July 9, 1886.] 



SCIENCE. 



39 



curriculum is a university. I have even read in 

 the newspapers the description of a building 

 which " will be, when finished, the finest univer- 

 sity in the country ; " and I know of a school for 

 girls, the trustees of which not only have the 

 power to confer all degrees, but may designate a 

 board of lady managers possessing the same 

 powers. 



Surely it is time for the scholars of the country 

 to take their bearings. In Cambridge the anniver- 

 sary so soon to be celebrated will not be allowed 

 to pass without munificent contributions for most 

 noble ends ; the president of Yale coUege, who 

 this day assumes his high ofiice with the unani- 

 mous plaudits of Yalensians, is the representative 

 of the university idea based upon academic tradi- 

 tions ; the voice of Princeton, like a hei-ald, has 

 proclaimed its purposes ; Cornell has succeeded in 

 a litigation which establishes its right to a large 

 endowment ; the secretary of the interior has 

 commended to congress the importance of a na- 

 tional university, and a bill has been introduced 

 looking towards such an establishment ; the 

 Roman Catholic Church, at its recent council in 

 Baltimore, initiated measures for a university in 

 the capital of the nation ; while on the remotest 

 borders of the land the gift of many millions is 

 assm:ed for promoting a new foundation. Already, 

 in the Mississippi valley, men are laboriously un- 

 folding their lofty ideals. It is therefore a critical 

 time. Wise plans will be like good seed : they 

 will spring uf), and bear fruit a hundred-fold. 

 Bad plans will be like tares growing up with the 

 wheat, impossible to eradicate. 



It is obvious that the modes of organization 

 will vary, so that we shall have many different 

 types of universities. Four types have already 

 appeared, — those which proceed from the original 

 historic colleges, those established in the name of 

 the state, those avowedly ecclesiastical, and those 

 which are founded by private benefactions. Each 

 mode of organization has advantages which may 

 be defended, each its limitations. If the older 

 colleges suffer from traditions, the younger lack 

 experience and historic growth. The state univer- 

 sities are hable to political mismanagement : eccle- 

 siastical foundations are in danger of being narrow. 



Under these circumstances, I ask you to con- 

 sider the characteristics of a university, the marks 

 by which it should be distinguished. 



It is needless before this audience to repeat the 

 numerous definitions which have been framed, or 

 to rehearse the brilliant projects which have been 

 formed by learned, gifted men ; but I hope it will 

 not be amiss to recall some of the noble aims 

 which have always inspired endeavors to establish 

 the highest institutions of learning. 



Among the brightest signs of a vigorous uni- 

 versity, is zeal for the advancement of learning. 

 Another phrase has been lately used, the ' endow- 

 ment of research.' I prefer the other term ; for it 

 takes us back to the dawn of modern science, and 

 connects our efi'orts with those of three hundred 

 years ago, when Francis Bacon gave an impulse 

 to all subsequent thought, and published what his 

 recent biographer has called the first great book 

 in English prose of secular interest, — "the first 

 of a long line of books which have attempted to 

 teach English readers how to think of knowledge, 

 to make it really and intelligently the interest, 

 not of the school or the study or the laboratory 

 only, but of society at large. It was a book with 

 a purpose, new then, but of which we have seen 

 the fulfilment." 



The processes by which we gain acquaintance 

 with the world are very slow. The detection of 

 another asteroid, the calculation of a new orbit, 

 the measurement of a lofty peak, the discovery of 

 a bird, a fish, an insect, a flower, hithei'to ' un- 

 known to science,' would be but trifles if each 

 new fact remained apart from other facts ; but, 

 when among learned men discoveries are brought 

 into relations with famiUar truths, the group sug- 

 gests a law, the law an inference, the inference 

 an experiment, the experiment a conclusion ; and 

 so from fact to law, and from law to fact, with 

 rhythmic movement, knowledge marches on, 

 while eager hosts of practical men stand ready 

 to apply to human life each fresh discovery. In- 

 vestigation, co-ordination, and promulgation are 

 not performed exclusively by universities ; but 

 these processes, so fruitful in good, are most effi- 

 cient where large numbers of the erudite and the 

 acute, of strong reasoners and faithful critics, are 

 associated for mutual assistance, correction, and 

 encouragement. It is an impressive passage with 

 which the lamented Jevons closed his ' Principles 

 of science.' After reminding the reader of the 

 infinite domain of mathematical inquiry, com- 

 pared with which the whole accomplishments of 

 a Laplace or a Lagrange are as the little corner of 

 the multiplication table, which has really an in- 

 definite extent, he goes on to say that inconceiv- 

 able advances will be made by the human intellect 

 unless there is an unforeseen catastrophe to the 

 species or the globe. " Since the time of Newton 

 and Leibnitz, whole worlds of problems have been 

 solved, which before were hardly conceived as 

 matters of inqiiiry. In our own day, extended 

 methods of mathematical reasoning, such as the 

 system of quaternions, have been brought into 

 existence. What intelligent man will doubt that 

 the recondite speculations of a Cayley or a Syl- 

 vester may possibly lead to some new methods, at 



