UNIVERSITY LIFE IN THE WEST -1857 -1864 271 



taut Western States, and nothing but his early death pre 

 vented his attaining a national reputation. He was a man 

 of convictions, strong and skilful in impressing them upon 

 his hearers, of fine personal appearance, with a pleasing 

 voice, and in every way fitted to captivate an audience. 

 Him I selected as the David who was to punish the pro 

 tectionist Goliath. He had been himself a protectionist, 

 having read Greeley s arguments in the &quot;New York 

 Tribune,&quot; but he had become a convert to my views, and 

 day after day and week after week I kept him in train 

 ing on the best expositions of free trade, and, above all, on 

 Bastiat s &quot;Sophisms of Protection.&quot; On the appointed 

 evening the city hall was crowded, and my young David 

 having modestly taken a back seat, the great Goliath ap 

 peared at the front in full senatorial costume, furbished 

 up for the occasion, with an enormous collection of books 

 and documents; and, the subject being announced, he arose, 

 assumed his most imposing senatorial attitude, and began 

 a dry, statistical oration. His manner was harsh, his 

 matter wearisome; but he plodded on through an hour 

 and then my David arose. He was at his best. In 

 five minutes he had the audience fully with him. Every 

 point told. From time to time the house shook with ap 

 plause ; and at the close of the debate, a vote of the meeting 

 being taken after the usual fashion in such assemblies, my 

 old enemy was left in a ridiculous minority. Not only 

 free-traders, but even protectionists voted against him. 

 As he took himself very seriously, he was intensely morti 

 fied, and all the more so when he learned from one of my 

 students that I now considered that we were * even. * 



The more I threw myself into the work of the university 

 the more I came to believe in the ideas on which it was 

 founded, and to see that it was a reality embodying many 

 things of which I had previously only dreamed. Up to 

 that time the highest institutions of learning in the United 

 States were almost entirely under sectarian control. Even 



1 The causes of my change of views on the question of &quot;protection&quot; 

 are given in my political reminiscences. 



