TWENTY-NINTH CONGRESS, 1845-1847. 347 



importance of the chief objects at which it aims will be conceded by 

 all — the advancement of agriculture, the improvement of primary 

 education, and the prosecution of scientific research. And if even in its 

 practical effects the plan fall short of the anticipations of its friends, 

 suffer me to ask you. What is the alternative in the Senate bill of last 

 year, the only one that has yet found favor enough to succeed in either 

 branch? Beyond the library scheme and the professorship of agricul- 

 ture (a feature equally in that bill and this), what is proposed? Public 

 lectures, to be delivered in this city "during the sessions of Con- 

 gress."' Who is to profit by these lectures? Let the author of the 

 plan answer: 



Who would their audiences be? Members of Congress, with their families; mem- 

 bers of the Government, with theirs; some inhabitants of the city; some few strangers, 

 who occasionally honor us with visits of curiosity or business. They would be pub- 

 lic men, of mature years and minds, educated, disciplined, to some degree, of liberal 

 curiosity, and appreciation of generous and various knowledge. (Speech of Senator 

 Choate as above.) 



Here is a plan for gratuitous lectures to be delivered to members 

 of Congress and of the Government, with their families, to some citi- 

 zens of Washington, and a few passing strangers; to men, so it is 

 expressed, educated, disciplined, already capable of "appreciating 

 generous and various knowledge.'" And this, as the mode the most 

 effectual, the most comprehensive, the most just and equal, to increase 

 and diffuse knowledge among men. We are to pass by all plans that 

 may reach and benefit the people by improving their education and 

 elevating the character of their teachers; all proposals, even to scatter 

 broadcast among them useful tracts, popular treatises; all projects, in 

 short, to distribute among them the bread and water of intellectual 

 life wherever these are craved, and we are to adopt in their stead a 

 course of lectures expressly restricted to the sessions of Congress; 

 expressly prepared for ourselves and for a few Government officers 

 and strangers; a course of lectures to be especially adapted to an audi- 

 ence already favored by fortune and education, already, as we are 

 complacently told, of mature minds and above all need of elementary 

 instruction. 



Sir, over the entire land must the rills from this sacred fountain 

 freely flow; not to be arrested and walled up here, to minister to our 

 pleasure or convenience. We greatly mistake if we imagine that our 

 constituents are indifferent to the privilege of drawing from these 

 waters of knowledge; that they can not appreciate their fertilizing 

 influence. If there be one feeling more powerful than another in the 

 hearts of the millions of this land, even through its remotest forests, 

 it is that the intellectual cultivation which circumstances may have 

 denied them shall be secured to their children. They value, sometimes 

 even beyond their worth, the literary advantages, by aid of which the 



