SECOND PERIOD
GERMINATION -ACADEMY AND COLLEGE History of the University of Virginia, 1819-1919; The Lengthened Shadow of One Man, Volume I | ||
IX. John Hartwell Cocke
John Hartwell Cocke is not to be credited with as conspicuous services in assisting in the foundation of the University
Cocke, like Cabell, was a broadminded advocate of public improvements of all kinds, and, in 1823, visited New York in order to inspect the new Erie waterway, and to obtain practical information for opening up the obstructed
Cocke's approval of popular education was so keen that he threw the full weight of his influence in favor of every attempt that was made to establish a State university; he was chosen by the Governor, at Jefferson's request, as a member of the Board of Visitors of Central College; and he was retained on the University Board in spite of his protesting his disqualification, from lack of experience, to meet the increased responsibility. "As to my personal views," he declared, with characteristic modesty and unselfishness, "God forbid that I should permit such grovelling motives to interfere with what I believe to be the public interest." His enlightened opinion touching education extended to primary and secondary instruction also. He established near his beautiful home at Bremo, in 1820, a seminary for boys under the age of fifteen, and drew up for its government a set of rules marked by excellent judgment. It was, however, his own high character that was the principal ground of the confidence which this school inspired in its patrons. "My calculations for my son's improvement," wrote Robert Saunders, of Williamsburg, to him, in 1819, "are made more on his situation with you than on the talents and fitness of the tutor. I am frank enough to say, without intending to compliment you, that I prefer your superintending eye to the benefit he might derive from the best classical scholar I might know in Virginia."
But far more multiform in its scope than the Bremo Academy was the gymnasium, on the most thorough German
The spirit of the most catholic philanthropy animated Cocke throughout life. He was deeply interested in the labors of the Bible, Tract, and Sunday School Societies, and frequently made the toilsome and irksome journey to New England simply to attend the great conventions of those bodies periodically held in the principal cities of those States. The familiar social intercourse with influential Northern men of the different religious denominations which these occasions rendered possible, created in him a less prejudiced attitude of mind towards the Northern States than was to he perceived among the Virginians at large. "While we nurse an angry spirit instead of a conciliatory one towards them," he wrote to Cabell as late as 1855, "the distance between us will continue to grow." But it was not merely this temper, which so wisely deprecated the further feeding of the spreading and consuming sectional fires, that distinguished Cocke from the personal friends about him. He was the boldest and most persistent advocate in his native State at that time of the adoption of universal prohibition. Amiable ridicule, sneering derision, and silent contempt for the doctrine, which, in the next century, was to be incorporated in the statute book of Virginia, did not shake his loyalty to his convictions on this subject, or divert him from publicly and emphatically expressing them. "Of all the events in our history," he said, "the Maine Law
Cocke was as firm and outspoken an opponent of duelling and slavery as he was of intemperance. Against the first, he directed his pen with all the literary and reasoning skill at his command; and the latter he was in the habit of bitterly stigmatizing as a "curse" to his native State. Only a man of invincible moral courage could have openly taken such a stand in those intolerant times. As early as 1821, he pressed upon the representative in Congress from his district the advisability of an amendment to the Constitution that would allow an appropriation to be made for the transfer of Southern negroes to Africa as the only means of practical emancipation then available. Ten years afterwards he wrote, "I have long and still do steadfastly believe that slavery is the great cause of all the great evils of our land, individual as well as national, and every man of common foresight and reflection is obliged to admit that we or our posterity are inevitably destined to be overwhelmed unless the cause is removed.
Cocke, in the spirit of all the Virginians who occupied the same rank in society, found a wholesome delight in the pursuit of the different branches of agriculture. As far back as 1809, he wrote to Cabell that his time was "divided between his family, his farms, his garden, and his books"; and that he did not have a moment "to be troubled about politics." "I would not change my situation," he exclaims, " with the most puissant prince of the House of Napoleon." He exhibited this characteristic spirit of independence even in his views of his own calling. Tobacco was still the principal crop of the region in which his home was situated, and it had already gone far towards depreciating the fertility of its lands. There was
Although the name of General Cocke has passed into obscurity because he steadily declined to be elected to high office, yet in power of foresight, he was the most remarkable of all his Virginian contemporaries of his own generation. He not only urged a more conciliatory attitude towards the North, and more frequent intercourse with its people, as a means of removing mutual antagonisms, but he confidently anticipated the success of numerous causes which were, in his day, looked upon with chilling indifference or outspoken aversion, but which have become an accepted part of the solid structure of our present social and political life. He warmly supported every plan to raise the standards of education in all departments, from the lowest to the highest; he advocated with never ceasing energy and devotion the wisdom of adopting universal prohibition; he condemned the barbarism of duelling, which had destroyed some of the most accomplished and chivalrous sons of Virginia, and had gilded
SECOND PERIOD
GERMINATION -ACADEMY AND COLLEGE History of the University of Virginia, 1819-1919; The Lengthened Shadow of One Man, Volume I | ||