Proceedings of the Inauguration 
37 
The State Universities, in the final analysis, owe their origin to 
the endowed colleges which preceded them and educated a public 
which today gladly supports higher education by the state. We 
are not rivals; we never were. We are co-laborers in a field so 
extensive our combined efforts will till it none too well. As 
Themistocles said to Aristides, ‘'At all times, and especially now, 
let this be our only rivalry — Which of us can do the most good 
for our country.” 
To the Alumni : The College holds you to be its proper rep- 
resentatives. Your concern in the welfare of the institution in 
which you grew to intellectual maturity is probably keener than 
when you daily gathered within its beloved walls and received its 
instruction. The College looks upon you as the accomplished 
work of its hands, and a visible example of its service to the 
public. Through you, in the various activities upon which you 
have entered, the beneficent influence of the college spreads 
itself abroad. The college is a throbbing heart, you are the life 
blood pulsing freely and far carrying vigor and strength in its 
path. 
To the Faculty: I thank you for the hearty welcome ex- 
tended me by one of your number. Allow me. first of all, a few 
words to the five men at whose feet I sat in college. Your service 
has been long and faithful. The friendship which began be- 
tween us twenty-four years ago as professor and student has 
been an unbroken one. I like to think that in a certain sense 1 
am here today because of you, and that I am undertaking my 
new duties with your benediction resting upon me. My lines 
have fallen in pleasant places ; my lot has not been cast among 
strangers, I appreciate thoroughly your welcome upon rejoin- 
ing a faculty with which I have already spent eight happy years. 
I am aware of the importance and difficulty of the educational 
problems awaiting solution. I shall endeavor to approach them 
with an open mind. It is not my purpose at this time to outline 
a policy. Were I to do so I should stamp myself as unfit to serve 
in the place to which you have welcomed me. The. necessity of 
organization would seem to require that a college should have an 
executive head, and yet if it is to maintain efficiency as an edu- 
cational institution, if it is to win distinction it must rely upon 
the scholarship, ability and energy of the members of its Fac- 
ulty. Laboring together we shall hope to produce educational 
