SECRETARY'S REPORT. 171 



comparison with Europe. Now, wc must change that. We 

 must change it to such an extent, that all our institutions for 

 public education shall be so superior to those of Europe that 

 the European student must come here to fniish his scientific 

 education. At least, that is what we must aim at; and 

 that is what we have the means of doing. The time is propi- 

 tious for that. It is just now that we must strike. It is now, 

 when thinking men are considering what is at stake in our 

 troubles, what may grow out of them, and what is the part we 

 are to play in the progress of humanity. And when they 

 understand that, believe me, the liberal men of Europe, the 

 liberal men of the Old World, will want to send their children 

 here to finish their education, under the influence of these 

 liberal institutions, rather than send them to Oxford or 

 Cambridge, to be snubbed by the nobility. 



You have it in your power to do that, but, in order to do it, 

 there is one thing which must be done with reference to the 

 matter of public education. No longer go on boasting as if our 

 public education was the greatest blessing the world has seen, 

 because it is good in its elementary parts. No longer go on boast- 

 ing as if they were perfect institutions — these institutions which 

 arc only superior in the places where they are, because there 

 are no others by their side. No longer go on boasting of our 

 libraries, as if tiiey were doing marvels for education and the 

 progress of learning, because tliere are a few thousand volumes' 

 there. Let us remember what the Old World has done, and 

 continue our efforts in that direction, with unabated energy and 

 devotion, until our institutions have really become superior to 

 to those of the Old World ; until they are not only ))ctter 

 endowed, but have brought together that number of men who 

 will possess more knowledge and stamp an intellectual character 

 upon them superior to that of the institutions of the Old World. 

 I trust that the character of our free institutions will make it 

 possible for us to accomplish tliat. I believe it, from what 1 

 have seen in these few days, in my intercourse with the farmers 

 of this neighborhood. I never learned anything in my inter- 

 course with the farmers of the Old World. They do not think 

 on what they are doing. Tiiey go on in the old routine that has 

 been transmitted to them from a thousand years back. The 

 plough which the old Grecians used is the plough still used in 



