Ir is a matter for congratulation to see the increasing interest manifested in the cause of education. The institutions under which we live impose a necessity for a general diffusion of correct and useful knowledge. It may be, therefore, that a sense of patriotic duty, as well as of moral and religious obligation, prompts the zeal shown in all parts of the country in establishing and maintaining seminaries of learning.

This assembly, here to-day, participating in the annual festival of our University, comes to approve the faithfulness of teachers and to encourage students to diligence. Public attention thus directed to the proficiency of merit and to the short-comings of indolence, by presenting an immediate motive for exertion, becomes an incentive to honorable emulation. Such encouragement is of no small importance to those who come here fresh from the gentle influences and indulgent care of parental hands, to find the thoughtless ease and irresponsibilty of childhood interrupted by a sterner discipline. Those best skilled in the training of youth testify to its utility. The constitution of the human mind, requires some attainable object in view-some tangible reward of profit or praise-before it can overcome its natural inclination to ease, and bend to the reality of irksome toil. The anticipation of future returns for the sacrifices of the present must be strengthened by some occasional realization, in order to bring out the best energies of any human character. The knight, fighting among the hills of Palestine, though fired with religous zeal and striking in the name of his God and his honor, must needs seek some nearer recompense in the approving smiles of his lady. So the eyes of approving friends, and the visits of a generous public to greet success with honorable applause, gives to the mind of the student new vigor and to his fainting heart fresh courage for the task before him.

The college course so far from being a pathway of flowers should be one of rigid training. The education here obtained is preparatory to the great battle of life, and meant to fit you to become faithful and efficient soldiers. To advance with profit and honor requires no small amount of labor, perseverance and self denial. The mere acquisition of knowledge should not be the primary object. Useful and varied information is certainly a very desirable incident of your literary and scientific studies. But the leading purpose should be to train and discipline the mindto call it from vagueness and uncertainty to precision and system-that 11 its wandering powers may be collected at will and concentrated upon a

single point-thus bringing into practical use its entire activity and strength. Facts and rules committed to the uncertain keeping of the memory are comparatively useless acquirements. The mind must be made to grasp the principles, and to work out as much as possible by its own exertions, the logical deductions which lead to the truths that it would store away for future use. By no other means can it be qualified to enter successfully upon practical investigation or to rely with any degree of confidence upon the result of its own labors. This work is not in the power of teachers. Their judicious guidance and encouragement may facilitate, but can never insure the leading benefits of a proper education. A careful selection of studies and a well planned routine of intellectual exercises afford much assistance; but after all it rests with the student himself. It is a struggle for mastery over his truant thoughts, to make them the subservient instruments of his will—and the victory cannot be gained without a fixed determination to pursue it with unfaltering purpose. The talisman to success is labor-determined, unflinching labor, until it becomes a habit-a second nature-a positive pleasure. Without it there can be no high degree of mental training. Only by repeated labor are the muscles and eye of the artist trained to works of skill and beauty. By such, the gladiator prepared himself for the deadly lists, and the aspirant for the olive crown became a victor at the Olympic games. The aspirant for intellectual excellence cannot learn too early, that his more exalted aim can be reached by no less arduous means. He will find no road to it over which the rich may roll in chariots of ease while the poor walk in weary toil. Nor can he receive it as a birthright. It will not descend with the manor and the castle and the liveried servants. Neither can the work be done by hired laborers. But, day by day, and step by step, with patience and labor, he must work out for himself the rewards of success. If he attempt to recline upon a bed of roses, or listen to the siren of ease when she sounds her deluding notes, he will never feel the palm of victory press his brow.

Nor can there be any safe reliance upon the native powers of the intellect, however great. It is too often true, that the most highly gifted are the most apt to neglect the proper cultivation of their endowments. Natural gifts of the most brilliant order may be neglected and misapplied, until they become rather a curse than a blessing to their possessor-serving only to make him appreciate more keenly the high estate from which he has fallensharpening the pangs of remorse, and adding to the bitterness of regret, the shame of self-condemnation. All are alike subject to the overruling necessity of depending on self-denying labor for the attainment of excellence in any department of life. In the private engagements, in the learned professions, in literature, science and the arts, it operates with the same binding and unavoidable certainty. Circumstances may give advan

tages, or chance may elevate for a time, but it serves only to make defects more conspicuous, and to increase the mortification of failure. Nothing but individual effort can secure individual excellence. And this is especially applicable to the student, who would bring into usefulness, by wholesome discipline, those exalted gifts with which Providence has endowed man so eminently above all the rest of creation. But it is an object worthy of his best exertions, and within the reach of every one who brings requisite diligence to the undertaking,

It is difficult to over-estimate the power of systematic effort—the magic of concentrated thought. To a mind well trained, obstacles become playthings, and seeming impossibilities vanish on its approach. Instead of begging a pitiful tribute it commands the trophies of triumph. It is this training that imparts to the correctly educated man such facility in the management of the ordinary concerns of life, and such readiness in the discharge of duties the most arduous. Without it, by an uncommon activity and natural quickness of mind, some manage to get along with tolerable success. With some ingenuity and a few flashes of fancy, they may turn attention from the shameful confusion into which they are betrayed by the want of consecutive thought. They may throw upon a matter in hand a kind of flickering light, with now and then a ray of borrowed radiance to penetrate the mist in which they are involved. With some applause, they may play around a subject without ever giving it a manly grasp. But these are mere scintillations of intellect. They catch the empty praise of the ignorant, but can never command the solid approbation of those whose esteem is so gratifying to a man of parts-nor can they secure that which is so much sweeter than all to the cultivated man-the consciousness of intellectual strength and the pride of mental superiority.

Every young man feels that the main object of life is to discharge all its duties with faithfulness and honor. With his mind well-trained, he is prepared to enter upon those duties in any sphere. If he choose any of the learned professions, he brings to the mastery of its principles the undivided powers of his intellect. Its honors and emoluments are within his reach, and wait upon his bidding. He will readily outstrip the many who press into the race before they have trained themselves to run it. If his country call him to her councils, he is able to stand among her benefactors with pride and dignity. If he engage in the unostentatious, but not less honorable, pursuits of humble life, he is saved from manifold perplexities that befall his less fortunate neighbors. Method and precision mark his arrangements, securing in their operation, satisfaction and success. Properly trained and cultivated men are the pride of a nation. To them must be intrusted the intricate affairs of government, requiring acuteness of mind and a well-balanced judgment. Judicial duties, espe

cially, require that close, discriminating and consecutive thought which can result only from a patient and thorough discipline of the mind. Without men so qualified, any government fails in many of its most important ends; and instead of securing right and upholding truth, justice becomes but a hazard in its tribunals-and ultimately it must be overwhelmed with confusion and disgrace. Happy is the nation and fortunate the age that prepares for its youths the means of fitting themselves to discharge the duties of its exalted stations, and by generous encouragement inspires them to train themselves for a career of usefulness and honor. The highsouled, aspiring young men of our land! They are the jewels of the Republic, the repository of its hopes, the defenders of its destiny! It is for them to be the benefactors of the age. May they prove faithful to their trust, and firm in noble resolve to discharge it to the honor and glory of their country.

But, in addition to public usefulness, educated men may exert a most beneficial private influence. They may elevate the social standard of morals and manners-give tone and character to the circles in which they move-restrain inclination to vice, and by the valued encouragement of their approbation promote whatsoever is virtuous and good. And this private influence upon the masses of the people is no less important than powerful. The human mind is inclined to be subservient, and to bow before the manifestation of superior intelligence and virtue. The great mass of mind requires some master spirit to think for it, and furnish it a model of conduct. Most men look up, for guidance, to some one whose acquirements and virtues have attracted their attention. Those who improve the advantages of a liberal education thus become lights for others to follow, leading them on to whatever is for social improvement and the public good.

Our peculiar political system requires elevating and virtuous influences upon the masses. With us every man is repeatedly called upon to become an active and equal participant in the rights and duties of the body politic. The people impress their character upon the government that emanates from them. If controlled by vicious influences, they may easily overturn the foundations of society; and unfortunately such influences are seldom wanting. To combat them in the private as well as the public walks of life is a duty required at the hands of educated men. All that is desirable in life depends upon the proper management of the feelings and obligations by which society is bound together. None are able to appreciate the extreme calamity which attends the disruption of social order, until they have experienced its misfortunes. The claims of affection-the advantages of private property-the protection of life-and indeed, every blessing which renders civilized existence more desirable than that of a savage, is sacrificed before the demon of social discord.

ADDRESS OF JOHN POOL, ESQ.

9

The responsibility for the preservation of social order and of the blessings of political and religious liberty, rests upon those who have enjoyed superior educational advantages. Let the appreciation of this, stimulate you in your efforts to advance in preparatory attainment. Duty, patriotism and // interest unite in urging you to diligence. With manly purpose and cheerful hearts, may you push on to the realization of the brilliant hopes that are centered in you. "A youth of labor" will surely be crowned by an age of honor. May no regret for opportunities neglected and the prime of life wasted, hang over your heads to cloud declining years, and haunt the walks of after-life with phantoms of remorse and shame. A duty well performed is no less a blessing to ourselves than a profit to others. Though it involve the sacrifice of present ease and require submission to the inconvenience of uncongenial toil, steady perseverance will bring a recompense more than commensurate with all the privations endured, in the unrivaled pleasure of self-approbation, and the consciousness of a well acted part and a life well spent.*

These considerations of duty and usefulness have, doubtless, had their due weight upon your conduct while here preparing yourselves to enter actively upon the theatre of life. But there is another view perhaps more closely connected with your individual happiness, which should prompt you in your literary labors. You must. expect to meet in your course through the world, with disappointments and misfortunes. They are unfailing incidents of earthly existence. No heart can be successfully nerved against their depressing influence. Amid them all there is no retreat, apart from religion, to be relied upon with so much certainty as that which every man may prepare and possess within himself—a clear conscience and the resources of intellectual enjoyment. They are possessions of which no man can deprive him-above the contingencies of chance and change—a part of his being-essentially his, by virtue of no human statute, but in obedience to the immutable laws of Nature and of Nature's God. And though he may not, as suggested by Cicero, carry them with him as a personal possession into the realms of the future world, yet surely the cultivation of the intellect partakes of divinity, and ennobles and elevates and refines that wonderful principle within us, which we are taught must live forever.

A taste once formed for literary pursuits is of priceless value. A rich field is spread before the votary, and he is invited to partake of the refined pleasures that are found in its walks. He has a world of his own into which he may retire, when pressed too hardly by the stern realities of that around him. It is peopled with the brightest creations of human fancy and decked with the legacies of the greatest and purest minds of earth. The present may be set aside for the feelings of other men and other times. There is food for all the higher emotions and impulses of the heart, to