Alumni Oration

"Liberal Education End in Itself Says Alumni Orator - Higher Education and Modern Life, a Liberal Education, What It Is" Daily Gleaner (14 May 1936). (UA Case 67a, Box 2)

John Stuart Mill in his great inaugural address at St. Andrew’s remarks that Education in its larger sense is one of the most inexhaustible of all topics. It is a topic, too, upon which nearly everyone feels free to express some views, gathered from his own experience, his reading and his reflections as to the proper instruction for youth.

On occasions such as this it is always appropriate to consider the aims of Education, and when I say "Education" I am not referring to a technical course, the aim of which is to prepare one for a definite profession, but I am speaking of what is termed "A Liberal Education." It is of value at times such as this to restate the value of a liberal education and to look at University work in a broad way, which indeed, is all that one not trained as an Educationalist can do.

Function of University

Primarily, the function of the University is to bring to light for each succeeding generation the beauty and the wisdom bequeathed to us by civilizations which have gone before, for to be ignorant of what occurred before you were born, is to always be a child.

John Selden said – "The neglect of the fruitful and precious part of antiquity . . . is but preferring that king of ignorant Infancie which our short little life alone allows us, before the many ages of former experience and observation, which may so accumulate years to us, as if we had lived even from the beginning of Time."

I remember at one time thinking what a splendid arrangement it would be if men of great intellect could bequeath their minds with all their accumulated knowledge and wisdom to the nest generation, so that each succeeding generation might start off with the highest that had gone before. That is not however exactly the Divine plan. Each of us is born with his own inherited aptitudes; each of us departs this world with his accumulated knowledge, and with his wisdom or lack of wisdom, obviously because we have to continue in some future life with our personality, our soul, with all the attributes inherited and acquired, and it is not possible to bequeath our souls.

Value of Books

But we do inherit the great intellects of the past by means of Books. In Books as Ruskin tells us we may associate with "Kings and Statesmen who linger patiently in those plainly furnished and narrow anterooms – our bookcase shelves." But he says you must love these people if you are to be among them, and show your love by a true desire to be taught by them, and enter into their thoughts. Thus you may come to know from them what is true and to feel with them what is Righteous.

Education however does not consist merely of storing our minds with the knowledge contained in Books, for Fuller tells us – "Thou mayst as well expect to grow stronger by always eating, as wiser by always reading. . . 'tis thought and digestion which makes Books serviceable, and gives health and vigor to the mind."

For though a man know all the facts of History, and all the latest developments in Science, - if he cannot reason on these facts to draw their lessons for life in the present, he may have much knowledge, but he is not in possession of a Liberal Education.

Two Phases

Education has two parts or phases – The first is equipping the student with a certain minimum of factual knowledge, and familiarity with the common modes of [expression]: mathematical, lingual, musical or graphic; the other is arousing his interest and developing his faculties, and they are parts of one process.

A liberal education thus supplements knowledge with understanding, and should enable its possessor to adjust himself to changing circumstances and equip himself with special information upon any subject in which he may be interested.

University Not Indispensable

The University, of course, is not indispensable to the acquisition of a liberal education . It provides a continued exposure to formulated knowledge and organized reflection thereon. If the appetite for knowledge has been wakened and trained in the Schools, then the Public Library and intelligent companions will supply a non-technical education. But it is much more difficult to come by. The student will stumble over masses of discarded opinions and theories. He will not be aided by mature minds, who can give him the best method of approach and guide him in selecting the best, in detection of the false and in finding the best standards of value.

Some part of a Liberal Education may be acquired around the dinner table in such dining hall as we have in the Beaverbrook Building. As President Conant of Harvard says – "Educations at College is not a matter only of taking courses but rather acquiring a point of view which should continue throughout the student’s life."

But what a dreadful tragedy if the young man or young woman who has been furnished with all the aids to learning which are to be found in a University, should leave it without a genuine appetite for knowledge, without a capacity for independent thinking, without a craving to understand the opinions of other people and other times, fore these are all the marks of an educated man.

Not Measured by Utility

At the time when our chief problem in unemployment, there are those who decry a College education, and claim because it does not always enable a man to gain a good livelihood, that therefore it is not worthwhile. But the value of a liberal education must not be measured by its utility, that is, its utility in enabling a man to make a living. The chemist, Faraday, was once asked by a lady in regard to an experiment in electro-magnetism – what is the use of that experiment? Faraday replied – "Madam, what is the use of a baby?"

A liberal education is an end in itself.

John Henry Newman said – "A liberal education should bring the mind into form, just as athletic exercises develop the body. It should make itself felt in good sense, sobriety of thought, reasonableness, candor, self-command and steadiness of view. It is aimed to give cultivated intellect, and with it should go a delicate taste, a candid, equitable, dispassionate mind, a noble and courteous bearing in the conduct of life, - for these are the qualities that go with a large knowledge." Or, as said by another – "A liberal education should give us a sense of values, approved by the experience of the centuries, and a cultivated sensitiveness to the hundred small voices which sing and whisper to those who have ears to hear." It should give a student an ability to delight in intellectual and artistic pleasures, for besides earning a living, a man has to live.

James Russell Lowell said – "The object of a liberal education is not to help a man as a bread-winner, but rather to be the lifelong sweetener of all the bread he ever earns."

Practical Preparation for Life

From what I have just been saying, you might imagine that success at College rarely means success in after life. Statistics, however, show this is a complete fallacy. Brilliant scholars in College generally do succeed in after life. Dr. Hugh A. Smith of Wisconsin University looked up the records of 1800 College graduates who had been out in life 15 to 45 years. The list of those who succeeded in College corresponded with the list of those who later achieved worldly success to a remarkable degree. Out of the1800, a list of 97 was made who were considered the most worthy, successful or eminent. And it was found that 87 of these were the men who made the highest grades in College.

Imperative Need

In a country like Canada, a trained personnel for the conduct of public administration is an imperative need. We have a huge country with a comparatively sparse population. We have a great deal of governmental machinery, and complex problems involving a conflict between Federal and Provincial governments. A vast amount of new social legislation has been passed, and more is proposed. We have a large public debt. These conditions all demand a highly trained Civil Service, for upon the Civil Service rests the responsibility of carrying out the policies of the various Governments, and supplying the information upon which those policies are based.

May I also say that the Civil Service throughout Canada would be vastly improved if it were more closely modeled upon the British Civil Service, which has an outstanding record of achievement. The modern history of the English Civil Service begins in 1855 when the principle was established of making appointments open to competition for all comers. It is to be noted that the British Commissioners considered that – "Men who have been engaged up to one and two and twenty in studies which have no immediate connection with the business of any profession, and the effect of which is merely to open, to invigorate and the enrich the mind, will generally be found in the business of every profession, superior to men who have at 18 or 19 devoted themselves t the special duties of their calling."

The examinations for these higher positions call for an education which will produce candidates with the highest power of enlightened common sense.

Obviously to induce men to make a life-work of Civil Service, there must be security in their tenure of positions. It has been a great weakness in the United States System of Government. This, says a learned writer on the subject of the Civil Service, is the product of a democracy over-suspicious of its Executive. It should not exist under the British system of Government, where the Executive is drawn from the party commanding a majority of seats in the elective Assembly, and changes with the change of that majority.

For Whom Should It Be?

The liberal education to be gained in a University should be available to all those who have the intellectual equipment, and the industry to acquire it. But there should be no attempt to measure the extent of the instruction by the least advanced members of the class. Rather the instruction should be adapted to the requirements of those who are most advanced. Here, in the University if anywhere, should be given a training suitable to those who will be leaders of the people. The undergraduates who are not interested in or not fitted to take a College course should be eliminated.

In a province such as this, there should be a much larger attendance at Agricultural Colleges, while general culture for the farmer might well be provided by short courses at the University without examinations, given with the sole object of awakening a love of learning and laying the foundation of a liberal education to be carried on by the student’s own reading.

Lord Beaverbrook

The great difficulty in our country has been to make higher education available for those who have the intellectual equipment, but lack the financial means to go to College. Happy indeed is this University in the beneficence of the Right Ho. Lord Beaverbrook, who now for a number of years has provided seven Scholarships annually for selected students of ability who could not otherwise obtain a College training. Justice Richards on behalf of the Committee has just announced that the Beaverbrook Scholarships have been increased by Lord Beaverbrook from $325.00 to $400.00 per annum, with an additional $100.00 per annum to those who take up their residence in the Lady Beaverbrook Building.

With similar benefactions to our other Universities, provided either by the generosity of wealthy men, or by the State, (for the State is interested in educating its future leaders), there will be added each year to our Canadian citizenship a select group of young men and young women equipped with that liberal education of which I have spoken, which should enable them to bring to Canadian life that broad understanding and idealism which is needed in order to form public opinion and the produce great servants of the State.

Ideals of a People

I recently read a book entitled "The Science of Power," by Benjamin Kidd. He claims that Darwin’s doctrine of the survival of the fittest has been applied throughout our Western Civilization to justify warfare, and that the whole history of our civilization had been nothing but a series of wars with the object of establishing the survival of the fittest, measured in terms of force. As he points out, the greatest paradox in the history of the world is the spectacle of nations professing a religion which is the negation of force, and yet continually engaging in warfare. 30,000,000 men were engaged in the Great War. It was the climax of putting everything to the test of force.

Mr. Kidd also points out that the moving power which controls public action in any country is the ideals which are implanted in the people during their youth by their parents, their Church, the society with which they are surrounded, and in the States like Russia, Germany and Italy, by the direct action of the State. He claims that the ideals of a nation can be changed in a generation, if they are taught to youth, vivified by that appeal to the emotions which catches youthful enthusiasm and idealism.

There is in the very young an immense capacity of self-sacrifice for the sake of an ideal, which easily overcomes all thought of economic self-interest. This was amply demonstrated during the Great War. There was a universal willingness to die for ideals. Mr. Kidd claims that Germany has capitalized this truth by setting before its youth the might and majesty of the State as supreme ideal, with the result that they are willing to live and die for that ideal.

Life Blood of a University

Finally, a University should set up ideals, but it will not force them upon its students.

The true University spirit demands the free search for truth, untrammeled by any social or political philosophy imposed by authority.

The youth of many countries today are being exploited by the inculcation of false ideals deliberately taught at the dictation of the governing power of the State. As the London Times says – "The fatal beginning is made when the people first pay heed to an orator who preaches that freedom is in servitude, that personality grows by being submerged, that henceforth he himself will do their thinking for them."

We in this country believe in freedom both within and without the University walls.

A liberal education is above all things valuable because it prepares the citizen for freedom, "freedom from narrow and self-seeking selfishness, freedom from meanness and hypocrisy, freedom from malice and antagonism whether personal, group or national, freedom from willingness to exploit or impose upon one’s fellowmen."

I close with a stanza from Canon Scott’s recent poem entitled "Youth"

"The hosts of youth are marching in the day-spring of their life,
They are mounting up the highway and they face the distant goal;
They crave not praise nor pity as they gird them for the strife,
But their cry goes up for ever, "Give us freedom of the soul."