THE COLLEGE OF THE WEST. 27 



THE COLLEGE OF THE WEST.* 



By President DAVID STARR JORDAN". 



LKI.AND BTANFOED JUNIOR UNIVERSITY. 



r T^O each century is granted one great discovery, and from this its 

 - 1 - highest thought and action takes its bent. In each century 

 this discovery is never a new one. It has had its prophets and martyrs 

 ages before — men whose lives have seemed thrown away until at last the 

 world moves on and the caravan reaches their point of vision. The 

 great discovery of the eighteenth century was that of the humanity of 

 man. In action this became the spirit of democracy. The great dis- 

 covery of the nineteenth century was the reality of external things. 

 Carried out into action this means the progress of science. It is the 

 movement of science which makes possible the varied activities of the 

 new twentieth century. 



We are gathered together this morning of the twentieth century to 

 dedicate a new hall of science, a new temple to the worship of the truth 

 of nature. It is erected that it may help men to know and to know 

 what they know — to separate their knowledge of realities from their 

 feelings, their hopes, their dreams, their traditions. All these may be 

 beautiful, helpful, inspiring — but truth is something more than sub- 

 jective satisfaction. To that part of the divine outside of ourselves 

 which we are able to grasp we give the name of science. 



In what I may try to say this morning, I shall speak freely in praise 

 of science, of science study and science teaching. It is for this that 

 we are gathered together. When we erect the hall of the poets, then 

 our discourse may be on Euripides and Shakespeare, on Schiller and 

 Browning, and some gentler tongue shall speak the fitting word. Each 

 power of man shall be exalted in due season and no one at the expense 

 of another. It is true that science is a late comer into the educational 

 household, and that finding none too much room at the best, she some- 

 times unwittingly ventures to claim it all. But that is only for the 

 moment. Knowledge of man and knowledge of the universe do not 

 exclude each other. In urging the claims of science we would not deny 

 one word ever said for training in the humanities or in any branch of 

 these. This only would we claim. There exist forms of culture other 

 than those which rest on the classical tripos. Other men with other 

 powers have an equal right to training. There is no aristocracy in the 

 human mind. Moreover, prescribed courses of study, whether classical 



* Address at the dedication of Palmer Hall, Colorado College. 



