, uni- 
 versities cannot be numerous. Far better that they should be 
 few, thoroughly equipped, well manned, largely supplied with 
 members eager for the advantages they may offer, and become 
 necessarily great centres for original work and valuable contri- 
 butions to science and literature; Colleges may be numerous, 
 — in the nature of the case, must be; but universities involve 
 so much outlay of money, so large an assemblage of great 
 talent, that to carry out their true conception they must be 
 limited in number. When the college tries to imitate their 
 methods, it fails to furnish the young student the training he 
 needs, and immerses the adult in superficiality instead of the 
 thoroughness which he has the right to expect. It travesties 
 the genuine, it degrades its own special functions, and it 
 becomes a hindrance instead of an aid to the spread of knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 Thoroughness is an object to be striven after by every edu- 
 cator. What is worth learning at all is worth learning well. 
 Shallow pretence, superficial display and a smattering of 
 knowledge belong to the humbugs of the day. Life is too real, 
 too earnest to be occupied with such substitutes for genuine 
 proficiency. The age needs less veneer over crass ignorance, 
 less of the whited sepulchre full of nothing that possesses vi- 
 tality in itself or can confer vitality upon others, less of the 
 pitiful pretender, less adulteration of the good and the wise, 
 and more of the solid and enduring, more of earnest labor. 
 
19 
 
 more of that true spirit of manliness which delves for gold and 
 will not be satisfied with any base counterfeit it may exhume 
 in the course of its quest. 
 
 The college that is inspired with such a spirit will be the 
 source of incalculable value to its patrons and an inestimable 
 benefit to its students. It will teach the latter to beware of 
 shams and subterfuges, to despise a lie in action as well as in 
 wordj to leave no effort untried to be true in study and in reci- 
 tation, to spare no labor to master whatever may be assigned 
 as the daily task, and to grow up to an honorable, upright 
 manhoodj fitted for direct, earnest work wherever their occupa- 
 tions may place them. It will prepare the way for excellence 
 in professional life, for success in mercantile or any other pur- 
 suit, and will furnish the State what it needs at present, — pru- 
 dent, wise, far-sighted and broad-minded citizens, able to rise 
 above the machine-politics of the day, to appreciate the widest 
 and most enlarged statesmanship in others, and to take a judi- 
 cious position themselves on every question affecting the honor 
 or prosperity of the nation-at-large or the particular State of 
 which they may be citizens. 
 
 The duty now rests upon educated men to take part in many 
 questions that are demanding speedy solution. The masses 
 must be educated, — and what does this not involve ? At most 
 they can only be made the recipients of the rudimentary 
 branches taught in our primary schools. The little learning 
 acquired may prove to be quite dangerous unless it is supple- 
 mented from the pulpit, the platform and that most wonderful 
 agent for good or evil, the press, with a larger and more copious 
 supply. The welfare of the nation demands that there should 
 be constant instruction of the people as to the rights and duties 
 of citizens, the relations existing between capital and labor, the 
 mutual obligations of the State and its component parts, and a 
 thousand other subjects on which unprincipled agitators are 
 continually haranguing the people and preparing the way for 
 the introduction of measures which mean, when carried out, 
 anarchy and the ruin of everything that divine or human law 
 
20 
 
 teaches us to hold sacred and inviolatGc We cannot avoid the 
 performance of this duty. It is not possible in this conflict to 
 hire a substitute and send him to the front to represent us. We 
 must go ourselves. We must individually take part, because 
 ■we owe it to our families, to the State and to the great Being 
 who has so mysteriously made us our brothers' keepers. We 
 must also prepare our children for like duty when they enter 
 upon their life-work. Knowing our own deficiencies, how we 
 neglected many opportunities that were offered us in our days 
 of preparation and used others feebly, we have the right to ask 
 that the' eojleges shall be so conducted that these children shall 
 be led by con^tmitly improving methods, which will develop the 
 best form of mamKwd and fit them thoroughly in mind and 
 spirit for the contest. And when all the colleges shall become 
 alive to this duty, .shall frown down and expel from their midst 
 everything that smacks of superficiality, and shall become cen- 
 tres of honest and faithful training, the effect will be to so in- 
 crease the army of sturdy warriors for the right that victory 
 will be the inevitable result whenever they may encounter the 
 hosts of evil and misrule. 
 
 As a nation, we are now enjoying the blessings of peace. We 
 must not, however, entertain the thought that the possibility of 
 future struggle for right or even for national existence has been 
 obliterated. It may be that our national strength as well as the 
 tendency of the age will ensure the reference of all future diflS- 
 culties with foreign nations to just arbitration, that the stupend- 
 ous fraternal conflict through which we have passed will forever 
 hereafter cause us to avoid such an unnatural method of settling 
 internal difficulties, that a more civilized and Christianized 
 statesmanship will force us to so look upon the Indian question 
 as to find it not only better, but even more economical, to edu- 
 cate our red brothers than to shoot them down at sight. But 
 there are signs of danger from another quarter, which may call 
 for the best means of offense and defense known to the^Chris- 
 tian statesman and scholar. Heretofore we have exhibited a 
 wonderful faculty of fusing the most incongruous and even an- 
 
21 
 
 tagonistic elements into one homogeneous people. This has 
 been so successfully accomplished that we have invited the na- 
 tions of the earth to send their surplus population to us, with 
 but little, if any, care as to the moral character of our immi- 
 grants. And so, beside the hardy and honest foreigner who 
 brings with him his family and scanty means, there is now landed 
 upon our shores a class of lawless, unprincipled, godless scoun- 
 drels, full of the political doctrines that precipitated the French 
 Revolution, and practicing a defiance of religion and morality 
 which would be destructive to the well-being of any people. 
 As in other days when the nation's cry was heard for help, our 
 colleges felt it a high privilege to show their patriotism by 
 sending forth their students to rally around the national ensign 
 and to insure its triumph, so now, in the coming contest with 
 anarchy and socialism, it will be their duty again to enter the 
 ranks and show by their valor and courage how they have 
 trained their students to do good service against the wrong in 
 whatever shape it may appear. On all such occasions may the 
 sons of Franklin and Marshall be found in the front rank, earn- 
 estly contending for the principles on which the college was 
 founded and zealous for their maintenance. 
 
 And when another centennium shall have passed away, and 
 graduates and citizens shall again assemble to recount the inci- 
 dents of her history, may the pages of her record be then as 
 bright and honorable as they appear to-day, the number of her 
 graduates be increased a thousand-fold, and her reputation for 
 learning, patriotism and piety be second to no sister institution 
 in the land ! Then, as now, may it be said in truth : '^ Surrex- 
 erunt Filii eius, et Beatissimam prsedicaveruntJ'