264 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



tended,) and who are obliged to fall back upon the farm for a 

 livelihood. In all the practical labors of husbandry, they seem 

 to have lost the art of taking hold of things by the smooth han- 

 dle; and their blunders in live-stock, are almost sure to make 

 them the laughing-stock of their neighbors. Now there is noth- 

 ing surprising in this, if we consider the o\ ject of college 

 education. The college is not intended for persons who are to 

 occupy themselves much with physical matters. Even the boys 

 understand this perfectly well; and it is to be feared, that not a 

 few importune their parents to gain admission there, from no 

 higher motive than to get clear of muscular effort; though it is 

 generally observed, that such are equally shy of intellectual 

 exertion. No: the college is a place for the training of persons, 

 who, if they are ever to work at all, must do so through the 

 medium of mind, as scholars, as statesmen, as clergymen, or in 

 the medical or legal profession. Nothing can be more unreason- 

 able than to suppose, that we see the practical use of the 

 sciences to mankind, in the lives of our college graduates. 

 Why, the college course is chiefly made up of a study of the 

 literature and philosophy of the ancients, to whom our sciences 

 were a dead letter, and of the elements of mathematics and 

 geometry, to which is added a sprinkling of metaphysics and 

 logic, and considerable drilling in English composition and elo- 

 cution. On these studies, and good morals, the discipline and 

 the honors of the college turn. Lectures are given, indeed, on 

 some of the modern sciences, but less with a view to their bear- 

 ing on the arts of life, than to the purpose of intellectual disci- 

 pline and general accomplishment. No teacher will be tolerated, 

 who should more than incidentally allude to any common use, 

 like that of economical profit, that could be made of them. The 

 college is not the place for learning rules of thrift. It presup- 

 poses a degree of independence; and in cases where this is not 

 enjoyed, it takes it for granted, that money-making is to be held 

 as a secondary consideration with all who partake of its ben- 

 efits. The college graduate is never to seek glory in wealth, 

 but in know'edge, and in usefulness of a lofty kind to his fellow- 

 men. This I take to be the true theory of the college and of 

 literary life in general. Both hold themselves at the most re- 



