University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER X

EARLY EFFORTS AT GOVERNMENT

The Visitors committed the administration of
the affairs of the University to the faculty, organized
with a chairman as the chief executive officer,
aided by several subordinates directly responsible
to him. These officers and employees were the
proctor, patron, bursar, hotel-keeper and janitor.

The chairman was charged with the execution
of all laws made for the government of the institution.
He was to preside at meetings of the faculty,
suspend students until that body could examine
into the offenses charged against them,
and, in a word, to assume the responsibilities now
committed to college presidents; but the office
was wanting in autocratic power except in one
respect: the faculty could not punish or try an
offense unless the case was "brought before them
by the chairman."

The proctor was "master of police" and inspector
of the lands and buildings, and this inspectorship
extended to a weekly scrutiny of all the dormitories
and a monthly visit to all the hotels, now
called boarding-houses. His duty required a report
to the chairman of the faculty of all injuries
to University property, together with the name

of the perpetrator, if known, and the collection
of all fines imposed by the faculty. He also had
charge of all building operations, made all contracts
authorized by law, settled all accounts with
contractors, and paid them by warrants on the
bursar. In his capacity as master of police he was
required to be diligent in observing all violations
of law, to lay before the civil authority, when requested
to do so by the chairman, such information
as might prevent or punish breaches of the
peace, trespass, etc. The patron and hotel-keepers
were assistants to him in the matter of maintaining
the police and good order.

When the student arrived at the University,
and proposed to reside in the precincts, he found
he was not permitted to matriculate till he had deposited
with the patron all the money, checks,
bills, drafts, and other available funds in his possession,
and in any manner intended to defray his
expenses while a student at the University. His
deposit was required to be sufficient after deducting
the patron's commission to discharge his indebtedness
for his dormitory and the public
rooms,—library and examination rooms,—to pay
his professor's fees, three months' board to his
hotel-keeper, and to purchase the text-books and
stationery necessary to begin with, and ten dollars
to cover contingent charges and assessments.

With his receipt from the bursar for this deposit
he was finally permitted to present himself to the
proctor for registration. That officer handed him
a printed copy of the regulations, which he was
required to master. These apprized him that all
the funds received while a student he was required
to deposit with the patron, and at the end of the

first three months of the session he was expected
to hand to that officer money to pay his board and
other expenses for the ensuing three months.
The final payment for the session was to be made
at the conclusion of six months from the beginning.
Having read over the enactments, eighteen
pages of closely printed rules, the applicant was
permitted to write his name in the matriculation-book.

A student not resident in a dormitory was expected
to deposit in the same manner, except that
he did not have an account with the bursar for
board or books and stationery.

The expenses of a student were limited by University
regulation: Clothing during the session
not exceeding $100; pocket money for the same
period not exceeding forty dollars; for books and
stationery whatever parent or guardian thought
fit to allow; medicine and medical attendance,
whatever was necessary.[1]

The money deposited with the bursar was paid
out on the warrant of the proctor. Amounts for
books and stationery were paid when an itemized
bill was presented with the student's order to pay
endorsed on it. Pocket money was treated discreetly:
no draft was allowed to exceed, in any
quarter session, a due proportion of the amount
allotted for the entire session, and no order from
one student in favor of another was honored unless
for the purpose of some article the sale of
which had been authorized in writing by the chairman.
Plainly, debts of honor could not be paid
by orders on the patron. The restraint of gambling

may have indeed been the object of this regulation.
There were cases before the faculty in
which as much as two hundred dollars had been
lost in an evening. These dormitory games were
often accented by fisticuffs, and in one case, certainly,
by a cowhiding. On this last occasion the
game was "all fours," and the fight was inspired
by anger at loss and intensified by excitement arising
from indulgence in mint sling. Perhaps the
tipple was furnished by "an individual by the name
of Ben—a black man," who sold spirituous liquors
surreptitiously in the cellar of one of the dormitories
until the proctor was directed by a resolution
of the faculty to abate the nuisance. It was
more probable that the sling was procured from
some ordinary in the village.[2]

The hotel-keepers were appointed by the proctor,
and were charged with some other duties than
that of providing food for the students. The
proctor could require them once a week to visit
the rooms of the students in the morning and report
to him all the violations of the law regarding
early rising, and the faculty could exact from them
testimony upon honor touching any matter of inquiry
before that body. All opportunities of private
gain were removed by an enactment forbidding
the furnishing of entertainment for compensation
to any one not a student or otherwise a
member of the University community, and this inhibition
extended to expelled students for the term

of five years. The hotel-keeper was not to permit
any game of chance on his premises, "or any ardent
spirits of wine, mixed or unmixed, to be
drunk within his tenement."

One of the duties of the janitors was to visit the
dormitories in the morning and report violations
of the law requiring students to rise early. This
was sufficient to make him a man of many sorrows,
but he had other burdens, such as attending
meetings of the faculty, their several schools while
in session, and the meetings of the Board of Visitors,
waiting upon the professors of natural philosophy
and chemistry in their lecture-rooms and
in the laboratories, winding up and attending to
the clock, etc.

It must be understood that by far the greater
part of these regulations—such as limiting the
pocket money, the deposit of all funds with the
bursar, etc.—were enacted after Mr. Jefferson's
death, and during the rectorship of James Madison.
The year 1828 was prolific of enactments,—
many of them yet to be referred to,—some of
which the first rector would probably have disapproved.
Jefferson's greatest gifts to the world
proceeded from his idealism, which was always
sane, and invariably convertible to practical use and
service. This sanity was the natural profit of a
mind which insisted upon truth and never trafficked
with ingenious and sophistic premises.

One of the finest gifts of his idealism—in our
day converted to a practical realism, and yielding
superlative benefits—was his thesis in the report
of the Rockfish Commission on the best mode of
governing the young in large collections, "certainly
a desideratum not yet attained by us." "It

may be well questioned," he continues, "whether
fear, after a certain age, is a motive to which we
should have ordinary recourse. The human character
is susceptible of other incitements to correct
conduct more worthy of employ and of better effect.
Pride of character, laudable ambition, and moral
dispositions, are innate correctives of the indiscretions
of that lively age; and when strengthened by
habitual appeal and exercise have a happier effect
on future character than the degrading motive of
fear. Hardening them to disgrace, corporal punishments
and servile humiliations cannot be the
process for producing erect character."

The chapter on discipline and police contains
eight printed pages, the most of them filled with
prohibitions, inhibitions and penalties, which,
combined, left room for only a very narrow way
for the student's feet. Inattendance, inattention,
indecorum, or misbehavior were prohibited by
law. No student was permitted to appear in the
lecture-room with a stick or weapon, to remain
covered without professorial consent, to use tobacco
by snuffing, chewing, or smoking. Servants,
horses, and dogs within the precincts were
forbidden to students. Noises in dormitories or
in the precincts, the possession of weapons, and
the discharge of fire-arms, were all offenses, "but
the proper use of musical instruments" was
"freely allowed, except during lecture-hours, and
after 10 at night, as well as on Sundays." Mr.
Jefferson was himself a violinist. The professors
were in part charged with the execution of the
regulations, and when one of them knocked at a
student's door the latter was required to open or
the professor could have the door broken in, and

the cost of repair charged to the inmate. Any
professor, the proctor, the hotel-keepers, and the
janitors, in one way or another, all had official
right of entry into the student's room. Among
the many prohibitions were habits of expense, dissoluteness,
dissipation, profane swearing, wearing
of masks, and playing at games of chance, as these
habits "were obstructive to the acquisition of
science."

If the student would "make any festive entertainment
within the precints of the University"
he had to get the consent of the chairman, and the
regulations advised that officer that "as such entertainments
are for the most part unfriendly to
collegiate duties they should be allowed with caution."
Public dinners were strictly prohibited,
but on the occasions of the celebration of the
anniversary of independence and Washington's
birthday a ball or other evening party attended
by professors and students, "having its pleasures
chastened by the company of ladies," was allowed
under conditions. This limitation of celebrations
was not consonant with the feelings of the students.
The 8th of January, the 13th of April, and
the 19th of October claimed recognition, and
were soon duly observed. The chairman very
wisely granted permission, and several balls during
each session were fixed social fetes. These
took place at Fitch's Hotel in Charlottesville, or
at Midway Hotel, or at one of the University hotels,
always kept by persons of good family. The
writer of reminiscences of those days would
scarcely fail to record the highest praise of the
dance music furnished by the Scotts. There were
four of these musicians—father and three sons;

and they played the real old Virginia jigs, reels,
breakdowns, and the like, "with fervor, with spirit,
and proper accentuation." In 1829, when William
C. Rives went as minister to France, he took
with him one of the Scotts to be his body-guard.
Scott heard Paganini in the French capital, and,
it is said, foreswore the violin forever.

The consent of the chairman or some professor
was necessary to a student's absence from the precincts
at night, "unless on a visit to a respectable
family," and the same permission was necessary
to his visit "to any tavern or confectionery," and
it is needless to say that a student who asked for
such a privilege had to enforce his request with
the best reasons before it was granted. Written
or extempore addresses, or orations, in public
were lawful only when permitted by the faculty.

Mr. Jefferson seems to have expected that the
duelling customs of the German universities
would be introduced at his institution, where they
would have been a more serious matter than a
brawling pastime, and with his own hand he drew
an enactment which has probably never been violated[3]
to the extent of a duel actually fought. It
provided that every student who engaged in a
duel or combat with weapons which might inflict
death either by fighting or being in any manner
accessory should be liable to instant expulsion,
and the sentence was not remissible by the faculty,
and did not need the approval of the Board of
Visitors. The proctor was required to give information

to the authorities with a view to aiding
the civil punishment of the offenders. There have
been several challenges to combat, but rarely with
weapons that might inflict death. The encounters
have all been fistic, and there was severe punishment
in some cases, but never death.

The following enactment caused "discomfort"
and gave rise to much trouble and some humorous
episodes: "The bell shall be rung every morning
throughout the session at dawn. The students
shall rise at this signal and dress themselves without
delay. Their rooms shall be cleaned and set
in order, and they prepared for business at sunrise;
at which time the proctor shall, at least once
a week, inspect their apartments and see that they
are in proper order. The bell shall be again rung
at 10 o'clock at night, by which time at least the
students shall retire to rest, and after which time
perfect quiet shall be maintained within the precincts,
and no light shall be kept burning in any
dormitory unless in case of sickness or by the
special leave of the chairman. It shall be the duty
of the proctor to see that the lights are extinguished
accordingly. He shall scrupulously report
all breaches of this enactment to the chairman,
and any student who shall violate it shall be subject
to any of the minor or major punishments."

This ordinance was passed by the board July
24, 1828. James Madison, rector, James Breckinridge,
Chapman Johnson, John H. Cocke, William
C. Rives, and Joseph C. Cabell were present,
but the minutes give no hint as to who proposed
or who voted for the measure.

The clause requiring the ringing of a 10 o'clock
bell and the retirement of the students to bed at

that early hour was rescinded at the next meeting,
which took place in October, 1828. The remainder
of the law was on the statute books as late as
1870, but it had been a dead letter a long time. A
bell is still rung at a very early hour in the morning,
but this may be the janitor's compliance with
a practice no longer enjoined, long after all knowledge
of the originating mandate has been lost to
his kind.

In the old, strenuous days, when the big bell in
the Rotunda was rung at dawn, when the janitor
knocked at the door of each dormitory and looked
in at that early hour to see that the summons to
the business of the day was obeyed, that personage
was often the object of the malevolent humor
of the disturbed student; bucketfuls of water descended
upon him from the door-tops, where they
had been balanced with diabolical skill, or other
unwelcome attentions were bestowed upon him.
He had his means of revenge, however, and pursued
it with a steady purpose. He would submit
a full report of any mistreatment to the faculty,
and the offending student would be suspended and
rusticated for a fortnight or so, which time he
usually spent very agreeably at some tavern—perhaps
Cocke's or Bowcock's—a dozen miles from
Charlottesville. Sometimes the student deceived
the janitor by jumping out of bed as he approached,
donning a dressing gown hastily, and
taking a seat with a text-book in readiness. When
Spinner, or Brockman, or "Dr." Smith, whoever
the janitor happened to be, looked in he found an
apparently exemplary student busy at his task;
if he had looked a moment later he would have
found the studious young man in bed again. But

the enactments caught the student in the end, for
one of them required the hotel-keepers to furnish
a list of such of their boarders as were absent from
breakfast and of those who appeared a half-hour
after the breakfast bell had been rung.[4]

The faculty was authorized to prescribe the details
of the fare at the hotels, "if they found it convenient."[5]
The enactments positively prohibited
luxury, but required plentiful, plain, good, wholesome
viands, neatly served and well dressed.
Compensation for "diet, bedding and furniture for
their dormitories, and washing, also proper attendance
of servants for domestic and menial
duties," was $100 for the session, paid monthly.
And with all this went an inquisitorial inspection
by the faculty through the proctor or the proctor's
agent, which descended to a scrutiny of the student's
laundry or to an inquiry as to whether the
bread was burnt or the steak tough. Many years
after these enactments were promulgated a proctor
flatly refused to perform this duty, and the fact
of the refusal was entered upon the minutes of the
faculty, and perhaps reported to the Board of
Visitors.

Among the post-Jeffersonian enactments was a
series of regulations on student dress which were
for years a cause of bitter feeling on the part of
some of the collegians and a source of trouble in
and out of the faculty. These rules prescribed
that the attire of students should be uniform and
plain: the coat, waistcoat and pantaloons of cloth
of a dark gray mixture, known as Oxford gray

broadcloth, at a price not exceeding six dollars
per yard. The coat was required to be single-breasted,
with a standing cape, and swallow-tailed,
the skirts of a moderate length, with pocket-flaps;
the waistcoat single-breasted, with a standing
collar, and the "pantaloons of the usual form."
The buttons of each garment were flat, and covered
with the same cloth. The pantaloons and
waistcoat of this dress could be varied with the
season without offense. For instance, the waistcoat
might be white and the pantaloons of light
brown cotton or linen. Boots were absolutely
prohibited; plain black neck-cloths were prescribed
for winter and white for summer, while
no difference seems to have been made in the hat,
which was required to be "round and black." A
surtout of cloth of the price and color of the regulation
dress was allowed, but not as a substitute
on occasions of public examinations and exhibitions
within the University.

The proctor, under the direction of the executive
committee, provided the model according to
which each article of the dress was made, and the
regulation enjoined conspicuous badges on the
coat—an embroidered black silk star on each side
of the collar—and permitted the addition of the customary
badges in case of mourning. This uniform
was strictly enforced for years, except that
in warm weather the student was permitted to
wear within the precincts a light gown or coat of
a pattern approved by the chairman.

The uniform law was passed by the Visitors
December 16, 1826: present, Madison, Monroe,
Cocke, Cabell and Johnson,[6] and repealed in 1845.

This final action the Visitors approached with apparent
reluctance. In 1842 they suspended the
law "for one year from date" (July 5). The suspension
was renewed in 1843 and 1844; and a
resolution rescinding it was passed July 4, 1845.

The law had been in force a year before the
clauses requiring gaiters in winter and ordaining
the color of the stockings were repealed. In spite
of the effort of the Visitors to require plain attire,
there were many instances, before the law was
suspended, of extravagance in dress. The fop
was abroad then as now, the difference being less
in the man than in the colors that appealed to his
vanity. With less restraint, perhaps, the exquisite
of 1840 donned a garb of straw-colored pantaloons,
striped pink and blue silk vest, with a white
or straw colored ground, crimson merino cravat
with yellow spots on it, coat of fine cloth, and
cloth cap trimmed with rich fur.[7]

The year 1824—the one in which nearly all the
regulations passed in Mr. Jefferson's lifetime
were framed—the following section fixing punishments
was adopted by the board:

"Punishments for major offenses shall be expulsion,
temporary suspension, or interdiction of
residence or appearance within the precincts of
the University. The minor punishments shall be

restraint within those precincts, within their own
chamber, or in diet; reproof of the professor privately,
or in presence of the school [class] of the
offender, or of all the schools, a seat of degradation
in the school-room of longer or shorter duration,
removal to a lower class, dismission from the
school-room for the day, imposition of a task."

Much of this is amazing and almost incredible
in this day. The most of these penalties would
now be, and probably were then, impossible of
application to even children of spirit. What a
distance lies between this conception of young
manhood and that to which Mr. Jefferson pays the
tribute of a noble enactment made at the same
meeting: "When testimony is required from a
student it shall be voluntary, and not on oath, and
the obligation to give it shall be left to his own
sense of honor." These enactments have a
strange sound when read in connection with the
lofty sentiment of the Rockfish Commission that
"hardening them [youth] to disgrace, to corporal
punishments and servile humiliations, cannot be
the best process for producing erect character."

The folly of these futile fulminations against
youthful indiscretions is rendered more obvious
by the permission to form a student board of censors:
"Minor cases may be referred to a board of
six censors to be named by the faculty from
among the most discreet of the students, whose
duty it shall be, sitting as a board, to inquire into
the facts, propose the minor punishment which
they think proportioned to the offense, and to
make a report thereof to the professors for their
approbation or their commutation of the penalty,
if it be beyond the grade of the offense."[8]

The object of this legislation was to put into
effect Jefferson's theory of self-government, but
it seems remarkable that he should have believed
a body of students for which a code of such puerile
penalties was regarded as necessary could wisely
and safely have so large a share in the government
of this institution. One would think that
the imposition by a student court of a sentence
to an hour on "a seat of degradation" would produce
conditions not promotive of academic calm.

But these Virginia statesmen were not the only
men who framed drastic codes for universities.
Harvard, influenced by the great English schools,
embedded in her academic code provisions for
corporal punishment inflicted publicly and with
details that were humiliating to the last degree,[9]
and continued them in force for nearly a century after
England had abolished them. There were enactments
against "profane cursing and swearing," the
"frequenting of alehouses," "extravagant expenses
at taverns" for drink, running accounts for liquors
until they amounted to "a very enormous sum,"
"breaches of the Sabbath," "costly habits," "wearing
gold or silver lace, silk night gowns," etc.,
absence from dormitories at "unseasonable times
at night," and many other offenses also described
in the early enactments of the University of Virginia.
It is altogether likely that Ticknor explained

the Harvard code to Jefferson when he
visited Monticello in 1815, and certain that the
latter made a study of the enactments of the New
England university to guide him in his preparation
of a code. The two bodies of college law
were alike in an important and significant respect
—the major punishments of both were inoperative
until approved by the Board of Overseers in one
case and the Board of Visitors in the other.

In September, 1825, the faculty requested the
Visitors to repeal the most puerile punishments—
such as "restraint within the precincts, within
their own chamber, or in diet, a seat of degradation
in his school-room of longer or shorter duration,
removal to a lower class, the imposition of a
task." The faculty minute-books furnish no evidence
that any of these penalties were ever imposed.
The Visitors "expunged" them from the
enactments.

Any one privileged to read the minutes of the
first session of the University—comprised in
about thirty pages of the manuscript minute book
—would necessarily come to the conclusion that
more than "a lurking few" of the first students
who enrolled in Mr. Jefferson's university were
"unworthy." Nearly every page recites offenses
which are never committed now, and which seem
to mark the offenders as wanting in self-respect
and ordinary common sense. On the other hand,
with many evidences of good judgment on the
part of the professors were mingled instances of
bad in the cognizance of breaches of order which
would have been better overlooked. Unfortunately
the Visitors seemed to enjoin espionage.[10]

But it would not be just to ascribe all the disorders
that disturbed the academic peace at either
institution to unwise laws. Certainly foolish legislation
produced some offenses, but in all large
collections of young men, as the venerable rector
of the University pointed out, there is sure to be
an "unworthy few" ready to engage in irregularities
more or less vicious. These "lurking"
youngsters soon made themselves felt to the grief
of Mr. Jefferson, who found his pet scheme of
self-government jeopardized, to say the least.

The Lawn became the scene of nightly disorders
promoted by armed and masked students. Insults
were offered to the foreign professors, and
everybody else. The professors took measures to
suppress these riotous demonstrations. They tore
the masks from the faces of rowdy collegians,
who countered with profane language, sticks and
brickbats. On the evening of Saturday, October
1, 1825, the outrages culminated. The faculty
was convened on Sunday morning, and it resolved
that "an address be drawn up to the students expressive
of the abhorrence of the faculty at the
outrages, and requesting them to aid the faculty
in the discovery of the perpetrators"—a false step
of which the students promptly took advantage.
It was also resolved that a letter be addressed to
the Visitors stating the unanimous determination
of the faculty to resign unless an efficient police
were immediately established in the University.

On Monday the professors convened to receive
the response of the students to the address. What
the answer was may be gathered from this entry
in the minutes: "A paper was handed in signed
by sixty-five students expressive of their determination

not to act the part of informers and of
their indignation at the aspersion thrown upon
them by the faculty in expressing a belief that
they were capable of such baseness. They denied
the fact of any assault having been made upon any
professor, and asserted that on the contrary two
professors had attacked one student[11] and that
he was justified in making resistance."

Ex-President Madison, General Breckinridge,
General Cocke, Mr. Cabell, Mr. Johnson, and Mr.
Loyall had arrived at Monticello, probably on
Saturday, and had remained over Sunday, to confer
in regard to matters to be disposed of at the
meeting of the Visitors on Monday. The faculty,
in its perplexity, referred the matter to the board,
and the venerable men composing that body repaired
to the University and held a meeting in one
of the lecture-rooms of the Rotunda, at which occurred
one of the most notable scenes in the history
of the University. The students were summoned
to meet them. "At a long table in the
center of the room sat the Board of Visitors—
most of them men venerable for their age and distinguished
for their great services to the country
—Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Chapman
Johnson, Joseph Cabell, John Cocke, and one or
two others,[12] with their secretary, Nicholas P.
Trist. Mr. Jefferson arose. He began by saying
that this was the most painful event of his life, but

soon became so much affected that he could not
proceed. He then turned to Mr. Johnson, and
said that he must commit to younger hands the
task of saying that which he felt himself unable
to say. Those who have seen and heard this eminent
lawyer will remember his dignified bearing,
his bright and intelligent face, his earnest and persuasive
manner. If eloquence is to be estimated
by its effects, I have never heard any that surpassed
this. His glowing appeals to their honor,
the withering scorn with which he denounced the
outrages, were irresistible. When the guilty students
were asked to come forward and give their
names, without any apparent concert there was a
simultaneous rush to the table. While Mr. Trist
was taking down the names, one of those concerned
in the riot arose and disclaimed on the part
of himself and his associates the acts of outrage
which had been perpetrated by only a few, and
said that no one felt more scorn for the guilty
authors."[13]

The secretary of the board furnished the names
to the faculty, and an examination was held at
once. Four students were expelled, and some
others were visited with minor punishments.

Mr. Jefferson's noble belief in the sufficiency of
young manhood for its own government was assailed
by the conduct of these young hotspurs, for
certainly they were not yet ready for the liberty
with which the venerable rector would have invested
them. But he did not make the mistake of
attributing the character of the foolish and
vicious few to the whole body of students. On

the contrary, he addressed to the rational and
manly among them a dignified appeal for a right
sense of honor and a proper co-operation with the
faculty—an appeal which was an ovewhelming
answer to "the paper" which sixty-five of the students
had communicated to the faculty. This address
is in the form of a resolution addressed to
the professors, in which they are requested to
make known to the students "that it is with regret
that some breaches of order committed by the
unworthy few who lurk among them unknown
render necessary the extension to all of processes
afflicting the feelings of those who are conscious
of their own correctness, and who are above all
participation in these vicious irregularities. While
the offenders continue unknown the tarnish of
their faults spreads over the worthy also, and confounds
all in common censure, but that it is in
their power to relieve themselves from the imputations
and painful proceedings to which they are
thereby subjected by lending their aid to the faculty
on all occasions towards detecting the real
guilty. The Visitors are aware that a prejudice
prevails too extensively among the young that it
is dishonorable to bear witness one against another.
While this prevails, and under the form of
a matter of conscience, they have been unwilling
to authorize constraint, and have therefore, in
their regulations on this subject, indulged the error,
however unfounded in reason or morality.
But this loose principle in the ethics of schoolboy
combinations is unworthy of mature and regulated
minds; and is accordingly condemned by
the laws of their country, which in offenses, within
their cognizance, compel those who have knowledge
of a fact, to declare it for the purposes of
justice and the general good and safety of society.
And certainly where wrong has been done, he who
knows and conceals the doer of it, makes himself
an accomplice, and justly censurable as such. It
becomes then but an act of justice to themselves
that the innocent and the worthy should throw off
with disdain all communion of character with such
offenders, should determine no longer to screen
the irregular and the vicious under the respect of
their cloak, and to notify them, even by a solemn
association for the purpose, that they will cooperate
with the faculty in the future for the preservation
of order, the vindication of their own
character, and the reputation and usefulness of an
institution which their country has so liberally established
for their improvement, and to place
within their reach those acquirements in knowledge
on which their future happiness and fortunes
depend. Let the good and the virtuous of
the alumni of the University do this, and the disorderly
will then be singled out for observation
and deterred by punishment, or disabled by expulsion,
from infecting with their inconsideration the
institution itself, and the sound mass of those
which it is preparing for virtue and usefulness."