1857.] Our College, Errors in Respect to its Object and Aim. 243 



learned towards the votaries of science ; yet many great names adorn 

 our country's annals, wlio have arisen to eminence by their own un- 

 aided efforts. And so numerous are the examples of this kind, it 

 has greatly lessened the supposed absolute necessity of the mental 

 training furnished by these institutions, not only for advancement 

 in the arts and sciences, but even for the successful prosecution of 

 the learned professions themselves. 



We are often led to inquire, whence the boldness of thought, the 

 originality of genius, the precocity of intellect often manifest, and 

 meeting us among those who have not had great advantages /or in- 

 tellectual culture in early life? 



Among other causes favorable to such development, is that here 

 was a continent fresh from the hand of the Almighty. Its forests, 

 and rivers, and mountains, calculated by reason of their extent and 

 gigantic proportion to lead forth the mind to unexplored hights, 

 and depths, and place it in a new track, and while amid trials and 

 privations our fathers came here, originally to enjoy peace of con- 

 science, and escape persecution, yet the very circumstances in which 

 they were placed, were calculated to cultivate in an eminent degree, 

 self-reliance, and develop those very thoughts, and principles 

 which give majesty and grandeur to our civil, social, political and 

 religious institutions. Our form of government, in its inception and 

 adoption, is one of the mighty results of minds thus nurtured, thus 

 educated The revolution of seventy-six was a revolution that ran 

 deep into the forms of social order, and civil authority, which had 

 long prevailed and caused the sundering of ties, and the modifica- 

 tion of principles, at least in the extent of their application which 

 had been recognized supreme for centuries. But this revolution of 

 social order and civil authority reached not to the higher literary 

 institutions. They still remained and held on their way as they 

 had existed in the morbid monasticism of the old world; with but 

 little difference or amelioration. 



The College is still planned, endowed and directed with special re- 

 gard for the few, not the many. 



Our complaint here is, not that our course is too liberal or extensive, 

 but, that while science is for the million in its influence and adapt- 

 ation — while amid these Colleges and Universities its most marked 

 discoveries have been outside their routine, persistently the stu- 

 dent of essentially a literary course should be regarded as deserving 

 of all honor, and claim to himself exclusively, the appellation of being 



