24 APHORISMS AND REFLECTIONS 



Many of the faults and mistakes of the ancient 

 philosophers are traceable to the fact that they knew 

 no language but their own, and were often led into 

 confusing the symbol with the thought which it 

 embodied. 



If the time given to education permits, add Latin 

 and German. Latin, because it is the key to nearly 

 one-half of English and to all the Romance lan- 

 guages ; and German, because it is the key to almost 

 all the remainder of English, and helps you to 

 understand a race from -whom most of us have 

 sprung, and who have a character and a literature 

 of a fateful force in the history of the world, such 

 as probably has been allotted to those of no other 

 people, except the Jews, the Greeks, and ourselves. 



In an ideal University, .... the force of living 

 example should fire the student with a noble am- 

 bition to emulate the learning of learned men, and to 

 follow in the footsteps of the explorers of new fields 

 of knowledge. And the very air he breathes should 

 be charged with that enthusiasm for truth, that 

 fanaticism of veracity, which is a greater possession 

 than much learning ; a nobler gift than the power 

 of increasing knowledge ; by GO much greater and 

 nobler than these, as the moral nature of man is 

 greater than the intellectual ; for veracity is the 

 heart of morality. 



Do what you can to do what you ought, and leave 

 hoping and fearing alone. 



