University of Virginia Library

SPEECHES AT THE DINNER TO DELEGATES

RESPONSE BY JACOB GOULD SCHURMAN, PH.D., LL.D., FORMER PRESIDENT OF
CORNELL UNIVERSITY

This splendid dinner, so characteristic of the generous hospitality of the
South, marks the close of three of the four days set apart for your Centennial
Celebration.

It is difficult to imagine what remains for you to do to-morrow. Certainly
the past three days have been for us all days of noble and elevated
joy. We have been genuinely conscious of a fraternal communion and interchange

of spirit and sentiment. Not only the speakers, but the great company
of delegates and visitors have joined in the well-merited congratulations
and cordial good wishes which the speakers brought you on behalf of
sister institutions.

Have the triumphs of truth and reason in this University been eloquently
set forth? The silent auditors, as you might have recognized from
many signs of approval, make those eloquent tributes their own. Has the
influence of this University in molding the religious life of the Nation been
justly assessed? The audience joins you in the testimony that man lives
not by bread alone—nor yet by bread and science together. Have you set up
memorials to your heroic dead? In the presence of your tears, in the hearing
of your prayers, we bow our heads and devoutly give thanks that the
University of Virginia has been so preëminent in the training of men for the
service of the Republic.

Not only oratory, you have invoked also music and art and pageantry
to give worthy expression to the spirit of this occasion. And the spirit seems
to me as manifold as the media of its expression are varied. No doubt the
primary note is the exaltation of the scientific and scholarly mind, for the
formation of which universities were called into being and after the lapse of
so many centuries still continue to exist and flourish. But life is more than
intellect. And the university is in close and friendly alliance with the
church, the state, and every other institution which makes for the improvement
and advancement of mankind. Thus, most appropriately, you have
made your high celebration a means not alone of stimulating intellect, but
also of awakening historical imagination, of quickening patriotism, and of
deepening the sense of the religious significance of life.

All this might have been done, nay, all this I have seen done, by other
universities at home and abroad. But there is one feature of your Celebration
which is absolutely unique. No other historic university could have
arranged to make a pilgrimage to the home of its founder and under the very
roof where he spent his mortal days pay honor to his memory as we this
afternoon at Monticello all-hailed the Father of the University of Virginia.

There is often a contrast, which may amount even to contradiction,
between the founders and benefactors of colleges and universities and the
proper ideals of the institutions which they have called into existence. The
things which give them pleasure, the objects they pursue from day to day,
the literature they read, the thoughts which make the furniture of their
minds, may be entirely alien to the life of the devoted scholar or scientist.
And their conception of his function, and of the ways and means of performing
it, are likely to differ entirely from his. Here lies the possibility of fatal
collisions! The millionaire benefactor, apart from his benefaction, has
seldom been an object of enthusiasm either on the part of teachers or

students. Nor can I imagine that Henry VIII or even Wolsey was ever
regarded as an exemplar for the young gentleman of Christ Church. It was
not merely cynicism that inspired Goldwin Smith's bon mot that the proper
place for a Founder was in marble effigy in the College chapel!

The University of Virginia is in this regard fortunate in her Founder.
No doubt Jefferson's thorough-going democracy predisposed him in some
matters to defer too much to popular opinion; and the principle of vox populi
vox dei is fatal to the life of a university. But it was only in politics that he
would determine truth by counting noses. In other spheres he insisted on
evidence, and if evidence were lacking he suspended judgment. In this
respect he was the very embodiment of scientific method. Indeed, all things
considered and all necessary abatements made, you will find a remarkable
harmony between the mental postulates, operations, and outlook of Jefferson
and the spirit of a genuine university. Here and now I can signalize only
one or two of these features.

In the first place, Jefferson was above everything else an idealist.
Those who would disparage him called him an impractical visionary. Certainly
he was ready to theorize on any subject which engaged his thought.
The force of his penetrating intelligence could not be restrained by any
convention, however respectable, or by any tradition, however venerable.
He was a thinker who must see and understand for himself. The dread of
new ideas, which is a universal characteristic of mankind, had no place in the
composition of that daring spirit. On the contrary, the fact that a theory
was new commended it to one who, like Jefferson, ardently believed in
progress and zealously strove for the advancement of mankind. He did not
mind being branded as a radical or a revolutionist. His sanguine taste for
novelty was exhibited in all his activities—in agriculture, in which he was all
his life an enthusiast, as well as in politics, in which for forty years he was an
unrivaled leader. And no consequences deterred him from following the
principles he had embraced to their logical conclusions. If the "rights of
man" signified to his mind an almost entire absence of governmental control
he did not hesitate to declare that "a little rebellion now and then is a good
thing."

Now this hospitality to new ideas, even to the extent of being enamoured
by their novelty, and this readiness to follow new ideas whithersoever
they lead—till they eventually proved themselves true or false—is the
animating spirit of a genuine university. On this more than anything else
whatever the intellectual progress of mankind depends. Has not Darwin,
indeed, taught us that the evolution of life, from lower to higher forms, is due
to the survival of characteristics which on their first appearance can only be
described as "sports" or freaks? And, in the realm of mind it is just by
means of the "freakish" ideas of dreamers and visionaries that successive

steps of progress are effected. In the highest conception of it a university
is an organ for the creation, development and dissemination of new ideas.

I do not recall any time when this high and vital function of the university
stood in need of greater emphasis. We are to-day living in one of
those periods of reaction which invariably follow war. The exhibition of
physical power which for four and a half years convulsed the world still
dominates our habit of thought. The invisible world of ideas seems weak
and insignificant beside that colossal empire of all-compelling might. And
if the two come, or appear to come, into conflict men invoke force to suppress
new theories, which can always be branded as dangerous, if not also
disloyal. But vis consili expers mole ruit sua.

Now the university is the nursery of new ideas. Its members are, in the
fine phrase of Heine, "knights of the holy spirit"—the holy spirit of truth
and culture. I trust that a fresh dedication to that noble service may be one
of the results of this celebration of the Centennial of the University founded
by Jefferson.

There is a second service rendered by Jefferson to this University which
you will perhaps grant me the time briefly to mention. I can describe it
best by contrast. All institutions tend to lose themselves in their own instrumentalities.
A university has buildings to care for and funds to invest
and enlarge and routine business to administer. But a university is a spiritual
institution. It has to do with mind, and exists for mind. The danger
to-day is that the real university shall be submerged by its "plant" and
"business."

Are not universities corporations? And should they not be conducted
like financial or manufacturing corporations? Nay, should not heads for
them be found in the offices of Wall Street or the factories of Pittsburg?
These are the questions we hear in the marts and markets to-day.

In contrast with the implications of these questions, stands Jefferson's
just and noble conception of a university. He clearly perceived that it was
the Faculty that made the University. And that the Faculty might not be
dislodged from the high place that naturally belonged to it, he would have
no president at all but leave the administration of the institution in their
hands.

I think Jefferson sacrificed to this fine idea the obvious means of administrative
efficiency. And I argued that thesis in a long letter fifteen or
twenty years ago when your Trustees did me the honor of soliciting my
opinion regarding the creation of the presidential office in this University.
Undoubtedly the course of university development in the United States
had made such an office a necessity. But even that reform would have been
purchased too dearly, if it had involved the abandonment of Jefferson's
conception in respect of the supremacy rightfully belonging to the Faculty.

Nothing whatever can change the fact that in relation to the teachers and
investigators, not only all material appliances, but also all governing and
administrative officials—even the highest—exist solely that they may do
their work in quiet and freedom and utter devotion with the minimum of
distraction and the maximum of efficiency.

Happily the University of Virginia found the right man for the new
office. We join you in rejoicing over the success of President Alderman's
administration! Long may he continue to go in and out among you as your
intellectual leader and the worthy exponent of your spirit.

But though methods of administration vary, Jefferson's conception of
the place and function of the Faculty is so true and precious that the University
can never afford to part with it. It is through the eminence of its
professors that the University of Virginia has attained the great influence
and the high standing which it to-day enjoys. May their tribe continue and
increase! So shall the noble University which they serve and of which all
America is proud fulfill the universal heart's desire: Semper Floreat!

RESPONSE OF REVEREND ANSON PHELPS STOKES, D.D., OF YALE UNIVERSITY

I hardly recognize myself in the highly colored picture which the Toastmaster
has so generously painted of my character and work. His estimate
was evidently not shared by the officers of a publication in Chicago with
some such title as "Distinguished Young Americans" who recently wrote
me enclosing a sketch of my life from Who's Who and added, "you are not
quite up to our standard, but if you will forward $10 we will include sketch
of your life!" However, a local undertaker in my home town thinks better
of me, for he recently asked me to join the Coöperative Burial Association.
I told him that I did not feel so inclined, but would like to know the conditions.
He replied that if I would pay $10 down and $5 a year they would
guarantee to give me and every member of my family a $100 funeral. He
added: "I know, Mr. Stokes, that this is not a financial necessity for you,
but the fact of the matter is that if we can bury you and a few other people
of local prominence we will gain much prestige!"

Your Chairman, in writing to me and the other speakers, courteously
suggested a ten minute limit. I had not supposed before that the South
cared anything about time. But you are even stricter in your requirements
than we in the College Chapel at Yale, where President Hadley is reported
to have answered a preacher's inquiries by saying, "We have no time limit
at Yale, but few souls are saved after twenty minutes!" What, only ten
minutes to pay my respects to Thomas Jefferson, to President Alderman, to

Charlottesville, the State of Virginia, the South and this great University,
and in addition to say something about University ideals! It seems like a
sheer impossibility, but I will do my best.

First, as to Thomas Jefferson. No man can speak here without paying
his tribute to the sage of Monticello. Although a Northerner and a New
England man, I was brought up by my father to have great respect for the
political teachings of Thomas Jefferson, and I do not regret this. I am
proud that my University was among the first in this country to honor him
by giving him in 1786 the degree of LL.D. I remember that when Jefferson
visited New Haven two years previously and was introduced by Roger
Sherman to Ezra Stiles, the latter, then President of Yale University, put
in his diary: "The Governor is a most ingenious Naturalist and Philosopher
—a truly scientific and learned man—in every way excellent"—an admirable
tribute to which most of us are glad to give assent. I know of no place in
America which is so dominated by the personality of one man as this place
has been by that of Thomas Jefferson. One has to go to Europe for its counterpart.
At Eisenach you breathe the spirit of Martin Luther. At Assisi
you feel the very presence of St. Francis. So is it here with the "father of
the University." The beautiful pageant yesterday evening showed "the
shadow of the founder." May it never grow less, but may it stand for all
time as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to hold this institution,
this Commonwealth and this Nation up to the high educational
and political ideals for which he stood.

And now as to President Alderman. I often wondered why the University
of Virginia went for eighty years without a President. I realize now
that it was largely because it took this length of time before the spirit of
Jefferson was reincarnated in someone who could carry out his educational
ideals here. As a political philosopher, as an eloquent speaker, as a man of
broad culture and of high conceptions of a University, President Alderman
may in many ways be considered the living representative of the founder, the
one on whom the mantle of Elijah has fallen. We have had at my University
during the past twenty years many of the most distinguished
speakers from America and abroad. Theodore Roosevelt gave his first
public address as President of the United States at Yale's Bicentennial.
Woodrow Wilson delivered at Yale his great address on Scholarship, before
the Phi Beta Kappa. Many other orators have made a profound impression
upon Yale audiences, but no one has made a speech which created a more
profound impression than that delivered by President Alderman at a Yale
commencement a decade ago when we gave him our highest honor, the
Doctor of Laws degree. As a colleague of your President's for many years
on the General Education Board I have gained a deep respect and affection
for him. I know of no one in this country who interprets all that is best in

the South to the North, and all that is best in the North to the South, with
more unfailing insight and a better spirit than he, and it would be hard to
render a larger public service than this to the nation.

And now as to the University. There are many reasons why the University
of Virginia should make a profound appeal to all thoughtful Americans.
I have time to mention but four.

It stands for beauty. There is no academic group in America of more
simple charm and dignity than that which Jefferson designed about the
Lawn here. Virginia is the only American university that has passed through
the Victorian period without being saddled with some architectural monstrosity.
I hear some of you complain of your Geology Museum, but it
would pass among the best buildings at some of our educational institutions!
I can only hope that you will continue your policy of developing a consistent
architectural plan in one style. If a donor should come along and offer you
a million dollars for some much-needed building with the understanding
that he could choose his architect without reference to the University's
plan, I hope that the Board of Visitors may have the courage to decline the
offer. You have escaped all "early North German Lloyd" and "late
Hamburg-American" here, and you must maintain your precious
heritage!

It stands for breadth. Here was developed under Jefferson's guidance
the first real university ideal in America, for Jefferson's system included
medicine, and law, and the fine arts, and statesmanship, and engineering,
and mental and natural philosophy, and almost all the other departments
which universities have developed in the past half century. He had a broad
plan, and he showed his breadth by instituting here at an early day what was
virtually the elective system in the different schools of study. This breadth
has been well maintained, and it is seen to-day not only in the curriculum,
but in the fact that students come here not only from the Commonwealth
of Virginia, but from all the States of the South, from many States of the
North, and from foreign countries.

It stands for idealism. The incident of the carved marble column
about which so much was made last evening has its profound significance.
Jefferson and his successors have had high ideals. The starting here of the
honor system, which has meant so much to American universities, was a
good example of this. So is your Chapel, a building, I regret to say, not
always found in state universities; so is the record of your great scholars
Gildersleeve, Sylvester, Moore and many others.

It stands for public service. Founded by one President of the United
States, guided by two others, it has nurtured a fourth, and has trained at
least as large a proportion of men for the highest public service of the nation
as any American university.

And now as to the future. A university like the University of Virginia
has many functions. In its College it will train men as leaders in citizenship;
in its professional departments it will continue to give men the highest preparation
as lawyers, doctors, engineers, teachers; in its Graduate School it
will extend the boundaries of the world's knowledge, and, perhaps most
important of all, as a University it will hand down through all its schools
and departments the culture and traditions of the past. This last is a matter
of vital importance in our changing democracy. All is in flux. We have not
in this country many of the institutions such as an established church, or a
royal family, or great buildings like Westminster Abbey bearing memorials
of many centuries, which hand down and focus attention on national traditions.
For some of these lacks we are thankful. For others we express
regret; but the fact remains that there are few American institutions which
sum up so much history and are so well fitted to transmit the heritage of the
past to future generations as our historic universities. For these reasons I
say with you most heartily to-night "Diu floreat Alma Mater Virginiensis."

RESPONSE OF PRESIDENT HARRY WOODBURN CHASE, PH.D., OF THE UNIVERSITY
OF NORTH CAROLINA

The ties of friendship and affection which link the University of Virginia
with the institution that I am privileged to represent to-night are so
close, so intimate, that no formal words of congratulation on my part could
possibly convey the warmth and heartiness of the greetings which I bring
you from the University of North Carolina. Both of us are children of that
far-visioned Southern statesmanship which so soon saw that democracy
must make public provision for the training of its leaders; we have known
common sorrow and mutual joy; we have learned each other's temper at
work and at play; we claim, equally with you, him who at this hour presides
over your destinies—our own alumnus, teacher, and president, whose Alma
Mater greets him and rejoices with him at this birthday feast.

On an occasion such as this, one is torn inevitably between the mood
of the historian and the mood of the prophet. A milestone has been reached
in the history of a great public, a great national, institution. It marks the
completion of a century of distinguished achievement; a century spent in the
growing of men whose careers are a more lasting memorial than bronze to the
magnitude of the service of this University. But it is, I know, your temper,
as it is the temper of America, to conceive of anniversaries not merely as
memorials, but as points of departure. The mind kindles not only with the
memory of that rich and glorious past which is yours, but in no less measure
with the vision of the splendid promise which lies ahead.

Thus it seems to me of happy significance that we should celebrate with
you your centennial, with all its joy in work well done, at the moment when
you and your sister universities of the South are called to the performance of
a task, certainly of greater magnitude, perhaps of greater difficulty, than
any that lies behind. For it is very clear that the South is even now beginning
the writing of a great new chapter in her history, whose theme is to
be the final and full release of her splendid material and human resources.
There is no braver story in history than the story of the last half-century in
the South; the story of her struggle for reëstablishment and for liberation
from poverty and from ignorance, which was its sequel. I cannot think it
without significance that the men who had the courage and the vision to
make that fight have been men of the stock and the blood that made
America, children, almost without exception, of the colonists, the pioneer,
the builders of our country, they are making a new civilization where
their fathers made a new nation.

Such is the blood which flows in the veins of the youth of the Southland.
Who can fail to see what promise their liberation holds for the South and
for America!

This is the South's appointed hour. Out of the hearts and minds of her
sons then shall surely proceed—is even now proceeding—a new, a greater
and a higher order. Thus the task of the Southern university of our generation
must be, in the full sense of the word, constructive. Men must be
trained for full participation in the difficult and complex responsibilities of a
swiftly developing new civilization, fitted to live happy and productive lives
in an environment that shifts and alters even as we view it. And it is, I
think, no less the task of the universities of the South to guide, to focus, to
interpret to themselves and to the world this great forward, upward movement
of democracy, to do their utmost to see to it that it becomes, not
merely a great national expansion, but a steady enrichment of life in all its
higher reaches.

The task of the Southern State universities is then to-day in a very real
sense a pioneering task, as in the days of their foundation. Their journey is
again by unknown, untried ways.

To you, University of Virginia, born of the spirit of the pioneer, to you
who played so bravely your part in the making of your State and your
country, beloved by us all, hallowed by memories that cluster about you—
to you we bid Godspeed as your second century begins, in confident assurance
that your contribution to the future South will be as free, as splendid,
as enduring, as has been the service of the century you have passed. The
new South, the new day, is here. May you go forward, under skies that
brighten more and more, with steps that falter not, and a vision that never
shall grow dim.

RESPONSE BY THE HONORABLE THOMAS WATT GREGORY, FORMER ATTORNEY-GENERAL
OF THE UNITED STATES

The experience of the ages has demonstrated that liars are divided into
three ascending grades—the liar, the damn liar, and the old Alumnus. It
is astonishing how, on an occasion like this, the fossil representative of a
former generation of students magnifies and manufactures the Homeric
deeds of his youth. He likes to think that in the old days he was a distinct
menace to society, that the faculty quailed when he went on the rampage,
and that the police of Charlottesville took to the Ragged Mountains when
his voice was heard in the land. He may have been the mildest sheep in the
entire flock, but he will bow his back and purr like a cat on hearing his son
whisper that "Dad was a devil in his day." Few people believe these
stories of the old timer any more than the story-teller himself believes them.

I claim no monopoly of veracity, but it does no harm to tell the truth
occasionally, and besides it sometimes pays. I recall a citizen of my native
State of Mississippi who was elected to Congress and remained there twenty
years, largely because he openly proclaimed that he had been a private
soldier in the Confederate Army. The great body of privates, who were
masquerading as captains, and majors, and colonels, voted for this man
because they had a sneaking admiration for his honesty and were unwilling
to see his grade become extinct. He developed into a national character
known as "John Allen, the only surviving private soldier of the Confederacy."

With deep humiliation I confess that when I attended the University of
Virginia during seven months of the collegiate years of 1883-4 I was "a
grind." I trust that this candid confession will be remembered in my favor
at the judgment day, if not sooner. I did not belong to the German Club
or the Eli Bananas; I did not take calico even in homeopathic doses; I did
not have more than two pairs of pants at any time, and only one pair during
much of the time. For me it was a period of grinding labor, with few
friendships, interspersed with little of lighter vein. I was a part of the
wreckage of a stricken South. I was born just after the first battle of Manassas.
My father died in the Confederate Army. A widowed mother, with
painful toil, accumulated the small fund which enabled me to enjoy for a
few months the best instruction the South afforded. I came to sit at the
feet of John B. Minor and Stephen O. Southall, to breathe an atmosphere
sanctified by Monticello and the grave of its builder, to gather inspiration
from the best that was left of the old South by contact with its loftiest minds.
Almost forty years have passed and "the old grind" comes back, and will
tell you why he comes back.

Those were the most valuable seven months of my life, and looking
backward I can clearly see what made them so.

Loyalty is the finest word in any language; as long as you have it you
will be young in heart and worth associating with, and when you lose it
your years will be of little value to anyone, least of all to yourself. I have the
most profound sympathy for former students of this Institution who are
absent on this occasion without good excuse. They remind me of the unhappy
Scotchman who said he found no more pleasure in smoking, that
when he was smoking his own tobacco he was thinking of how much it cost
him, and when he was smoking the other fellow's tobacco he packed his pipe
so tight it wouldn't draw. In contemplating the indifference of those who
show no appreciation of past associations and the high ideals which bring
us here I recall the words of Stevenson when he heard of the death
of Matthew Arnold: "I am sorry for poor Arnold, he will not like God."

Like most of you, I have long since forgotten most of what I learned in
the classroom of "The Old Annex," though God knows John B. tried hard
enough to teach me the distinction between an executory devise and a
contingent remainder. I have never been an enthusiastic admirer of the
mere scholar, and recall with malignant pleasure that John Randolph of
Roanoke once said of a very erudite opponent that "the gentleman reminded
him of the soil of Virginia,—poor by nature and worn out by cultivation."

What then is the tie that binds? What is the mark set upon the brow
of the student of that long past day? What did he take away from here
which he has not forgotten? It was the teachings of Thomas Jefferson, and
the personal example of the men who constituted the Faculty of the University
during the years immediately following the Civil War.

In those days the spirit and influence of Jefferson brooded over this
Institution like the wings of a mother bird. If asked to state his doctrine in
few words I would say it was the principle of individual liberty and a corresponding
individual responsibility. He was not so much interested in
protecting the rights of the States against the powers of the National Government,
as he was in protecting the rights of the individual against the
encroachments of all authority. Out of this fundamental belief of Jefferson
grew, among other things, your original faculty organization, your honor
system which has spread over all the land, the right of the student to select
his courses, the freedom of the student from restraint outside of the classroom,
and the trial by an organized student body of all infractions of a high
code of personal integrity. Well might he dictate for an inscription upon his
marble sentinel—not that he was Minister to France, not that he was
Secretary of State, not that he was Governor of Virginia, not that he was
Vice-President of the United States, not that he was President of the United

States—but that he was the "Father of the University of Virginia." And as
long as the old Arcades, planned by the Master's hand, shall stand, as long
as her sons shall bear her honored name to every section of this Republic,
so long shall the University of Virginia be counted no unworthy monument
to her mighty founder.

To the memory of the Faculty of that day I bow in humble reverence.
They were a Spartan band, but old age had crept upon them. They had
toiled for a third of a century in making the University of Virginia the
Mecca of learning for all the South, and had established here a standard of
scholarship probably unequaled on this continent. They had lived through
war and defeat. Finally the tempest of reconstruction had swept over them,
carrying away for the moment every landmark of social status and political
faith, and leaving these men standing, with folded arms and undaunted
courage, amid the flotsam and jetsam of creeds which were knit into every
fiber of their beings and ancestral traditions which had become a part of their
daily lives. Their attitude carried no craven apology for the past and no
unseemly defiance of the future.

Speaking of the typical Southern leader of that day, Daniel H. Chamberlain,
the reconstruction ruler of South Carolina, said:

"I consider him a distinct and really noble growth of our American soil.
For, if fortitude under good and under evil fortune, if endurance without
complaint of what comes in the tide of human affairs, if a grim clinging to
ideals once charming, if vigor and resiliency of character and spirit under
defeat and poverty and distress, if a steady love of learning and letters when
libraries were lost in flames and the wreckage of war, if self-restraint when
the long-delayed relief at last came; if, I say, all these qualities are parts of
real heroism, if these qualities can vivify and ennoble a man or a people,
then our own South may lay claim to an honored place among the differing
types of our great common race."

Such was the matured judgment of the Massachusetts Governor of
South Carolina during the reconstruction period in regard to men of this
type, and there is nothing I would wish to add to it except this—that when
we of the South forget the precept and example of these men, when we forget
that from them there has come down to us a heritage of loyalty, of manhood
and of courage such as the world has seldom known, when we forget these
things then God, in His infinite justice, should forget us.

The "old grind" has not forgotten. He is here to-night to renew his
allegiance to these men and what they stood for, and to reconsecrate himself
to the faith that was theirs.