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 LIBRARY 
 
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 AN ADDRESS 
 
 BY 
 
 Ex- President of the University of Michigan, 
 
 Delivered at the Commencement Exercises of the 
 University of California, June 1, 1881. 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO: 
 
 Cubbby & Company, Steam Book axd Job Printers, 
 
 4.15 Market Street, just below First. 
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 Will universities ever become obsolete? Are 
 they an integral element of an ideal state; or non- 
 essential, and in the ages destined to be ephemeral ? 
 
 The great Roman orator, who was proud to be 
 called the Savior of his Country, said: " Times 
 change, and w^e change with them." And cer- 
 tainly a picture of the eternal city as it was in his 
 days, by the side of a photograph of the same city 
 to-day, would confirm that exclamation. Where 
 is the Forum? The Senate-house? Where the 
 perpetual fire? Where the conquerors' triumphs? 
 Where the subsequent, now ruined Colosseum? 
 The largesses of bread and the circus? Where, in- 
 deed, the Appian Way? The Code Justinian? 
 
 It may be claimed that such mutations are 
 superficial. Phenomena bubble up and burst, sub- 
 stance abides; clouds change their form, but the 
 supply of heat and vapor is ever renewed, and 
 
 P 
 
4 
 
 nature's clock never runs down. The Parliament 
 House takes the place of the forum, the pulpit of 
 the theater, the cathedral of the temple, and human 
 passions still manifest themselves in work, and 
 empty noise. Gesticulations and intonations per- 
 petuate themselves, though the accents and articu- 
 lations may vary. True it is that human nature 
 and experience have a limited range, and history 
 is, if not cyclical, spiral; yet within the limits in 
 which it ever returns upon itself, lies all the terri- 
 tory that employs the sage, the statesman, the 
 reformer and the philosophical historian. 
 
 The question then is still pertinent: Are univer- 
 sities essential or accidental? Had ancient Egypt 
 anything parallel with a modern European or 
 American university? If so, what good did it ac- 
 complish ? If not, would it have saved the country? 
 How did Greece and Rome meQt the demands 
 filled by these modern institutions ? 
 
 That some institutions like what we now call 
 universities have existed in all civilized commu- 
 nities, that they have been a cause and not a mere 
 effect of advancing civilization, and that they 
 have exhibited in origin and potency the peculiar 
 elements of contemporary society, may be inferred 
 from what scanty facts we have. But whether 
 they will always abide, and, if so, what will prob- 
 ably be their future form, are themes prolific in 
 thought and profit. 
 
 We are not now in the middle ages of little Europe, 
 and can never reproduce its history. Once there 
 
the monastery and the court were the two foci of 
 whatever intellectual and moral forces existed, and 
 the monastery perhaps developed into the univer- 
 sity; but the days of crusades, knight-errantry, and 
 the Inquisition have passed away. No longer do 
 the most of the leading thinkers of the genera- 
 tion gather themselves in groups in cloistered 
 walls or even university halls, while the great 
 mass assemble about them to be bought and sold 
 with the. cattle, and housed, and fed, and milked, 
 and shorn. As the striae on the bed-rock, and 
 the boulders on the plains and hillsides betoken 
 the long-passed glacial age, so the ruins of mon- 
 asteries and castles in western Europe are traces 
 of a social condition as truly forever past as the 
 age of the icthyosaurus and pterodactyl in the 
 red mud of ancient marshes and forests. 
 
 But the castellated age witnessed the beginnings 
 of universities. Are they, too, to become extinct 
 as one of the relics of feudalism? 
 
 Our own age has its peculiar atmosphere, and 
 we, being to the manor born, exult in it. We 
 roll on our railways, toss on our steamboats, blow 
 up and wash down mountains, speculate in fancy 
 stocks, read our newspapers, discuss star mail 
 routes and civil service reforms, politics, philoso- 
 phy, agnosticism and religion, and flatter ourselves 
 that the world has lately reached its maximum. 
 Certainly the times change and we with them. 
 But what of universities in this rolling, crashing, 
 grinding age \ Will they soon be left to be gazed 
 
at, covered with debris, to be investigated by 
 future archeologists? What is a university? I do 
 not pause to determine what the word may first 
 have signified, or ought to signify; but to us now, 
 what body and soul does it present to our imagin- 
 ation ? 
 
 It is easy to say what it is not. It is not the 
 place by eminence, or one of a few places only, 
 ail of one kind, where nearly all the original think, 
 ers of the race are congregated. It is not the 
 spot where men still, like Abelard, the Friar 
 Bacon, Huss, Luther, and WycHffe project upon the 
 world nearly all the thought that gives fashion to 
 the times. Thought is no longer the privilege 
 only of a few. The world is full of aroused mind. 
 Were mind proved to be only some sublimated 
 form of matter we might begin to fear that the 
 whole globe would yet be evaporated and trans- 
 lated into a dream. 
 
 There is more aroused thought now in a single 
 State of our Union than there was in the entire 
 Roman Empire in the days even of Augustus 
 Caesar. Had we a psychometer to measure soul- 
 force, as a thermometer measures active heat, we 
 should find that the world of mind in the human 
 race has undergone greater revolutions than the 
 material globe, and that never before was there 
 such a manifestation of original thought as now. 
 Not only in schools, but elsewhere, thinkers of 
 every grade associate themselves in parties too 
 numerous to be remembered. Books are so mul- 
 
titudinous that ere long a large library will be 
 deemed a nuisance; periodicals of every season, 
 trom the annual to the semi-daily, perhaps soon 
 to be followed by the hourly, force themselves 
 like flies upon our attention; all are taught to 
 read; the wildest theories have their propagators. 
 
 Nor are universities now recognized as endowed 
 with authority to determine infallibly between 
 truth and error, and to impose their decisions 
 upon the community. 
 
 But universities are needed in the present age 
 and in America, if possible, more than ever before. 
 To regulate rather than originate, to discriminate, 
 classify, select, and reject, to value and stamp, is 
 becoming constantly a greater demand and neces- 
 sity. The world is running wild with disjointed 
 thought; and honest youths are lost in a wild 
 babel of conflicting claimants. Can there be no 
 guide? A university by common consent is un- 
 derstood to be the highest of all schools or collect- 
 ions of men who claim to be teachers and con- 
 ductors in all the pathways of mental and mater- 
 ial investigation. The faculty and their associates 
 in instruction profess to be competent to instruct 
 in their respective lines, and communicate all that 
 can be taught. They really constitute the uni- 
 versity. The incorporation, endowment, libraries, 
 and apparatus of every kind, are simply to aid 
 them in their high vocation. 
 
 Now for what are these institutions most 
 needed ? Not simply for original investigation. 
 
In the modern arousement of intellect, stimulated 
 by the renown of discoverers and inventors, and 
 by the great wealth which is often the prize of a 
 new application of science or art to material 
 products, original thought has become a weed 
 that obtrudes itself into every garden. Associa- 
 tions devoted to every kind of investigation, and 
 rewards offered for every valuable increment to 
 human power, sufficiently stimulate the fever for 
 originality of expression and action. 
 
 Are universities needed simply to enable youth 
 who have passed through the prescribed curricu- 
 lum of a lower school to proceed indefinite!)' fur- 
 ther under the leadership of trained guides in well 
 defined and unvarying pathways nearly the same 
 for ages, as in China, always looking backward, 
 and hostile to the ever-varying demands of the 
 outer world ? Certainly this is not the ideal of 
 an American university. 
 
 There can be no authority from without or 
 above arbitrarily to make universities what it con- 
 ceives they should be. Like agriculture and man- 
 ufactures, art, science, and human government, 
 they must become, under the free action of de- 
 mand and supply, and experiment, and failure and 
 success, what the forces of human endeavor shall 
 make them. But it is the part of wisdom to form 
 a clear idea of what they ought to be and do. 
 First, undoubtedly they are to teach the most ad- 
 vanced of those who have still time to spend chiefly 
 in learning and in being taught. Second, un- 
 
9 
 
 doubtedly the)- should encourage the greatest 
 degree and varieties of original investigation, 
 needed by those whose function it is to teach what 
 is already known, and also how to investigate. 
 Third, and chief, they should show the true value 
 or relative values of all knowledge and art of all 
 kinds, ancient and modern, and be able to aid stu- 
 dents to determine what they need to know, as w r ell 
 as to guide them after the track is chosen. 
 
 Ideally, the last demand is first and highest. 
 Perfection in it implies omniscience and absolute 
 justice and unlimited benevolence. Therefore, to 
 a university made up of fallible men it is forever 
 unattainable. Nevertheless it is the part of wis- 
 dom to aim at perfection. What and why, as 
 well as how to study, require investigation. 
 
 There may yet come a recoil against science 
 and art and culture, so called, as against religion; 
 and then universities will be needed to stand in 
 the breach, as the church stands against secularism 
 and animalism. Symptoms of this possible on- 
 slaught of refined barbarism are not wanting; and 
 indeed, in other ages, it has frequently appeared, 
 with the usual variations in form, but always 
 tending to disintegration and destruction. Civili- 
 zations have had their ebbs and subsidences and 
 destructions; and perhaps the noisy and preten- 
 tious utilitarianism of the nineteenth century may 
 follow their example. If so, what is to follow I 
 
 There are many w r ho seriously question the 
 value of popular education. By some it is claimed 
 
IO 
 
 that our public schools actually increase the 
 aggregate of discontent and crime. How long 
 before a graver charge may be brought against 
 our higher schools? If the outcome of honest 
 thought is pessimism, why should the world hurry 
 the catastrophe? If rotting must follow ripening, 
 why be anxious for the harvest ? If all material 
 nature is as destitute of plan and design as the 
 disorderly mixture in the refuse of a kitchen 
 thrown into a slop barrel, why should scientists 
 spend their own time and ask the attention of 
 others to stirring it up unnecessarily? If nominal- 
 ism be really the true philosophy, and there is 
 absolutely nothing beyond names, why should 
 men puzzle themselves to create and quarrel over 
 classifications which are simply hallucinations? 
 If all things are evolved without an Evolver, and 
 in the last analysis, evolution and devolution, im- 
 provement and abasement, sanity and insanity are 
 identical, why harass ourselves with what has 
 no beginning, nor ending, nor form, nor reason, 
 nor soul? If scientific and metaphysical and 
 religious discussions alike are as worthless as the 
 chattering of apes, why persist in the chattering? 
 Ought not the commune, the great all of humanity 
 who may be supposed to have common sense, to 
 determine how much and how little of this amuse- 
 ment to allow, and take efficient means to enforce 
 its will? 
 
 These interrogatories suggest the proper func- 
 tions of universities. They ought to be fountains 
 
I [ 
 
 of the soundest, highest, and best of thought and 
 culture to the people. They should fear nothing 
 so much as either inferiority or bewilderment. 
 They should not shrink from the most difficult of 
 problems; they should have courage They 
 should be able to discriminate between the 
 valuable and the unessential, and honestly and 
 bravely defend the best. If they do this they will 
 never become obsolete. 
 
 During the palmiest clays of European universi- 
 ties, when confessedly they exerted their greatest 
 power as guides of the * nations, the wonderful 
 writings of Aristotle were studied with a 
 reverence that almost betokened a belief in their 
 inspiration. Perhaps the reaction against them, 
 begun by Lord Bacon, has led to too great 
 neglect of some of the subjects discussed by the 
 great Stagirite, the most comprehensive mind, take 
 it for all in all, that has appeared among men. 
 No better discipline could now be received than 
 to examine thoroughly his general outline of all 
 thought, with the illustrations and corrections and 
 enlargements of history. And why should not 
 all our students in the university be aided 
 thoroughly to trace out the w r onclerful power in 
 the world, alike of the Hebrew commonwealth 
 and expectation, followed by the Christian faith 
 and virtue and philanthropy, as well as the effects 
 of Grecian philosophy, Roman law, medieval art 
 and modern discovery and investigation? 
 
 Universities that neglect the highest problems 
 
12 
 
 are gradually digging their own graves, and pre- 
 paring themselves to be bowed out of the com- 
 pany of recognized factors of the world. There 
 is an instinct that demands leadership. The 
 people seek to find and follow creators. To 
 elect is not to create, but to find and designate 
 and acknowledge. It matters . not how our 
 universities may be established, whether by indi- 
 viduals, associations, the church, or the state; but 
 when established we desire them to be in advance 
 of their founders, as we desire a president to be 
 superior to those who appoint him. Whether in 
 the constitution, written or by common consent, 
 there should be a wide range for benevolent ac- 
 tivity. The university is created to be an investi- 
 gator, sifter, and promulgator of sound thought. 
 It should rather be creative than destructive, 
 though each aim is necessary. It should and will 
 attract to itself the sympathy of the best mindsj 
 by its evident honesty of purpose and unquestioned 
 strength. 
 
 I do not therefore regard universities as in 
 danger of becoming obsolete. Society can never 
 outgrow them. They are as eternal as the race. 
 They are practically schools with no upward 
 limitation, and they will be needed as long as 
 there is truth to discover and men to be taught. 
 
 But nothing unchangeable is permanent in 
 exact form. Whatever is to abide must accom- 
 modate itself to ever varying demands. Is there 
 not a demand in American society which perhaps 
 
13 
 
 universities, better than any other agency, might 
 volunteer to supply? 
 
 Is there not needed a comprehensive, impartial 
 summing up from time to time of the thought, 
 discovery, aims, and ability of the times, which, 
 compactly and lucidly set forth, would direct the 
 great leaders of the people in Church and State? 
 Whence could this come so properly as from a 
 university ? 
 
 Such problems as the proper adjustment of 
 appointed to elected officers in this great republic, 
 commonly called the civil service reform, or the 
 relations of mining to agricultural industry in 
 California, where they seem to oppose each 
 other; or the great question of a proper adjust- 
 ment of American civilization to Asiatic emigra- 
 tion, call for a comprehensive and lucid setting 
 forth that should be so thorough, so clear and so 
 honest, that, however much criticised, its truth 
 would be acknowledged and in course of time its 
 recommendations would be obeyed. Now, I ask, 
 whence could this come so well as from a univer- 
 sity? 
 
 But I have no room in an address to elaborate 
 these suggestions. Permit me to say that I have 
 been too long engaged in university life not to be 
 in full sympathy with it. It was my good fortune 
 and great pleasure to labor for and in perhaps the 
 strongest, because the oldest and best managed of 
 our State Universities, while it was passin 
 through some of its hardest experience. It con 
 
 b 
 
*4 
 
 quered a position universally regarded as victori- 
 ous and felicitous. It has frequently demonstrat- 
 ed its right to live. I can see also the peculiar 
 incentives and difficulties of such an institution in 
 this State. 
 
 From one point of view our State is one of the 
 oldest in the world. It is the product of the old- 
 est thought, and therefore ought to be the best. 
 
 The anonymous author of the u Vestiges of 
 Creation," half a century ago, well said: " The 
 United States might be expected to make no great 
 way in civilization till they be fully peopled to the 
 Pacific; and it might not be unreasonable to ex- 
 pect that when that event has occurred the great- 
 est civilization of that vast territory will be found 
 in the peninsula of California, and the narrow 
 strip of country beyond the Rocky Mountains." 
 This certainly is a sagacious prophecy, probably 
 of a Scotchman. The peninsula of California as 
 yet makes no great impression on the world. Per- 
 haps it will soon be heard like the cracker of a 
 whip. But "the narrow strip of country beyond 
 the Rocky Mountains,' 7 not so very narrow after 
 all if Scotland is to be taken as a measuring line, 
 is fast filling up. We are beginning to conquer 
 a place in the attention of the world; we are 
 conscious of a destiny to come. 
 
 With this view, in common with you all, I hope 
 for a noble development of all the educational 
 institutions of our Pacific Coast. 
 
J 5 
 
 And among them all, none has a grander op- 
 portunity than this University of California. Here 
 on this beautiful bay, with the great arms of the 
 State on the right and on the left, and the conti- 
 nent behind it, and already strongly founded, I 
 trust it will be conspicuous among its associates, 
 the leader of leaders, the mother of well trained 
 intellects and hearts, and worthy of honorable 
 mention and memory among the renowned uni- 
 versities of the leading nations in the world. 
 
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