light of Christianity germinate and develop the college which
lends its splendid power to all mankind. It is in the college that
the man is trained. He is broadened and widened outside the
narrow and cramped limits of self with all his biased opinions and
preconceived theories. He is raised, elevated up above the restric
tions of creed; above the obligations to party; above the dictations
of precedent; above all the mental miasma and noxious fogs
which bedazzle and besmirch the mind of man as the pestilential
vapors of the swamp poison and destroy his physicial being;
above all the clouds of doubt, uncertainty and possibility into the
pure light of truth, where with face kissed by the sun of wisdom
and with brow laved by the refreshing and invigorating zephyrs
of understanding, he may read and interpret, so that all men may
know and understand the thoughts of God written in Nature’s law
book, and that all mankind may say with one voice as that emi
nent scientist Keplar once said, * ‘ Almighty God, I think thy
thoughts after thee.! ’
But you say, “ Why laud the college to the sky ? Why praise
the college man above all else? Other men have done great
deeds.” Isay, “True! True!” But it is the great truths, the
great principles, the great precepts of Nature’s laws which the
college teaches —these laud the college. It is the grasping, the
understanding, the comprehension of these great truths and prin
ciples—this lauds the man. Did untrained minds accomplish
great deeds? Who will dare mark the achievements of these same
minds if aided by education ? So, when you say to me, ‘ ‘ Wonder
ful discoveries have been made, great deeds have been wrought,
by men who never saw the inside of a college, ’ ’ I say in reply,
“Be not deceived! Be not deceived I Show me the gold which is
not, by the polishing cloth, made brighter; show me the blade
which is not, by the hewing stone, made sharper; show me the
eye which is not, by purest light, made keener—aye, show me
the man whose intellect the • contact with other minds and with
the experiences of generations of minds which have preceded
him does not make sharper, keener, and brighter —show me such
a one —and I’ll show you a being not of this earth!”
But. one more thought and lam done. What do these things
mean ? Are they simply vivid and visionary fancies ? Are they
but naked skeletons of the imagination, clothed with the gorgeous
tapestries of language to please the mind’s eye, perchance, for, a
fleeting moment? No! A thousand times, no! They have a
The Free' Lance.
[February,