291.70973 
 
 Ad28 
 
 ADDRESSES 
 
 AT THE INAUGURATION 
 
 OF 
 
 I 
 
 REY WILLIAM C. CATTELL, D.D., 
 
 PRESIDENT OF LAFAYETTE COLLEGE, 
 EASTON, PENNSYLVANIA, 
 
 JULY 26, 1864. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 WILLIAM S. & ALFRED MAETIEN, 
 
 No. 606 Chestnut Street. 
 
 1864. 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 ILLINOIS LIBRARY 
 AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 STACKS 
 
UNIVERSITY OF 
 ILLINOIS LIBRARY 
 AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 STACKS 
 
The Inaguration exercises took place in the College Chapel, Tuesday after- 
 noon, July 26, 1864, in the presence of the Trustees, the Faculty and 
 Students of the College, and a number of the members of Synod, Alumni, 
 citizens of Easton, and other friends of the Institution. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Hand of Greenwich, N. J., opened the exercises with prayer, 
 after which the Hon. James Pollock, President of the Board of Trustees, 
 delivered the following 
 
 INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen: — As President of the 
 Board of Trustees, I have a very pleasant duty to 
 perform on this occasion — to formally induct into 
 office the President elect of Lafayette College. 
 
 Permit me to congratulate you upon the auspi- 
 cious circumstances under which we meet. Hereto- 
 tofore, this College, located in one of the most beau- 
 tiful and fertile regions of our State, under the care 
 and control of a venerable Synod of the Presbyterian 
 Church, and with a patronage that should command 
 success, has exhibited symptoms of premature decay — 
 its very existence has been a series of struggles for 
 life. With all its natural advantages — with all the 
 talents and learning which have distinguished its 
 Professors, it has not realized the expectations of its 
 friends and founders. Causes, deeply to be regret- 
 
4 
 
 ted, local and personal, have prevented the consum- 
 mation of their desires — the realization of the hopes 
 of the generous and patriotic men who planted and 
 nurtured this Institution. 
 
 But the hour of darkness and gloom has passed — 
 and to-day, within her walls all is harmony and 
 peace; and at this hour, in analogy with nature now 
 robed in sunshine, and smiling after the storm, the 
 light of a genial sun pouring down upon us through 
 the riven and scattered clouds, Lafayette College 
 stands revealed in the light of returning prosper- 
 ity, and all without betokens favor, success, and 
 triumph ! 
 
 We have met to-day to witness the inauguration 
 of one well known and appreciated by you all: and 
 who has been honored by a most happy, cordial, and 
 unanimous election by the Synod and Board of Trus- 
 tees. We present him to you as the scholar and the 
 man — the highest style of man — the Christian gentle- 
 man; and one who combines, in a remarkable degree, 
 the quiet dignity of the Christian minister, the ac- 
 complishments of the scholar, and the no less im- 
 portant qualifications of an administrative officer. 
 
 But before the formal transfer to him of his Presi- 
 dential authority, permit a few general remarks ap- 
 propriate to the occasion. 
 
 We have assembled to inaugurate the President 
 of a Literary Institution. What theme, then, more 
 appropriate than education'? The primary idea of 
 
5 
 
 education is development of mind, morals, and man- 
 ners. It comprehends the entire series of instruc- 
 tion and discipline that strengthens the intellect, 
 controls the understanding and the will, moulds the 
 manners and the man, and adds to knowledge, truth ; 
 and to both, virtue. Education is not learning — it is 
 the mode of its acquisition. Learning is not only the 
 acquisition of knowledge; but knowledge acquired 
 through education. An educated man may not he, 
 and is not always a learned man. He may have 
 received the training necessary- — may possess the 
 ability to acquire knowledge, but fail to apply the 
 forces at his command to secure the desired result. 
 A collegiate education is not conclusive evidence of 
 scholarship. A college, is education in one of its 
 modes or forms — the educational machinery by which 
 knowledge is acquired, and through which mind 
 moves and acts in the acquisition of learning — a 
 power to give strength to intellect, and energy to 
 youth and manhood. 
 
 Education, in its development, has relation to man, 
 as such — to man in his individuality — to his man- 
 hood, as the result of character and culture. Our 
 educational Institutions are organized systems of de- 
 velopments — of individual development; and when 
 they fail to recognize men in their individuality, and 
 to promote their advancement in the progressive 
 work of intellectual and moral development, they 
 abandon their true position, and neglect the duties 
 
6 
 
 of their high calling. By individuality, I do not 
 mean individualism, which is selfishness intensified; 
 but that distinct oneness — that separate and poten- 
 tial existence that marks us as men, and makes the 
 individual man the substratum of social and national 
 organization ; investing him not merely with indivi- 
 dual existence, but with rights, privileges, and pre- 
 rogatives, as also duties and responsibilities, which 
 are his own, unchallenged and uncontrolled, except 
 by Him who created and crowned him with honor. 
 
 The history of the world is a history of individual 
 development. Nations are but individuals in aggre- 
 gation; national greatness is dependent upon indi- 
 vidual and personal progress; and nations cease to 
 be great when the individuals cease to be men. 
 Therefore it is, that every system of education 
 should recognize man in his individuality, and de- 
 velope his manhood, as the certain means of securing 
 personal, social, and national elevation. 
 
 It is a significant fact, that the educational and 
 historical epochs of the world exhibit a wondrous 
 unity and harmony of the law of individual develop- 
 ment, with moral, social, and national progress. 
 Take the earliest epoch, that of Oriental civilization, 
 and we find the status of the man determined the 
 character of the government; and the opinions men 
 entertained of themselves revealed the idiosyncracies 
 of the age. The government was patriarchal and 
 despotic — man the child and the slave; the rela- 
 
7 
 
 tionship established the despotism — that destroyed 
 individuality, and man knew not himself, his rights 
 or powers. The education of the age was in har- 
 mony with those conditions, and produced those 
 results. Grecian and Roman civilization was an 
 advance over the Oriental. A superior education 
 elevated the man — made him a citizen — but the 
 property of the State. His citizenship secured for 
 him protection, but the protection of the govern- 
 ment made him the property of the State; and, as 
 such, he was protected. He formed no part of the 
 State, for his individuality was lost in the tyranny 
 that oppressed him. 
 
 Travelling down the track of time, the revelations 
 of history indicate a rising manhood, a more de- 
 veloped individuality, under the power of education, 
 and the pressure of progressive thought and expand- 
 ing intellect. In modern Europe we discover man 
 lifted to an equality with the State, but not above 
 it. Man and the State is the rule of European 
 civilization. 
 
 The light of the Reformation, flashing through 
 the night of the dark ages, revealed man to himself, 
 and caused him to realize the value and power of 
 his manhood. Education was reformed; truth, flow- 
 ing from the fountain of eternal truth, bade man 
 look upward, and find within himself the image of 
 his great Original. The Reformation, in its influ- 
 ence and results, prepared the world for the advent 
 
8 
 
 of a new system, based upon the rights of man, and 
 the powers of a restored and recognized manhood. 
 Under such guidance we move along the highway 
 of the ages, and come to our own land- — to America, 
 “the land of the free heart’s hope and home” — the 
 land of progress, of development — the historic centre 
 of the world. Here we find men — not the slaves of 
 despots, not the property of the State — not merely 
 equal to the State — but men who stand erect in the 
 dignity of their manhood, masters of the State, and 
 personally free. In other lands the government 
 begins and ends with the throne; here it begins 
 and ends with the people. It is what the people 
 make it. It is the political incarnation of their 
 will. Their power we find embodied in the simple 
 forms of our political and social order. Our educa- 
 tion, reaching to the practical and real, the spiritual 
 and the free, has made our citizens sovereigns, and 
 our nation great — great in her men, in her intellec- 
 tual and moral power, in her progress, and the 
 bright promise of a greater future. So much for 
 education in its relations to personal and national 
 progress and development. These thoughts are 
 merely suggestive; they cannot now be elaborated. 
 
 The office of teacher, whether in our common 
 schools or higher seminaries, is one of dignity and 
 responsibility. It is mind acting upon mind, and 
 leaving its impress there. The teacher should be 
 fitted for his work. It is gratifying to know, that 
 
9 
 
 we have in this Institution men engaged in this 
 high calling, in whom all have entire confidence — 
 able, learned, and zealous men, who realize their 
 vocation, and well discharge its duties. The age 
 and the hour have their demands upon them and 
 every American scholar. Never, in the history of 
 the world, was this demand more imperious and 
 pressing than at this moment. The land we love is 
 America — the only America. War is upon us, and 
 in its mighty convulsions our nation trembles to its 
 centre. It is a war of systems. Man, free man, 
 against tyranny and oppression — right against wrong, 
 truth against error, freedom against despotism. It 
 is not alone our war; we .are fighting the world’s 
 great battle for freedom and human rights. Amid 
 the throes of war and revolution the voices of six 
 thousand years are heard, bidding us go forward, 
 calling upon us to maintain our own rights, and 
 vindicate the rights of earth’s millions who long to 
 be free. This demand is not made alone upon our 
 armies in the field — the call is upon every American 
 scholar, upon all who love their country, who have 
 the intelligence to appreciate and the courage to 
 defend it. 
 
 Permit me now, Mr. President elect, to say that 
 the office to which you have been so honourably 
 called — not by your seeking, but by our choice — is 
 one of high trust and solemn responsibility. From 
 the position you occupy, it is yours, under God, to 
 
10 
 
 act directly upon the mind, the morals, and the 
 heart. You deal not only with the past and the 
 present, but with the future. Like the artist of 
 old, but in a higher sense, you work for posterity, 
 for eternity. The impressions made by you will be 
 as immortal as the intellect upon which you act. 
 Let them be the impressions of truth and virtue. 
 I need not say to you, that the system of education 
 that ignores the Bible, and shuts out from its teach- 
 ings the truth as contained in that volume of eter- 
 nal truth, is a blank — a chaos dark and wild, with- 
 out light or life. Secular knowledge may be and 
 is valuable, but in that book is found the “rich 
 treasures” of knowledge, peerless and priceless. Let 
 your teaching be consecrated by religion, and let 
 the young men who wait upon your instructions 
 receive, above all other teaching, that which will 
 add to their wisdom here, and make them “wise 
 unto salvation.” 
 
 To your associates in the Faculty, let me say, that 
 in giving you a new President, we are giving you a 
 man emphatically of your own choice — a former col- 
 league, known and beloved by you all. With him, 
 and each other, you will be a band of Christian bro- 
 thers. He will need your aid and encouragement. 
 The Institution will require all your energies and 
 strength. Give them cheerfully and prayerfully to 
 the cause of Christian education — to the cause of 
 God and your country. Let religion and patriotism 
 
11 
 
 blend harmoniously in your teachings. Let your 
 names, and the names of the students of Lafayette, 
 be for ever associated with those who, in the hour of 
 their country’s peril, offered life and all in her 
 defence; who, true to the inspiration of American 
 manhood, stood in the world’s presence the noble 
 advocates and defenders of American freedom and 
 American nationality. 
 
 One word to the students. Remember your in- 
 structors are Christian gentlemen. Ever respect 
 and trust them as such. Let there be a oneness of 
 aim among all who may assemble within these vene- 
 rable Halls, consecrated to learning and religion. 
 Remember that disobedience is always wrong — 
 often a crime. Cultivate a noble and manly spirit; 
 and let the members of the Faculty feel that you 
 regard them, not as task-masters and rulers, but as 
 friends, worthy of your confidence and love. Dare 
 to do right — fear to do wrong. This is manhood — 
 this is true courage. 
 
 And now, Mr. President, as the last act I have to 
 perform on this occasion, I present to you, in the 
 name and by the authority of the Trustees of Lafay- 
 ette College, these keys of the College, as symbols of 
 your authority. Take them, and on assuming the 
 duties of your office, remember, also, your responsi- 
 bilities, and meet them firmly, conscientiously, and 
 in the fear of God. In the performance of your 
 arduous duties be assured you will have the sympa- 
 
12 
 
 thy, the cooperation, and prayers of the friends of 
 the Institution. And when your work here below 
 is done, and the last lessons of earth are over, may 
 teacher and student- — all here to-day, or who may 
 hereafter enter these Halls, meet in that upper and 
 better world, where happiness is eternal, and know- 
 ledge has no limit. 
 
 On receiving the keys of the College, Dr. Cattell responded as follows: 
 
 I thank you, sir, for the very kind terms in which 
 you have been pleased to convey the solemn trust 
 which the Synod of Philadelphia and the Trustees of 
 Lafayette College have committed to my hands. In 
 accepting it, be assured that, under God, I rely 
 most for success upon that active and cordial coope- 
 ration from them, of which I have been so fully 
 assured. Returning to this beautiful region of coun- 
 try and to these Halls, the scene of my first labors 
 as an instructor in liberal studies: renewing the 
 pleasant associations of other years with the respected 
 citizens of Easton and with my esteemed colleagues 
 in the Faculty, whose abilities more than compen- 
 sate for any deficiencies of my own, I enter upon the 
 duties of my office with a confident trust and a 
 cheerful hope, though not unmindful of its grave 
 responsibilities, its cares and its toils. 
 
 Then followed the Inaugural Address, at the conclusion of which the 
 benediction was pronounced by the Rev. Dr. Andrews, of Doylestown, 
 Pennsylvania. 
 
INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 
 
 Gentlemen of the Board of Trustees, 
 and Friends of Christian Education : 
 
 The design of College studies, as distinguished 
 from those of all other schools, is the culture of the 
 human faculties, without immediate reference to any 
 specific business, or even professional pursuit. The 
 definite aim of the primary school, and of the Uni- 
 versity, is to impart useful information. The facul- 
 ties of the mind are used as instruments to gather 
 and shape the material for future building; while 
 training, considered in itself, is only an incidental, 
 though a very great advantage. The shortest and 
 easiest way of securing these materials is therefore 
 the best. All labor and time-saving appliances 
 facilitate the object in view. On the other hand, 
 the definite object of the College, as a place of libe- 
 ral culture, is training for its own sake, as distinct 
 from mere knowledge. It is Education in the pro- 
 per sense of the term — not the pouring in, or the 
 filling up, but the educing, the leading forth, the 
 harmonious and symmetrical development of all our 
 faculties. Although this process is inseparable from 
 the acquisition of that which is both true and useful 
 
14 
 
 — ancl while that system of education is undoubtedly 
 the best, which secures proper training, and, at the 
 same time, the greatest amount of useful knowledge 
 — it is, nevertheless, to be borne in mind that the 
 determinate object of liberal culture is the mind 
 itself — by its own exercises — and, consequently, that 
 all labor-saving inventions defeat the very object 
 contemplated. 
 
 The Germans give the right word to their Col- 
 leges — Gymnasia. This term they borrowed from 
 the ancients, with whom Scholrn Philosophise and 
 Gymnasia were convertible terms. As every well 
 appointed gymnasium for physical culture differs, 
 for example, from the riding-school and the fenc- 
 ing-school, in requiring many things to be practised 
 for the sake of the exercise — so the college differs 
 from all schools of special instruction, in requiring 
 many studies to be pursued, not so much for their 
 practical application in after life, as for the mental 
 discipline they afford. Much, therefore, of what 
 has been learned in the college, may fade from the 
 memory of the student as the ink dries upon his 
 diploma; and yet its substantive value remains in 
 the power and strength which the pursuit of these 
 studies has developed in the man himself. Mathe- 
 matical symbols, and the ipsissima verba of the 
 classics, may never actually re-appear in the speech 
 of the statesman, the brief of the lawyer, the diag- 
 nosis of the physician, the balance-sheet of the mer- 
 
15 
 
 chant, or the sermon of the divine; yet those years 
 of toil have not been lost when the student- went 
 down into the Palaestra to wrestle with Euclid and 
 Plato. The sinewy grasp with which the practised 
 athlete now lays hold of whatever subject claims 
 his attention, in any profession or business pursuit, 
 reveals the value of that culture which disciplined 
 alike the memory, the reasoning powers, and the 
 imagination. 
 
 It is not claimed that a collegiate course will in- 
 variably produce these desirable results. The sterile 
 soil yields no harvest to the ceaseless and well 
 directed labor of the husbandman — and liberal cul- 
 ture on some, minds, is as much a waste of time and 
 labor, as plowing and sowing the sand; and it is for 
 every parent to judge for himself whether time and 
 money may not be wasted by his son in the pursuit 
 of liberal studies, and whether, indeed, he may not 
 become thereby unfitted for those branches of humble 
 industry, to which his talents — or rather his want of 
 talents — may have indicated his providential call. 
 
 Nor is it pretended that the substantial results of 
 liberal culture can only be secured within the walls 
 of . some chartered institution. There are too many 
 illustrious names, in the history of our race, which 
 have never been upon the rolls of any college: but 
 these, we contend, have received the equivalent of a 
 course of liberal study, in the various educational 
 processes by which they were moulded to usefulness 
 
16 
 
 and greatness. There are other and valuable modes 
 of exercise besides those which the regular gym- 
 nasium affords; and the friends of college education 
 insist only upon this, that as in a well arranged gym- 
 nasium there is a course of physical exercise, best cal- 
 culated to strengthen and develope the powers of the 
 body; so in the course of college studies, arranged 
 after centuries of experience, and by the wisest of 
 men, there can be developed in the best mode, to 
 the greatest extent, and in the shortest time, those 
 higher powers with which the Creator has endowed 
 us, and in the exercise of which, man rises to the 
 highest sphere of dignity, enjoyment, and usefulness. 
 
 It is not, however, my purpose to detain you with 
 any discussion, either of the design or value of liberal 
 culture. On these points thinking men are now 
 very generally agreed, and the present generation 
 of the American people, stigmatized so often as 
 wholly absorbed in the accumulation of material 
 gain, has multiplied throughout our land these col- 
 leges, having substantially the same curriculum of 
 studies, and designed to make not so much the 
 mechanic, the farmer, the merchant ; nor even the 
 lawyer, the physician, or the divine; but the educated 
 man, in se ipso tot us teres atque rotundus* And 
 while the student is thus, in a high and noble sense, 
 a an end unto himself, ”f he becomes at the same 
 
 * Hor. Sat. 11, 7, 86. 
 
 f Sir William Hamilton. Discussions, &c., Am. Ed., p. 689. 
 
17 
 
 time, a distributor of all good influences in his day 
 and generation, to all classes and conditions of men. 
 We claim this as the proud distinction of every 
 truly educated man, that he is in advance of his age; 
 and like the base of supplies established along the 
 line of an advancing hostf it is from the liberally 
 educated minds of the world that society in its on- 
 ward march is replenished and strengthened at every 
 stage of its progress. 
 
 Nor can the friends of liberal education resist a 
 feeling of honorable pride in contemplating these 
 numerous institutions as so many monuments of 
 triumph, erected upon the field where a hard fought 
 battle with ignorance and prejudice was won. To 
 speak in military phrase, the whole ground has been 
 fought over, and the opponents of liberal culture 
 driven from one entrenchment after another. The 
 opposition to any system of education for the masses, 
 which for so long a time was both persistent and 
 vigorous, early assumed formidable proportions. 
 Said Gov. Berkley, of Virginia, in 1650: “I thank 
 God, there are no free-schools nor printing, and I 
 hope we shall not have them these hundred years. 
 God keep us from both.” Happily there were mas* 
 ter minds among the first settlers of our country, who 
 thought otherwise; and they proposed at once to 
 move on the enemy’s works. Harvard College was 
 founded within twenty years after Plymouth Bock 
 was consecrated by the Pilgrims’ prayers, and while 
 2 
 
18 
 
 yet the forest trees were standing in the streets laid 
 out for the settlement at Massachusetts Bay. And 
 notwithstanding the boast of Gov. Berkley, the second 
 College in this country was founded in Virginia, and 
 by the same generation that heard his scornful words. 
 
 These two Colleges, with Yale and Nassau Hall, 
 (the next in order of time, as well as of importance,) 
 constituted the great quadrangular fortification in 
 which the friends of liberal culture securely en- 
 trenched themselves, and from which they issued 
 forth, from time to time, to make conquests. Before 
 the Revolution they had established fortified posi- 
 tions at Philadelphia, New York, Providence, New 
 Brunswick, and Dartmouth. These outposts they 
 firmly held in the cause of liberal education, while 
 they waged another war in the no less sacred cause 
 of political liberty; and when this was won, again 
 they unfurled their banners, and the whole line 
 moved fonvard to the final conquest of the entire 
 land. 
 
 Yet, however gratifying this triumph, it must be 
 confessed that there remains cause for anxiety and 
 alarm, in view of a most serious defect, widely pre- 
 valent in our present system of liberal education. 
 
 I refer to the comparatively small amount of bibli- 
 cal instruction given in most of our colleges; the 
 intellectual faculties* alone being considered worthy 
 
 * “The design of public seminaries is specially to develope and culti- 
 vate, to the highest perfection, the intellectual power of the nation.”— 
 Dr. Way land, Thoughts on the present Collegiate System in the United States. 
 
19 
 
 of culture and development, to the almost entire 
 neglect of the noblest endowment of man — his 
 moral and religious nature. It is to this subject I 
 would especially invite your attention upon the 
 present occasion. 
 
 The practical difficulty of introducing the sacred 
 volume to any considerable extent among the books 
 studied in our public schools, and in the higher 
 institutions of learning under the control of the 
 State, is perhaps insurmountable — at least while the 
 present low views as to the functions of the civil 
 government remain unaltered. But this defect 
 exists to a lamentable degree, even in colleges 
 founded and governed by Christian men. It may 
 indeed be affirmed, that among all the books now 
 used in the curriculum of most colleges, professedly 
 Christian, the Bible is either not included at all, or 
 holds a very subordinate position. 
 
 Do not understand me as under-estimating the 
 extent or value of the religious influences which 
 pervade the great majority of our colleges. Founded 
 mainly by Christian men, and upon Christian prin- 
 ciples, their Professors distinguished no less for 
 their religious character than for profound scholar- 
 ship, our colleges have been very generally nurse- 
 ries of piety, as well as seminaries of learning. No 
 Institution professedly founded upon infidelity, or 
 even ignoring with deliberate purpose our common 
 Christianity, could possibly withstand the force of 
 
 ✓ 
 
20 
 
 public opinion. The University of Virginia is a 
 notable instance of the complete failure of the ex- 
 periment, though tried under the most favourable 
 circumstances. Nor is it scarcely necessary to repel 
 the calumny so often brought against the college, 
 as a place of unusual danger to the young. It is 
 difficult to conceive of any organized community 
 where more pains are taken to foster all good 
 influences, and to exclude all that are bad. Indeed, 
 this very exercise of college discipline, while secur- 
 ing such desirable results, has in part occasioned 
 the wide-spread misapprehension in the public mind 
 as to the standard of morality among college stu- 
 dents. The care taken to arrest certain evils, gives 
 them great prominence in the public view; and 
 hence those sinful excesses, which are incident to 
 all youth, and which elsewhere too often run their 
 course, silently, because unchecked, to shame and 
 ruin, are considered peculiar to the college. The 
 most experienced educators agree upon this point. 
 The Rev. Ur. Moffat, once a Professor in this Col- 
 lege, and subsequently in two other colleges in 
 widely distant parts of our country, declares: — 
 “ I have had abundant means of forming an unbiassed 
 judgment, and I not only repel the charge, but also 
 most roundly assert, that the ranks of collegiate 
 learning are less contaminated with vice, than any 
 other ordinary occupation in which our youth 
 
21 
 
 engage.”* Such has been the result of my own 
 observation, though of course less extensive than 
 that of this eminent divine. While freely admit- 
 ting the many and fearful dangers which environ 
 youth here as elsewhere, I do not hesitate to affirm, 
 that temptations and facilities for evil are fewer 
 within college walls, and that all good influences 
 are stronger, than those which surround any body 
 of young men congregated together, and away from 
 the wholesome restraints and the blessed influences 
 of home. 
 
 While insisting upon this, we are nevertheless 
 forced to the painful admission that there is but 
 very . little regular, thorough and systematic study of 
 the word of God in most of our colleges ; even in 
 those, as before observed, professedly Christian. 
 Many good men, especially during the last few 
 years, have publicly deplored this evil. Dr. Cort- 
 landt Van Rensselaer, one of the most profound ob- 
 servers, and at the same time one of the most earnest 
 advocates of liberal education, declared before the 
 Synod of Wheeling, in 1854 : — “ The Grecian sophists 
 depreciated man’s moral nature in their method of 
 instruction, but scarcely more so than the liberal 
 philosophers, and often Christians , at the present day. 
 Religion can hardly be said to be a branch of know- 
 ledge in many of the institutions of the country. It 
 
 * See, also, Professor Tyler’s Premium Essay, and a most admirable 
 article in the Princeton Review, for 1859, by Dr. Atwater, entitled, “Reli- 
 gion in Colleges.” 
 
22 
 
 is taught incidentally, rather than authoritatively 
 and systematically. It is sometimes introduced with 
 a latent purpose to save appearances, and to satisfy 
 weak suggestions of conscience; and too frequently 
 is it left in the predicament of an optional study.” 
 Dr. Hodge, of Princeton, in a sermon preached before 
 the American Sunday-school, employs even stronger 
 language. “ Ever since the revival of letters we have 
 employed in the early stages of education, heathen 
 fables ; and in the more advanced stages heathen 
 poets, historians, orators and moralists. These have 
 been and still are, the instruments most extensively 
 employed in the education of Christian youth; need 
 we wonder at the result. Notwithstanding partial ex- 
 ceptions, it is certainly true that the Scriptures have been 
 systematically excluded from the places of education , 
 and that the great majority of Christian youth have 
 been brought up more under the influence of heathen 
 minds and models than under the inspired minds and 
 models of the word of God.”* Similar testimony 
 might be cited from many wise and judicious men,')' 
 nevertheless the evil is not remedied. There have 
 
 * This sermon was republished in Calcutta. We can imagine the sensa- 
 tions of an intelligent Brahmin on reading it — especially the sentence we 
 have italicised. 
 
 f Not merely those of our own denomination. A writer in the Baptist 
 Chronicle, (August 4, 1864,) giving an account of these inauguration ser- 
 vices emphatically endorses these statements. I quote only one sentence : — 
 “ The writer has long felt this flagrant defect in our course of college studies, 
 exalting Jove, and Minerva, and Paganism, and subordinating Christ and 
 Christianity, and he prays that the Lord will soon constrain his servants, 
 who have the education of our young in their charge, to correct it.” 
 
23 
 
 indeed been sporadic efforts, but many of these have 
 resulted in no permanent improvement, while in 
 none have the expectations thus excited been fully 
 realized, though Christian men as trustees, and pro- 
 fessors, and patrons of our colleges, have the matter 
 in their own hands. 
 
 Indeed there are eminent divines, even in our own 
 Church, who contend that from the very nature of 
 the college, biblical studies are inadmissible. The late 
 president of South Carolina College* did not hesitate 
 to characterize all such education as of necessity 
 only “ the inculcation of sectarian peculiarities,” and 
 as utterly unworthy of place in any system of liberal 
 culture. “ Let it come,” says he, “ in the character 
 of the professors ; let it come in the stated worship 
 of the sanctuary ; let it come in the vindication of 
 those immortal records, which constitute the basis of 
 our faith.” All other religious or biblical instruc- 
 tion must be sought at “the fireside and the church, 
 the home and the pulpit!” That is to say: — College 
 students may attend public worship- as other people 
 do, and even a pittance of time may be taken from 
 the study of heathen authors and the sciences, to con- 
 sider the authenticity and inspiration of the Scrip- 
 tures, but the momentous truths they contain, 
 though comprehending the necessary elements of 
 liberal culture, must not be the subject of special 
 attention ; and this, too, during the very period, 
 
 * In bis letter to Governor Manning on Public Instruction, 1853. 
 
24 
 
 when, above all others, the habits of thinking are 
 formed with rapidity for life, and the principles of 
 moral character are shaping themselves, perhaps, for 
 all eternity. 
 
 This certainly was not the view taken by the 
 pioneers of education in our country, and especially 
 those of our own Church. In 1667 the United 
 Synod of New York and Philadelphia, constituting 
 then our General Assembly, unanimously resolved, 
 “ That special care be taken of the principles and 
 character of schoolmasters, that they teach the West- 
 minster Catechism and Psalmody, and that the min- 
 ister, church sessions, and the aforesaid committee — 
 (where they consistently can) — visit the schools, and 
 see these things be done; and where schools are 
 composed of different denominations, that said com- 
 mittees and sessions invite proper persons of said 
 denominations to join with them in such visitations.” 
 This plan of visitation originated with the elder- 
 ship, who were no less zealous than the clergy in the 
 religious instruction of those in a course of secular 
 education, and we are told that the above recommen- 
 dation was not only repeatedly urged upon the 
 Churches and Presbyteries, but that “year after year 
 inquiry was made how far the business had been 
 attended to.”* The same zeal for religious instruc- 
 tion was manifested at Harvard College. In the 
 first constitution, (1642,) it was enacted: — “That 
 
 * Hodge’s History of the Presbyterian Church. Part II. pp. 340, 341. 
 
25 
 
 the students were to be practised twice a day in 
 reading the Scriptures, giving an account of their 
 proficiency and experience in practical and spiritual 
 truths, accompanied by theoretical observations on 
 
 the language and logic of the sacred writers 
 
 In every year and every week of the college course, 
 every class was practised in the Bible and catecheti- 
 cal divinity.”* Similar provision was made for these 
 studies in Yale.f The pious founders of Prince- 
 ton College “sought to rear an institution in which 
 should be taught at one and the same time, the 
 lessons of revealed truth and the elements of human 
 knowledge.’’^ 
 
 The men of that day were far from considering 
 the facts and doctrines of the Bible antagonistic to 
 all liberal studies, or that teaching the truths con- 
 tained in our symbols would be merely the use less 
 inculcation of “sectarian peculiarities,” tending to 
 dwarf the mind and to engender bigotry. In the 
 famous New England Primer, room was made for 
 the whole of the Westminster Catechism, a com- 
 pend of divine truth, which, so far from embracing 
 only sectarian peculiarities, at first united all the 
 Churches of the Reformation, and can now, with 
 the exception of one or two questions, be subscribed 
 
 * President Quincy’s History of Harvard College. Vol. i. pp. 190, 191. 
 
 t All the original trustees of Yale College were clergymen. It was at 
 first designed that the institution should be called “The School of the 
 Church.” 
 
 t Inaugural address of Rev. John Maclean, D.D. 
 
26 
 
 to by all evangelical denominations. In like man- 
 ner were the text-books for the higher education 
 largely filled with Scripture truths. And it was by 
 such thorough biblical instruction in schools and 
 colleges, and not merely by the indirect influence 
 of the “fireside and the pulpit,” that our fathers 
 were trained in those Christian principles of which 
 they were not ashamed, and which they were not 
 afraid to embody in those earlier constitutions in 
 which the national life took shape. With the 
 exception of Virginia, whose Constitution, like its 
 University, was moulded by the hand of Thomas 
 Jefferson, every one of the original thirteen States 
 bore decided and unequivocal testimony to its Chris- 
 tian character, by recognizing the fundamental prin- 
 ciples of Christianity in the constitution and laws 
 framed for its government. In most of them the 
 belief in the divine inspiration of the Bible was 
 explicitly avowed. What a contrast do these earlier 
 records present to the subsequent revised and im- 
 proved constitutions of the several. States! It would 
 be vain to search in the present Constitution of our 
 own State, for any thing to remind us of the solemn 
 declaration required by the Constitution of 1776. of 
 every member of the Legislature, viz. “I do believe 
 in one God, the Creator and Governor of the Uni- 
 verse, the re warder of the just, and the punisher of 
 the wicked; and I do acknowledge the Scriptures of 
 the Old and New Testaments to be given by divine 
 
27 
 
 inspiration.” A distinguished clergyman of our own 
 Church, Rev. Dr. Mcllvaine, said to one of the leading 
 members of the recent Convention that framed the 
 amended Charter for the State of New York : u You 
 have given us a constitution for the government of a 
 great Christian people, which covers a vast extent 
 and variety of topics, and yet which carries out one 
 idea with such perfectly logical vigor, that from no 
 single w T ord or form of expression could it ever be 
 inferred that such a fact as the Christian religion 
 ever existed.” To all of which this enlightened law 
 maker — 44 a liberal supporter of the Presbyterian 
 Church” — replied: “ How well you have understood 
 it! That was just what we intended to do.” Ex 
 uno disce omnes! 
 
 It is perfectly obvious that the American people 
 are no longer impressed with the importance of 
 recognizing, as a nation, even the fundamental prin- 
 ciples of Christianity. These have so generally dis- 
 appeared from the National Charter, from the Con- 
 stitutions of the several States, and from both Na- 
 tional and State deliverances, that we are not so 
 much surprised as grieved that the Supreme Execu- 
 tive of the land should officially declare, and this too 
 as a concession to Mahommedauism, that, • “ the 
 Government of the United States is not, in any sense , 
 founded upon the Christian religion. Alas! how 
 
 * Treaty with Tripoli; Laws of the United States, published under the 
 authority of Congress. Vol. I. p. 2'JO. 
 
28 
 
 is the gold become dim ! how is the most fine gold 
 changed! And what has caused this changed Doubt- 
 less a partial explanation may be found in the uncon- 
 querable aversion of our people to the enforced 
 union of Church and State; a union fraught with 
 the most appalling evils, and against which the peo- 
 ple of God have been the foremost to protest, and 
 Presbyterians primi inter primos .* Yet ought this 
 jealousy of Church establishments lead us to tear 
 down the altar of God, the very altar at which this 
 nation, in its infancy, was baptized] Gentlemen, 
 these States are, and of right ought to be, not only 
 free and independent, but Christian! and this dis- 
 tinctive feature should be impressed most plainly 
 upon their organic charters. Daniel Webster, the 
 great expounder of what constitutional law is, and 
 no mean judge of what it should be, uttered the fol- 
 lowing noble sentiment, in the year 1820 : “I am 
 desirous, that in so solemn a transaction as the es- 
 tablishment of a Constitution, we should express our 
 attachment to Christianity ; not, indeed, to any of its 
 peculiar forms, but to its general principles.” It is 
 not only a solemn truth that government is ordained 
 by God, and that only those who honor Him, will 
 
 * In 1777, while in the very throes of the Revolutionary war, the Pres- 
 bytery of Hanover addressed a memorial to the Legislature of Va., on the 
 subject of " liberty in the concerns of religion.” State establishments are 
 denounced “ as a restraint upon freedom of inquiry'and private judgment 
 and after fully arguing the question, the memorial says: "Therefore, we 
 ask no ecclesiastical establishment for ourselves, neither can we approve of 
 them when granted to others.” 
 
29 
 
 He honor ; * it is equally true, that the organic life 
 of this nation springs from Christianity. No people 
 can exist without a definite religious character, and 
 we have a national conscience to exonerate, by pro- 
 claiming that our Government is not Pagan, or In- 
 fidel, or Mohammedan, but Christian. We have 
 too long presented to the world the humiliating 
 spectacle of an infidel aggregate of Christian men ; 
 and were these millions of nominal Christians tho- 
 roughly trained in Bible truth, they would not have 
 become so tender of the consciences of a few infidels 
 or errorists, as to be unmindful of their own. No 
 clamor about church establishments, or Erastianism, 
 or liberty of worship, which are all false issues in the 
 case, could drive them from the public altars, where 
 
 * Our National Constitution is, perhaps, the only one in Christendom 
 that does not, in some manner, recognize the existence of God : and now to 
 maintain its supremacy throughout our land, what a frightful amount of 
 blood and treasure is daily expended! The same unenviable distinction 
 has been conferred upon our coins. “A sort of universal instinct, (says Dr. 
 Boardman,) has consecrated the coinage of the world to religion.” This 
 Christian people alone refuses to impress upon its coins even the name of 
 Him who has declared “the silver and the gold is mine.” And we do not 
 know of any other currency so subject to sudden paralysis: as if our 
 godless coins were periodically struck with conscious shame, and precipi- 
 tately withdrew themselves from public observation. We rejoice to know 
 that these two subjects are now occupying the attention of our people. An 
 extended movement is on foot to introduce into our national compact the 
 name of the Deity whom the whole country worships: and upon some of 
 the recent issues from the U. S. Mint, we gratefully read the solemn words, 
 “In God we trust.” For this, we are indebted mainly to the eminent 
 Christian statesman, now Director of the Mint, and who, as President of 
 the Board of Trustees, presided at the ceremonies of this Inauguration. 
 
30 
 
 our fathers sent up their grateful cry to heaven: 
 44 By Thee only , will we make mention of Thy 
 name /” 
 
 But this, we apprehend, is the main cause of our 
 national defection. The Bible ceased to be the 
 chief corner-stone in our educational policy,* and 
 Christianity ceased to give character to the national 
 life. That the sacred volume disappeared entirely 
 from the curriculum of college studies — however it 
 retained its place in the college pulpit — is scarcely 
 a matter of conjecture. That distinguished scholar 
 and statesman, Samuel L. Southard, said in an 
 address at Princeton: — “The College of New Jersey 
 was the first, so far as I am informed, into which 
 the study of the Bible, as a college exercise, was 
 
 introduced. A few years after I was graduated 
 
 I believe about the year 1813 — the now aged and 
 most venerable minister of the gospel, Bev. Ashbel 
 Green, a few months after he became the President, 
 adopted the plan of recitations on the Bible, on the 
 Sabbath afternoon.” And at the Centennial celebra- 
 tion of the College, in 1846, the Bev. Dr. Samuel 
 Miller proposed the following sentiment— 44 The 
 venerable Ashbel Green, D. D., LL.D., our venerated 
 eighth President — we honour him as the first head 
 of a College in the United States, who introduced 
 
 * The report of the Board of Education, for 1850, contains the following 
 significant sentence: — “The General Assembly has resolved, in the fear of 
 God, to re-introduce divine truth into its institutions of learning as far as it 
 may be practicable.” 
 
31 
 
 the study of the Bible as a regular part of the colle- 
 giate course.” 
 
 These distinguished gentlemen should have said 
 restored , instead of introduced; and it is another 
 honor for grand old Nassau, the fruitful mother of 
 Presbyterian Colleges, that her hand should be the 
 first to wipe the accumulated dust of years from the 
 sacred volume. But yet these statements, in one 
 sense honorable to her, cast shame alike upon all. 
 Well might we be startled at the grave announce- 
 ment, that, in this Christian land, the study of 
 God’s revealed will to man was first introduced “as 
 a regular part of the collegiate course” of Christian 
 Colleges, in the year of our Lord 1813! Nor can 
 we affirm that even Dr. Green demanded for the 
 Bible the prominent position formerly accorded to 
 it among educational books, and which it both merits 
 and claims. “ It is a fact,” says he,* “equally noto- 
 rious and shameful, that men of liberal education 
 are sometimes more ignorant of the Bible than of 
 almost any other book of reputation.” And yet he 
 adds — “ If those parts of the Sabbath which are not 
 occupied with public worship, and other exercises 
 proper to the sacred day of rest, should be employed 
 in the study of the sacred writings, it would be 
 amply sufficient.” Is then the toil of the week to 
 be given to Livy and Plato, and only the repose of 
 
 * “On Evangelizing a Course of Liberal Education/’ published in 
 1822. 
 
32 
 
 the Sabbath to Moses and Paul, to say nothing of 
 the great Teacher, who spoke as never man spoke ? 
 Nor has much more of the lost ground been re- 
 covered since his day, if we may judge from a state- 
 ment of Dr. Baird, in the latest edition of his 
 “Religion in America,” published only eight years 
 ago: — “It is a cause of gratitude to God, that in 
 many of our Colleges the Bible is studied by the 
 students every Sabbath, under the guidance of their 
 teachers.”* And is this all, my Christian auditors ? 
 — all the time and attention that is to be given to 
 the word of God, by those professedly engaged in a 
 course of liberal studies'? What heathen nation, 
 ancient or modern, has been satisfied with such a 
 modicum of its religion embraced among the studies 
 of its youth'? “From the beginning of time till a 
 period very near to us,” says Dr. R. J. Breckin- 
 ridge,')' “ and amongst the entire race of man, except 
 only reformed Christians of these latter days, the 
 general principle remotely occupying the base of 
 this subject has been cordially and universally re- 
 ceived and acted on as of paramount importance. 
 Every people, without exception, has thought it 
 necessary to teach its religion to its children, as the 
 very basis of all other knowledge; and every nation 
 that has been sufficiently advanced to have a written 
 
 * Book III., Chapter xiii. 
 
 f Speech before the Maryland Bible Society, (1839,) published in the 
 Baltimore Literary and Religious Magazine. 
 
33 
 
 religion, and places for the regular instruction of 
 youth in knowledge, has made the national religion 
 a national study in childhood. The sacred books of 
 all heathen nations have been known of all who 
 knew anything whatever.” 
 
 But examine now our College catalogues, and see 
 how far the national religion of this Christian coun- 
 try is made “the very basis of all other knowledge,” 
 and what provision is made for the thorough and 
 systematic study of its “sacred books.” From the 
 catalogues upon my table for the current year, I 
 select one, almost at random, presenting fully and 
 minutely the course of study in one of the oldest 
 and most influential Colleges of our land. In all 
 the departments of secular learning, it is an honor 
 to any age and country. Its Trustees and Profes- 
 sors are not only Christians in the general sense of 
 the word, but evangelical. Some of them are the 
 ordained expounders of God’s word. Its Calendar 
 refers to Thanksgiving-Day, Christmas, and Good- 
 Friday. Yet, so far as the published course of in- 
 struction shows, this College is almost as oblivious 
 of the fact that Christianity exists, as is the Consti- 
 tution of the State of New York. Among the 
 eighty books named in the “Department of Instruc- 
 tion,” for special study or general reference, neither 
 the Bible, nor any part of it, is so much as named. 
 One hour in each week of the first session of the 
 senior year “is devoted to Natural Theology, so far 
 3 
 
34 
 
 as arrived at by unaided reason;” and which might, 
 therefore, have been as well taught by Plato, Aris- 
 totle, and Cicero— whose books are, indeed, the very 
 ones cited for reference. The same amount of time 
 per week, in the second session, “is devoted to the 
 Evidences of Revelation, both Philosophic and His- 
 torical;” and this last exercise, scarcely embracing 
 a dozen lectures, is all that brings the youthful stu- 
 dent, during his four years’ course of liberal studies, 
 in contact with the grand themes of Christianity! 
 The Bible itself, its antiquities, history, and doc- 
 trines, receive no attention whatever. Must we 
 give to such a course of study, in a Christian land, 
 the comprehensive and solemn term Education] 
 Alas! what a short step have such colleges taken 
 in advance of the Academia, the Stoa, the Peripatos ! 
 Indeed the comparison is unjust to those schools of 
 Pagan instruction. Cicero mentions, as first in the 
 order of time and importance, the studies de diis im- 
 mortalibus; and among the ancients, Theologia was 
 everywhere regarded as the prima Philosophia. Look, 
 too, at the heathen nations of our own day. The sacred 
 writings of the Hindoo, the Mohammedan, and the 
 Chinese, are their only educational books, although 
 their literature is both varied and extensive. From 
 this fact alone, we can form some conception of a 
 Pagan’s attachment to his sacred symbols, and are 
 not at a loss to understand why he clings with such 
 tenacity to his religion. But, gentlemen, we have 
 
35 
 
 better Oracles. Is not the gleaning of the grapes of 
 Ephraim better than the vintage of Abiezer! The 
 law of the Lord is perfect. Time would fail 
 me, nor indeed is it necessary in this presence, to 
 show the superiority of the Bible to the Koran, the 
 Shasters, and the writings of Confucius, even in a 
 literary point of view, and as a mere educational 
 book. But I cannot forbear repeating in this con- 
 nection, the well-known declaration of one of the 
 most learned men, especially in all liberal studies, 
 that the world has ever seen: “I have regularly and 
 systematically read the Holy Scriptures,” says Sir 
 William Jones, “ and am of the opinion that this 
 volume, independently of its divine origin, contains 
 more sublimity and beauty, more pure morality, 
 more important history, and finer strains of poetry 
 and eloquence, than can be collected from all other 
 works, in whatever language or age they may have 
 been composed.”* Yet this volume is scarcely thought 
 
 * Without multiplying similar testimony, I cannot resist adding the elo- 
 quent words of one who was formerly a student in this College, the Rev. J. 
 H. Mcllvaine, D. D., of Princeton. Speaking of those in process of educa- 
 tion, he says: “To acquaint them with all things most necessary to be 
 known, both for this world and that which is to come; to accomplish them 
 in the most profound, abstruse, and infallibly correct processes and 
 methods of reasoning; to imbue them with the knowledge of history, elo- 
 quence, poetry ; to quicken their perceptions of the true, the beautiful, and 
 the good; to inform them with sound principles of right and justice*; to 
 purify their affections, and fix them upon the most exalted objects — in fine, 
 to ennoble, transfigure, and glorify their whole humanity — to accomplish 
 these sublime objects, the Holy Scripture alone is adequate, and indispen- 
 sable, throughout the whole course, as matter of instruction and principle 
 of education.” 
 
36 
 
 worthy of even a subordinate place among our edu- 
 cational books. Banished from the College to the 
 Sabbath-school or to the Theological Seminary, it is 
 no wonder that young men regard the Bible, either 
 as a book for children, or, like Galen in medicine, 
 and Blackstone in law, a mere text book in theology, 
 the special study for a professional life, having no 
 claims upon the time or thoughts of those who are in 
 a course of liberal education. 
 
 It is against this evil we would formally and earn- 
 estly protest. We strenuously insist upon a perma- 
 nent occupation of all the ground won for the cause 
 of higher education. We admit that the studies 
 generally pursued in our colleges are admirably 
 adapted for liberal culture, and we recognize the 
 eminent worth of the various text books employed in 
 the different departments of instruction, but it is with 
 grief and shame, not unmingled with indignation, 
 that we see the Book of books excluded by Christian 
 men, wholly or mainly, from the college curriculum, 
 as though, instead of being “ alone adequate and 
 indispensable throughout the whole course,” it really 
 contained no “ matter of instruction, or principle of 
 education” for any part of it. Whatever may be 
 the value of other books, we contend that the Bible 
 surpasses them all, and that the course of study, in 
 every Christian College, should be so arranged, that, 
 while its general contents should engage the atten- 
 tion of all candidates for the first degree, certain 
 
37 
 
 portions of it, in the original tongues, should be 
 studied with at least as much thoroughness as is 
 given to any classic writer, and that this special 
 study of the Book should be, in addition to such 
 collateral instruction as may be given in the other 
 departments — especially Mental and Political Philo- 
 sophy, Ethics, Archaeology, and History. 
 
 As a step in this direction, the Faculty of Lafay- 
 ette College, in May last, adopted the following 
 minute: 
 
 Biblical Instruction. 
 
 “The New Testament is used as a text-book for 
 the regular daily recitations in Greek, during two 
 terms of the college course. The Gospel, according 
 to Mark, is the study of one term, and a Greek 
 Harmony of all the Evangelists, of a second term. 
 The life and words of Christ are thus made the centre 
 of Biblical study. 
 
 On Monday morning, throughout the year, each 
 of the classes has a Biblical exercise. It always 
 begins with repeating the Assembly’s Catechism, or 
 some part thereof. In the Freshman year, a general 
 view of the contents of the Bible, and of each book, 
 is given, with special attention to Chronology, ITis- 
 tory and Geography. The Bible in English, and 
 Coleman’s Geography of the Bible, are used as text- 
 books. In the Sophomore year, the Acts of the 
 Apostles are read in the original Greek, and special 
 study given to the lives and labors of the Apostles, 
 
38 
 
 and to the origin and antiquities of the Christian 
 church. In the Junior year, the Epistle to the 
 Romans is studied, both as to language and doctrine, 
 with much care and iteration. In this year also, a 
 daily recitation, for one term, is devoted to the 
 critical study of the language of the Gospels ; both 
 the original Greek, and the English of our standard 
 version. In the Senior year, are studied the Old 
 Testament, in the original Hebrew, (an elective 
 study,) the history of translations of the Bible, 
 especially the history of the English Bible, its merits 
 and influence ; the evidences of Christianity, with 
 Butler’s Analogy, and the Confession of Faith. 
 
 Throughout the course, the language of the Eng- 
 lish version is constantly examined, and referred to, 
 as standard English. In political philosophy, refer- 
 ence is made to the Hebrew Commonwealth. The 
 truths taught in the Bible in relation to the char- 
 acter, powers and duties of man, are inculcated as 
 fundamental in mental and moral philosophy, and 
 the Philosophy of History is identified with the 
 History of Redemption. 
 
 It is designed to make the Bible the central object 
 of study in the whole college course.” 
 
 To such an extended course of Biblical Instruction 
 in our Colleges, certain objections, or rather diffi- 
 culties, may arise in the minds of those who sin- 
 cerely love God’s word. It may be thought that by 
 
39 
 
 the enforced labor and toil which such studies 
 demand, the Bible will become an object of disgust 
 and hatred, or at least by degrading the sacred 
 volume to the level of other educational books, the 
 student will lose that peculiar reverence with which 
 it should always be regarded. Whatever force there 
 may be in this objection, does not the exclusion of 
 the Bible degrade it far more than would its intro- 
 duction, even upon a level with heathen authors'? 
 But we demand for it a place, high above them all ; 
 a reverent and deferential acknowledgment of its 
 superiority, that will leave upon the youthful mind 
 an abiding impression of its lofty and unrivalled 
 claims. And does the Pagan or the Mohammedan, 
 lose respect for his sacred books, from too great 
 familiarity with them'? Or are they hated, even 
 though exclusively associated with long years of 
 laborious study'? Far from it. In this, as well as 
 in every other department of instruction, much wdll 
 depend upon the teacher, upon his own love for the 
 sacred volume, and his skill in throwing interest 
 around such studies. But we are not ignorant of the 
 promises, and we believe that the careful, thorough 
 and laborious study of the Scriptures, even in the 
 orginal language, tends to clevelope its power, to 
 enlighten the understanding, to rejoice the heart, and 
 to convert the soul. # 
 
 * On this point (and, indeed, with general reference to the whole Biblical 
 course,) we give some extracts from the report of the Synod’s Committee of 
 
40 
 
 It may be said that the peculiar difficulties of 
 Christianity will of necessity be thus made promi- 
 nent, to the danger of implanting skepticism in the 
 
 Visitors, who attended the last examinations. This report, published by 
 order of Synod, came to hand as these pages were going through the press. 
 
 "But the thorough teaching of the Scriptures which has been in- 
 augurated in the College, is that which excited the most interest, and which 
 ought to awaken the earnest attention of Synod. The Bible is installed as 
 the most important class-book of the institution. This is a new and very 
 important, and very promising improvement in collegiate instruction. 
 And to one who sees how the word of God is studied in Lafayette College, 
 how it is made to train and enlarge the mind, as well as to fill it with a 
 vast fund of the most important knowledge, it will not appear as derogating 
 from the liberal nature of the studies appropriate for such an institution. 
 It will rather appear as a very important addition to them. 
 
 "The Greek of the New Testament is studied just as any classical book 
 usually is. Then the peculiarities of the language in that sacred book are 
 also investigated, the words being traced to their original fountain, and fol- 
 lowed out from that to all their different shades of meaning. Some of the 
 most important Epistles are also studied exegetically. The meaning of the 
 writer is investigated from the peculiarity of his language, from his con- 
 necting words, and from the whole context. Thus there is, first, the trans- 
 lation; then a more thorough study of the import of the language; and then 
 the full and exact meaning of the author is sought after. 
 
 "But even this is not all the study that the sacred Scriptures receive in 
 the various classes. The manners and customs of the times in which the 
 Bible was written, the geography of the places mentioned therein, and the 
 chronology of the times in which the events occurred, are made so new and 
 so familiar as to surprise and delight one to whom the Bible is precious. 
 The complicated and difficult study of the harmony of the four Evangelists 
 had been so pursued as to give it a lively interest. The analysis of some of 
 the books, such as the Acts of the Apostles, was brought out so clearly and 
 in such a striking manner as to clothe it with new life and interest. In 
 fact, the whole of this examination of the studies of the Scriptures was such 
 as would awaken an exceedingly great interest in the College in every 
 Christian breast; the word of God must be exalted in the minds of those' 
 who are so thoroughly trained in it; its great principles must be fixed there 
 so as never to be forgotten. And this is the very training, which, of all 
 others, educated young men need in this infidel age. 
 
 "It is no time now for the friends of God to divorce learning from 
 
41 
 
 youthful mind. This proves too much. There is no 
 branch of biblical study more open to this objection 
 than the evidences of revealed religion, and the very 
 lowest ground taken upon this subject, insists upon 
 “ the vindication of those immortal records.” But it 
 must not be forgotten that these difficulties are to be 
 met sometime in the life of every thinking man, 
 and, perhaps, when there may be no skilful instructor 
 to afford the antidote to the bane. Have we not 
 seen in this generation a prelate’s armor worn so 
 loosely that the shaft from a Zulu objector smote 
 through into a vital parti The period of youth is 
 pre-eminently one of confiding trust, and the acknow- 
 ledged difficulties of Scripture are more likely then, 
 than at any other time, to be put among these pro- 
 blems, for the solution of which, faith, with folded 
 arms, must patiently stand and wait. 
 
 Nor is it to be feared that any course of biblical 
 studies, likely to be introduced into our colleges, will 
 
 religion. It is just here that the enemy is attempting his most destructive 
 work. If our educated young men are not trained and grounded in divine 
 truth, as their minds are cultivated by regular studies, then woe to the 
 Church, woe to the world. There is probably not another point that coukl 
 be brought before the people of God, so important as this. It is vital. It is 
 one -of tremendous moment, both to ourselves and to the generations that 
 are to follow us. 
 
 “ It is in point here to notice another thing in the examinations that was 
 highly gratifying. It was the diligent study of the Catechism, to which the 
 classes had been subjected. As the students were seated in their classes, 
 the first one would ask the first question of the Catechism, and be answered 
 by the one next him. Then the third student would ask the next question, 
 and the fourth would answer it, ,and so on throughout the whole class; and 
 all this without any book in the hand. That is the way to become thoroughly 
 grounded in this wonderful and most invaluable compend of divine truth.” 
 
42 
 
 anticipate the work of the Theological Seminary, 
 and thus by transferring the college to the domain of 
 the university, place its instruction at variance with 
 the essential idea of liberal culture. Of course such 
 special or professional studies as Homiletics, Pas- 
 toral Theology, &c., would never be introduced. 
 Under the most favorable circumstances there could 
 be given only such general instruction in the great 
 truths of God’s word, its history, antiquities, &c., as 
 would be a desirable preparation for a regular theolo- 
 gical course, while it would be especially valuable 
 for those whose business or professional pursuits in 
 after life would tend to withdraw ; their attention 
 from such studies. And we insist upon it, that a 
 thorough knowledge of the Christian Scriptures is 
 essential to every liberally educated man. It is of 
 more importance even to the general student, to know 
 what Paul taught than what Plato taught. Hr. 
 Arnold, facile princeps among educators, quotes with 
 approbation the sentiment: — “ That a liberal educa- 
 tion without the Scriptures must be in any Christian 
 country a contradiction in terms and again, 
 “Christianity has so colored all our institutions, and 
 all our literature, and has, in so many points, modi- 
 fied or even dictated our laws, that no one can be 
 considered an educated man who is not acquainted 
 with its authoritative documents.”* Granted that 
 
 » It is well known that Dr. Arnold resigned his Fellowship in the 
 University of London because no examination in the Bible was required ot 
 candidates for graduation. See hit Life by Stanley, chap. viii. 
 
43 
 
 the college course is already overcrowded. This has 
 always been the case, and yet room has been made, 
 from time to time, for such new branches of study as 
 have arisen in the progress of science. Geology and 
 comparative Philology are among those but recently 
 introduced ; and we claim for Lafayette College the 
 honor of having first established, in this country, a 
 distinct professorship for the philological study of 
 the English language.*' Now all these studies have 
 been found no less adapted for liberal culture than 
 those which, to some extent, they displaced. So if 
 the word of God has not its due place upon the 
 present list of studies, let there be room made for it, 
 even though it crowd out a satire of Juvenal, or a 
 comedy of Aristophanes. Apart from its glorious 
 revelations of spiritual truth, which can alone purify 
 the affections, it will be found to exceed all other 
 books in expanding the intellect. 
 
 * This has been gracefully referred to by Dr. Wood, President of Han- 
 over College, in his very able inaugural address, on the true ends and pro- 
 visions of collegiate education. “It has been claimed for Lafayette College, 
 and with apparent justice, that that institution has the honor of being the 
 first American College which has established a professorship of the English 
 language. This example is worthy of imitation by other colleges.” We 
 confess to some degree of satisfaction in this distinction ; but to Hanover 
 College must be referred the greater honor of having been the first, at 
 least in modern times, “to order that the Bible, in some form or other, shall 
 be made a text book for daily study and recitation.” Dr. Thomas, who makes 
 this statement in his inaugural, (1850,) says tp the Trustees, “it is a singu- 
 lar and almost unaccountable fact, that in adopting such a course you are 
 venturing an experiment perhaps unprecedented in the history of American 
 colleges.” We are pleased to notice in the last annual catalogue of this 
 College, (which is under Synodical control) that large provision is still 
 made for Biblical instruction. This is claimed as “a characteristic feature 
 of our course of study.” 
 
44 
 
 Certainly, gentlemen of the Board of Trustees, 
 selected for your responsible duties by the venerable 
 and mother Synod of the Presbyterian Church, it is 
 incumbent upon you to see, that in this College, 
 ample provision is made for the study of God’s word 
 and of Christian doctrine. 
 
 “It is one of the felicities of our Church,” says 
 Dr. Shedd, “that it has so many Academies and 
 Colleges under its Presbyterial watch and care ; 
 for these Institutions are thereby brought into very 
 warm and living contact with the individual Chris- 
 tian, and the local church. Not being under the 
 control of close corporations, who may appoint their 
 own successors, and whose management of the Insti- 
 tution is entirely beyond the supervision of the 
 churches that are to feel their influence, whether 
 good or bad; but being subject, in every respect, to 
 the religious bodies that appoint their boards of 
 management, and thereby their corps of instruction, 
 they stand in the most immediate and salutary con- 
 nection with the Christian brotherhood itself, and 
 the warm evangelical life of the people of God is 
 transmitted through all their veins and arteries. 
 Such institutions are eminently Christian, and re- 
 spond most sensitively to all that is going on in the 
 Churches that support them and control them” 
 
 This College was among the first in our Church for- 
 mally taken under ecclesiastical supervision. Fifteen 
 years ago the Synod of Philadelphia, while regarding, 
 
45 
 
 as they said, “with pleasure the efforts of other de- 
 nominations to promote sound learning and Chris- 
 tian education,” received this Institution under its 
 “ Presbyterial watch and care.” The narrative of 
 religion for the year following (1850), dwells grate- 
 fully upon the fact, that here “ the children of our 
 denomination will be taught the principles of our 
 holy religion, as contained in the symbols of our 
 faith.” The Synod still requires that these expec- 
 tations be realized, and, were we disposed to resist, 
 it has the power, by the amended charter, to make 
 us “respond most sensitively” to these demands, as 
 reasonable as they are imperative. Year after year 
 it sends its committees of visitors to attend our 
 examinations, and report to the Synod whether 
 “ these things be done.” 
 
 Upon this subject of ecclesiastical supervision of 
 our institutions of learning, there has been much 
 discussion. All admit the right and duty of the 
 Church to provide the means of Christian education; 
 but good men differ as to the best mode of accom- 
 plishing so desirable an object. If it be left to the 
 indirect influence of the Church, and the personal 
 efforts of her ministers and members as individuals, 
 some will point to Princeton College — that venera- 
 ble and massive tower of religion and learning — as 
 proof of the complete success of the plan; while, as 
 a signal illustration of its failure, others point to 
 Harvard, a College whose foundations were laid in 
 
46 
 
 prayer, and whose patrons, and officers, and munifi- 
 cent benefactors, were orthodox and evangelical 
 men, but from whose halls the glory has long since 
 departed. Eminent it certainly is in every branch 
 of secular learning, but it seems like solemn mockery 
 for the corporation to retain upon its seal those 
 sacred words, “ Christo et ecclesixs .” 
 
 It is, perhaps, generally conceded, that in smaller 
 Institutions there is more danger of serious defec- 
 tion on the part of close corporations, whatever may 
 have been the public sentiment which led to their 
 foundation, or which may even be supposed still 
 to exert an indirect influence over the board of 
 management. “An academy, not far from my own 
 residence,” says Dr. Van Rensselaer, in his address 
 at Geneseo, in 1853, “originally established by 
 Presbyterians, and committed to a board of trustees, 
 almost all of whom were of the same faith, relapsed, 
 by degrees, into different hands, until in 1852 there 
 was but a single Presbyterian in the board, and the 
 majority were infidels and nothingarians!” And 
 this is a matter of very serious consideration in the 
 present day, when our literary institutions are so 
 generally seeking for endowments to secure their 
 permanence, and increase their efficiency. The 
 liberal-hearted Christian is willing, nay, anxious to 
 give as God has prospered him, to lay broad and 
 deep the foundations of these much-needed semina- 
 ries of Christian learning. But he asks, How can I 
 
47 
 
 know that these funds may not be perverted] What 
 security can be given that these fortified places, 
 upon which I am Avilling to labor and to spend my 
 substance, may not yet be occupied by the enemy, 
 and their guns turned against the walls of Zion] 
 These questions are not impertinent,* and we can- 
 not but believe that direct supervision and control 
 on the part of the higher judicatories of the Church, 
 afford the best, if not the only security against the 
 introduction of unsound men into the boards of 
 management and instruction, and thus most effect- 
 ually guard against any perversion of sacred funds 
 from the original purpose of the donors. It has 
 been well said, with reference to this very point: — 
 “ The Church, indeed, has had her own periods of 
 religious decline, but whilst human infirmity is visi- 
 ble in all institutions among men, it is certain that 
 there is no guardianship of the truth so reliable as 
 the Church of God — divine in origin, sustained by 
 the Holy Spirit, ministered unto by the ambassadors 
 
 * Dickinson College is a case in point, though we would be far from con- 
 founding the religious teaching or influence of that excellent Institution 
 with that in such Colleges as Harvard. We regard its officers and teachers, 
 as brethren beloved in the Lord; but it is notorious that the system of 
 divine truth held by them is far from being that which was dear to the 
 founders and early benefactors of the College. Several of its Presidents, 
 and among them, pre-eminently, Dr. John M. Mason, were the distin- 
 guished champions of that system of belief which one of its late Presidents 
 denounces as “the withering doctrine which has, in almost every country 
 where it has had any length of sway, unnerved the energies of the 
 Church, and driven her away from pure Christianity into formalism, 
 Socinianism, or Rationalism .” — Observations in Europe , vol. ii., p. 272. 
 
48 
 
 of Christ, enriched with ordinances and sacraments, 
 and purchased by blood.” 
 
 This ecclesiastical connection and supervision has 
 been felt by many of our most distinguished and 
 successful educators to be the great demand of the 
 age — not only to secure the permanence of our insti- 
 tutions df learning, and to guard against perversion, 
 but also to promote their efficiency by Christian 
 sympathy and cooperation. “ There is a feeling 
 deep and strong, and daily becoming stronger and 
 deeper, that we must adopt some more adequate 
 measures for the training of our children, and that 
 nothing short of a complete equipment of edu- 
 cational institutions, under the supervision of the 
 Church herself can thoroughly meet our exigencies.”* 
 There has probably never been a school more 
 blessed with Christian influences than the Female 
 Seminary at Mount Holyoke. Its pious founder, 
 Miss Lyon, declared that, “while it should offer 
 every advantage which the state of female education 
 in this country will allow, its brightest feature will 
 be, that it is a school of Christ.” And such has 
 ever been its character; yet this devoted teacher 
 was painfully conscious of the need of just such a 
 system as we contend for, and in one of her letters 
 exclaims, “O that the Church would take our 
 highest female seminaries under her direct control, 
 protection, and support!” But this whole subject, 
 
 Dr. Boardman’s Sermon, June 6, 1852. 
 
49 
 
 in its various aspects, has been ably and thoroughly 
 treated by the distinguished Professor to whom we 
 have already referred — one of the most profound 
 thinkers not only of the Church, but of the age. 
 After a thorough and exhaustive examination of all 
 the plans for securing an adequate education for tlye 
 young, Dr. Hodge says: — “ We ought to look for- 
 ward, and strive to carry out the good old Presbyte- 
 rian plan, of having one or more schools in every 
 parish, a classical academy in every Presbytery, and 
 a college in every Synod, all under the control of the 
 Church.”* 
 
 In the practical working of this “ Church care,” 
 it is not denied, there may be difficulties and even 
 embarrassments. So long as “we have this treasure 
 in earthen vessels” what scheme is free from imper- 
 fection'? There is no magic influence in the con- 
 necting bond, which secures judicious and efficient 
 management for those Institutions under the watch 
 and care of the Church; whether it be the Theo- 
 logical Seminary, the Synodical College, or the Pres- 
 byterial Academy. A large body of men, changing 
 from year to year, with their annual sessions of a 
 few days, crowded with important business, cannot 
 inform themselves thoroughly of the condition and 
 wants of a college, nor adopt any settled policy as 
 to the many phases of its interior life and manage- 
 ment. All such matters of detail, the Synod of Phi- 
 
 * Address delivered before the General Assembly, I84T. 
 
 4 
 
50 
 
 ladelphia wisely refers to the faithful and competent 
 men, whom she selects as Trustees and Instructors 
 of her College, laying down merely the general out- 
 lines of the course they are expected to follow: just 
 as the General Assembly does with the Directors of 
 her Theological Seminaries, and the members of her 
 various Boards. The Christian public reposes con- 
 fidence in the orthodoxy, fidelity, and ability of men 
 thus selected ; and while the great ends of education 
 are thereby secured, is willing to cooperate actively 
 with those employed in the more immediate manage- 
 ment, at the same time allowing them a wide margin 
 in matters about which it is not expected that all 
 men will think alike. 
 
 It was feared, when the experiment was first tried, 
 that this control of our literary institutions would 
 beget, on the floor of Synod, the clamor of “many 
 masters;” that the failure to] secure the management 
 would produce — with some at least — a state of feel- 
 ing toward the Institution more to be regretted than 
 a lack of interest in its welfare ; or that the various 
 discussions would afford a too favorable opportunity 
 for the ventilation of private and personal animosi- 
 ties toward the officers and instructors, under the 
 pretence of zeal for the interests of education. Hap- 
 pily these fears have not been realized. The legis- 
 latures which control State Institutions of learning 
 may be the arena of partisan strife, and the lofty 
 aims of the higher education become entangled 
 with selfish ends, or degraded by schemes for the 
 

 \ 
 
 51 
 
 gratification of hatred and malice ; but we blush 
 when such things are suggested of a Court of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ. There, if anywhere upon the 
 earth, we look with confidence for prayerful delibe- 
 ration, calm and considerate judgment, prudent 
 action; all pervaded by a devotion to the Great 
 Teacher, which precludes unworthy and selfish mo- 
 tives, and inspires even a spirit of self-sacrifice, that 
 his glorious cause may be advanced. Such, we must 
 gratefully say, has been the Synodical history of 
 Lafayette College ; an unvarying record, from year to 
 year, of cordial, Christian sympathy, of prompt and 
 generous support. It is this which has given to the 
 College its present efficiency, and it is to this we look 
 for that extended influence and usefulness which 
 its friends confidently anticipate for it in the future. 
 
 To you, therefore, my brethren of the Synod, 
 I would renewedly commend the interests of the 
 College. Be assured that its Alumni, Trustees and 
 Instructors regard, as of priceless value, this “ most 
 salutary connection with the Christian brotherhood 
 while the Christian public, with a growing apprecia- 
 tion of the importance of all our educational institu- 
 tions, looks to your faithful custodianship, that the 
 great interests which the Church already has here,* 
 
 * It would perhaps he out of place here to enlarge upon this statement ; 
 yet we would beg to record the opinion of one of the wisest and best men 
 the Church has ever produced. In 1837, when the institution was scarcely 
 beyond its infancy, Dr. Archibald Alexander said, at a meeting in Philadel- 
 phia, “I should he very sorry to see the ground at Easton abandoned, and the 
 labor losU It must not be !” See Dr. Junkin’s published Letter, Jan. 2, 1864. 
 
52 
 
 shall suffer neither loss nor detriment ; and to the 
 continuance of your hearty co-operation that the 
 College may become still more effective in the work 
 of a sound, thorough Christian education. Lafayette 
 College, although young in years, has already sent 
 forth many of her sons to prominent and influential 
 positions in the various walks of life ; but it is her 
 distinguishing honor that nearly half of her Alumni 
 have devoted themselves to the ministry of the 
 Word — some of them in heathen lands sealing their 
 testimony, like the faithful witnesses of old, with 
 their blood. Could we this day stand by the new- 
 made grave of Gayley in China, and of Lcewenthal 
 in India,*' there would come from those sealed lips a 
 more eloquent appeal than any I could utter in behalf 
 of God’s word: that its lessons of wisdom may take 
 precedence of all others, in these halls of instruction 
 where they studied and prayed, and where they con- 
 secrated themselves to the work of carrying its 
 blessed truth to the benighted regions of the earth. 
 
 Let us strive, brethren, that Layfayette College 
 may not fall behind her sister institutions in afford- 
 ing thorough instruction in the sciences, letters, and 
 arts; but let it be our most earnest endeavor here to 
 honor and exalt that one incomparable Book, which 
 God himself declared He had magnified above 
 all His name. 
 
 * The Rev. Levi Janvier. D.D., who was murdered in India about the 
 same time as Mr. Lcewenthal, was among the earliest students at Lafayette, 
 though h^ did not complete the whole course.