Graduation Address

"Self-Discipline, Service, Faith and Effort are Emphasized" Daily Gleaner (12 May 1932): 4-5. (UA Case 67, Box 1)

It is with feelings of pleasure, not unmingled with sentiments of surprise, at my temerity, my young friends, that I find myself here facing you to-day, for I have never flattered myself with the thought that addressing students, much less graduates; was a role in which I was destined to shine. I have a liking for humble spheres, and for more common folk; and I recall too, the fact that the student mind, especially the recent graduate mind is likely to be reflected in. The frank, if somewhat sweeping declaration of that young Oxford don who on receiving his parchment at the close of his course, modestly announced that what he did not know was not knowledge!

I recall, too, from a four years experience as a school-master, that the schoolboy, and I think I may add also the schoolgirl mind, is invariably and somewhat nonchalantly proud of its achievements and possessions: which seems to have been the experience of Professor Phelps of Yale also who announces dryly in a recent Scribner’s that of course every school boy knows much more that he will know thirty years later!

You will not of course, young ladies and gentlemen, take it for granted that I am placing you on the level or in the category of the schoolboy, and schoolgirl, but you will pardon me if, perhaps, looking back through what to you must be the very long vista of thirty-seven years—the period since I left the University—I see you a little more closely related, in perspective, to schooldays, than possibly you see yourselves.

And therefore it is that I find myself marveling at my rash temerity in appearing before you in the person of teach or lecturer vainly hoping to tell you something you do not know, or impart unto you some lesson r stray truth you may not yet have apprehended. I am comforted by the thought and I am sure you will be—that the headmaster of your school, the President, I think he is now called, in asking me to come here and speak to you to-day, intimated that my address was to be short, showing, I take it, that he understood not only some of the common weaknesses of parsons, but also some of the well-known predilections of students, whose gay young minds may be much more occupied on a day like this, in looking forward to the prospective hilarity of the coming evening, than with the humdrum solemnities of this afternoon. I pledge you I shall not forget either, the wise word as to brevity, nor ignore the strong wish that is in your hearts to be through with this formality that you may plunge into the more appealing realities which the canonical tradition of the University require shall follow.

The "Gay Nineties"

I have said it is thirty-seven years since I left the University. Dr. Hoben, who was to have spoken as Alumni Orator, and I were members of the Class of ’95, the middle of the so-called "gay nineties." We entered in 1891 with eleven, and finished four years later with nine. From these figures alone, you will see, young ladies and gentlemen that there have been changes and that there has been growth. I recall very well that a maximum meeting of all the students in our time showed an attendance of fifty-six, which reminds me that Barrie, addressing students said: "Don’t forget to speak scornfully of the Victorian Age," and the Victorian Age had six years to run when we were graduated. "There will be time for meekness when you try to better it," Barrie adds.

In coming back I cannot help feeling that there must be a mistake somewhere about the time—I mean about the thirty-seven years! Surely some one has been playing the part of Julius Caesar—surreptitiously— and reforming the Calendar! At any rate, though it may seem a long time to you who look forward, to us who look back, it appears as though by some sinister and subtle legerdemain thirty-seven years had been annihilated. For surely all that time has never passed: it has dropped out en bloc.

The Norse Legend

And in this connection ,and as quite apropos, there comes to mind that old and beautiful legend of the monk who had come from the Northland of England, and had wandered into the field when a lark began to sing. He had never heard a lark before, and he stood there entranced, to listen, and to wonder—on and on and on, until the bird and its song had become part of the heavens.

Then he went back to the monastery to find there a gate-keeper whom he did not know, and who did not know him. Other monks came, but they were stranger to him as he was to them. He them he was Father Anselm, but that was no help. They said they had never heard of him, and they looked wisely from one to another in the belief that some mental malady had taken a wandering brother friar. Finally they decided to look through the books of the monastery, and there it was revealed that there had been a Father Anselm there some hundred or more years before. A century had been blotted out while he had listened to the lark.

And so, young ladies and gentlemen, though you will chivalrously refrain, I am sure, from telling it in Gath or publishing it in the streets of Askelon—so it is with myself and with some others here to-day, who have listened even longer to the lark, you will understand we have not lived all these years, and are therefore that much older than we were: something has happened to the calendar, and the place here, and the gate-keepers, and the dwellers in the halls, and in the halls themselves: it is in these, we feel, that the changes have come, not in us. But at any rate we are back as the monk at the familiar gate, and though you know us not, we are written in the books, we are your spiritual kith and kin, and as we face you across the chasm of the years to you so wide, but to us so narrow, we feel that we are not only of a common family, but of a common age even as we are the heirs to a common inheritance and the children of a common and kindly college mother.

Not a Remote Ancestor

It is with this view uppermost, and not as a sort of remote ancestor, that I wish to address to you a few words this afternoon, as graduates, off now, in a new sense, to the great adventure of life. I say, in a new sense advisedly, for you will greatly err if you look upon this day, and occasion, as in any very large or real sense interrupting the flow or marking any great change in your life. Wordsworth, you will recall, has some sane and deep words about our birth being "but a sleep and a forgetting," and about our coming out of the unseen not wholly unclothes, and "Trailing clouds of glory," in which I take it, he is emphasizing that larger unity that wider sweep which life always takes for the philosophically minded. And so you do not being to-day so much as continue: and I hope you will continue—that you will not fall into the error of supposing that your education is a fait accompli or come to look upon your university course not so much as a preparation for life, as is so often asserted—for it is much too late to begin life after leaving one’s alma mater—but rather as supplying, in some degree at least, inspiration and impulse for a life already begun with its roots deeply embedded in eternal principles, its leaves already showing, and its fruit buds set and ready for the unfolding. In your diaries to-night, therefore—and I hope you will all keep diaries no matter how humdrum existence may be for you—I suggest that you inscribe, as representing a quite proper estimate of this day, and its true significance, that phrase found so often in the immoral log of Christopher Columbus: "To-day we sailed on," for that, in a very real sense, is what you are doing, and what you are going to do—sail on.

Not Starting De Novo

You are not starting de novo from to-day, for this would be impossible philosophically as well as practically. You are part of all that you have ever met. You cannot divest yourselves of your inheritance, and it is here, at this point, that I would by invoking your own experience, and claim as your assent to the proposition I have laid down touching the continuity of life, that I would wish to emphasize with you the necessity not so much for initiating and creating as for enlarging and developing that with which life, by educating and otherwise, has already endowed you.

Self-Discipline

In descending to a few particulars at this point, and with a view to giving constant and enrichment to the life you have already entered upon, I would commend you to look first in the direction and toward the goal of self-discipline.

Of course you have had some of this; you know what it means. That is why I call your attention to it. It is not something outside the range of your experience, and this as our old friend Carlyle—so sadly antiquated and obsolete in college circles to-day, I believe, would say, "Is not without significance."

Yes, I take it in a general way—for you have been to school and to the University for four years—that through the media of examinations attendance upon lectures, observance of rules, etc. you have come to know that there is such a thing as self-discipline; and you have probably been told that work is a means to an end—to that end.

As a sort of interesting parenthesis it may be noted at this point and in this connection, that the word school is a Greek word, the original connotation of which is "spare time," "leisure,"—a philosophical discovery which most schoolboys, and probably all college students make, whether they know Greek or not.

Its Necessity

However, in spite of this and other discoveries and devices, there has been brought home to you, I am sure, in a broad way at least, the idea of and the necessity for self-discipline. College is no place to let one’s self go. The avenger is ever on one’s track if one does. No matter how gay the feast, above the head of every diner, there hangs the sword of Damocles—and the thread is of the frailest texture possible. It is a fit foretaste of what is to come; and by tribulation we enter our kingdoms, the miniature democracy that here lies around us, the demand for team play, rather than mere grandstand play, the idea of each for all, and all for each; that what is good for the hive is good for the bee, and what is good for the bee is good for the hive—all this, you have had here exemplified and illustrated, and in the language of Columbus as you "sail on," or after the more leisurely attitude of the monk of the legend you listen enchanted to the lark, I hope you will develop and enlarge this part of the inheritance into which you have entered and of which you have formed an important and an integral part.

I am sure you will give attention to self-discipline and in the threefold sphere of body, mind and spirit. St. Paul said wisely, I am sure you will agree: "I keep under my body and bring it into subjection." Plato, touching the mind, intimates in one of his letters, that "a man should say little, and write little, but go on learning to the end," while it is written in another authority, that I am sure non of you will dispute that "He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city."

In a world intoxicated with a mania for self-determination, for going one’s own sweet and willful way, there is a wide area and there is an increasingly loud call for self-discipline and self-control. I am sure you can be counted on not to come short in this sphere. You will look inward.

And Secondly, Service

And following upon this, as a sort of sequel and corollary to it, there is service, which means looking outward. You will of course keep this in mind, and make this prominent. Indeed in this most challenging day of all time—and it probably is that—I am sure you will understand that inasmuch as much has been given to you, much will be required of you. I probably do not need to remind you that as University men and women you will be looked upon as a specially privileged class, and you will doubtless be considered as owing high service and large duties to the community that has made your education possible. In a manner much bolder than in the past your fellows will demand of you a raison d’etre, and require a quid pro quo. I hope you are deeply conscious of this, and that you go out knowing that the master figure in the world to-day is not the leader but the servant. If you have not already done so, you must work this into the warp and woof, into the bone and fibre of your life. In you, the community will expect to reap dividends on the investment made—on the building erected, on the grants given, on the facilities provided for your convenience and edification. We want no soviet revolution on the ground of a useless, ornamental and highly expensive aristocracy of learning.

To prevent this, to make sure that this shall not happen, you must come from the mountain and stand in the plain. You must not attempt to stand "silent upon a peak in Darien." You must be dispensers of bounty. You must forget, to a degree, so far at least as any semblance of superiority goes, that you have been with Keats,
"Travelling in the realms of gold, and many goodly states and kingdoms see." Patrician through you may be at heart, you must not forget the needs and the demands of the plebian multitude. You must remember "noblesse oblige;" and forgetting that as college men and women you belong to a social and intellectual preserve, you must set yourselves to the great task of serving, in which way you will be able to capitalize both for your own happiness and society’s good, that internal equipment of self-discipline to which reference has already been made.

Being Heroically Good

And in this sphere, and in this connection, a still further word, in this rendering of your service, see that it be not merely perfunctory and ordinary service; let it be unusual, extraordinary, heroic service, for nothing to-day that falls below the level of the heroic seems to count or be worth while, so that what we want, therefore, is not only service, but heroic services. In this connections, and speaking of the sphere of morals, and of goodness, Coventry Patmore—I wonder if Coventry Patmore is ever mention in colleges now—says that "in order to be good, we must be heroically good."

I think you will know why I invoke this connection with my general thesis about service, I have had small time for general reading in recent years, but I have gathered that in practically all late works of fiction there are no heroes and no heroines, and on the simple ground that there are no heroes and no heroines in life; and so it is said that inasmuch as literature is to reflect and picture life—"hold the mirror up to life"—as per William Dean Howells—the heroes and heroines must be eliminated!

And so we have a sort of bald level to-day in the world of fiction, a drab and dreary communism in a world once so varied, and individualized and appealing. Surely, if this be true, we have suffered great loss. And surely you will take it as one of your chief tasks to change all that—to rescue life from drabness and put back into it some of the old and glowing semblance of color it had in the days of Dickens, Thackeray, George Elliot, Richardson, and of course most glowing and gorgeous of all novelists, Shakespeare.

But if you are going to do that for life, and consequently, also, for literature—for life is the foundation on which literature must ever rest, or rather is it the material with which literature must work—then you must in the sphere of service, recall and apply there what Coventry Patmore said about being good; and you must not only serve in a drab and conventional, and common way—you must serve heroically; and you must not only rescue life from dullness and mediocrity; you must vindicate the aristocracy of culture, as the aristocracy of England have vindicated their name and families by a list of war casualties among themselves recently unveiled and dedicated in the House of Lords. It has surprised the nation and astonished the world.

William Blake Quoted

Or, if you would prefer to have the same point made, and the same thought emphasized touching the necessity not only for serving, but for serving heroically, you will find it in William Blake, who, working in youth and giving expression, I believe to the sentiments in every one of your hearts to-day, says challengingly—and you may substitute Canada, or New Brunswick where he has written England:

"Bring me my bow or burnished gold!
Bring me my arrow of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green and pleasant land."

I believe, young ladies and gentlemen, that that is the note, and that is the attitude that appeals to you and I am encouraged thereby to hope that as you "sail on," or as you "listen to the lark" between now and your coming again to the University as Dr. Hoben and I come to-day, that you will not forget to look inward and think about self-discipline, outward and consider Service.

A Word About Faith

And here now, though I am sure my time is more than up, I must in closing add a word about looking in another direction another thing of importance, namely, about Faith. You have great reason to go out in faith—in the belief, and with the strong conviction that you may do, and be something worth while.

I am encouraged to think of this for one reason because most of you belong to this Province of New Brunswick and all of you are now of this University. To a pre-eminent degree among the Provinces of the Dominion, this is the Province, and this is the University of the Loyalists, a factor which I think quite naturally links itself to the subject of faith, for if there was any movement in the world that rested more largely on inner conviction, and faith than the Loyalist movement being so properly emphasized by His Honor Lieutenant Governor MacLean, recently in Britain, as well as here at home—if there was ever in history any movement more largely of faith than this, I have failed to discover or to hear of it.

And then, again, there is what has happened since. There is the illustrious record not only of the pioneer Loyalists—and of those others who preceded or followed them and imbibed their spirit, and exemplified their virtues and their faith—there are the deeds, and there is the inspiration that should come from the achievements of the sons and daughters of those men, who, coming from different lands, and at different times, have made such large and shining contributions to the life of the Dominion, to the welfare of the Empire, and indeed, to the civilization of the world.

This Province

It was on the Pacific coast and in the city of Victoria a little over a year ago at a gathering in which I was given the place of honor owing to the position I held at that time, that the Governor of the Province, in extending a welcome on behalf of himself and the citizens generally brought home to me the fact that as a Province, and from the standpoint of the production of men who had made their mark and rendered outstanding service, we were in a place of unique and commanding importance. In the course of his gracious and kindly speech the Governor, after intimating to the large gathering present that I had been born in New Brunswick, went on to say that he understood that in three adjacent counties, lying along the eastern shore of the Province there had been born and had grown up, three men who had become not only Empire, but world figures, namely Premier Bennett, Lord Beaverbrook and Bonar Law.

His Honor, after commenting on this as a fact which he was sure could not be duplicated anywhere in Canada or indeed in the Empire, and mentioning also the names of Sir George Foster and several others, added facetiously that he had come to the conclusion that he well-known passage in Shakespeare about greatness should be revised to read: "Some men are born great; some achieve greatness—and some are born in New Brunswick."

A Noble Roll

On my way home, and indeed almost ever since, I have been adding to that list; and as I add the wonder grows that none of our former graduates has written a book—and I suggest it to some of you now before me as a worthy task—on Notable New Brunswickers, for you will recall that in addition to those mentioned above we have as ornaments in the world of politics and statesmanship, Sir Leonard Tilley, one of the outstanding Fathers of Confederation, and who is credited with supplying the name for the Dominion; we have in education and imperialism Sir George R. Parkin; we have in law the Right Hon. Francis Anglin, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada; in poetry we have our rare and incomparable Bliss Carman, to whom of course we must erect a statue; in general literature, and covering a wide range of history, fiction and poetry, we have also our own Charlie Roberts, who was the first poet in all the Dominion to sound the note of nationalism; in the sphere of the theatre we have Margaret Anglin, unquestionably one of the great stage artists of America, and finally, and in yet another sphere, as a builder of one of the continent’s great financial institutions, and as a figure who became internationally known in the world of banking, our native born boy and good friend and benefactor of the University, Charlie Neill. And even this comes far short of exhausting the list!

So you will see, young ladies and gentlemen, that you may go out in faith, not only because it was in faith that the Province was founded, and the University established, but because, all around you you see what heights have been reached, what service has been rendered, what fame has been won by those mentioned, and by many others who might be mentioned if time permitted; and what has been done once may doubtless be done again. In that, is the call to Faith. "Produce great men," says Carlyle; "all else will follow."

I am sure you will not forget, then, about the necessity for effort—for faith in your country and province, and in yourselves—and Emerson says, you know, "Trust thyself: all great men have done so;"—and faith also in the more truly Christian sense of which there is such supreme need to-day lest life assume a too purely Greek aspect, and we be robbed of that part of our inheritance suggested by the word to the effect that man doth not live by breed alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

This will give you the upward look, even as by calling your attention in the beginning to self-discipline it was my wish to direct your thoughts inward upon yourselves, and secondly in referring to Service, to cause you to look outward upon the life that lies around you. If you keep this threefold aspect of life before you, namely the necessity for the inward, the outward and the upward look, thus implying a consideration of Self, Society and God, I am sure, no matter what your sphere, or task, or duty, you will not fail or come short of realizing the higher hopes of your friends and well-wishers who see you as I have already said, off to-day in a new sense, to the great adventure of life.

A Final Word

And two words more, one from St. Paul, the other from Bliss Carman. I have said a word of caution about the danger of slipping into the Greek manner of life, of Hellenizing, perhaps even paganizing life.

It would be so unfortunate I think, to a higher degree, if you went out without some Christian word wrought into the fibre of your lives—and so I give you this word from St. Paul, which you will find near the close of the Epistle to the Philippians:

"Finally, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things."

And this word from Bliss Carman, about you and the University. You will not forget your old school, and will come back—as he said he would come back—and I wonder if these words might not do for the monument we are to erect to the sweetest and greatest of all our Canadian singers—to his mother. The little poem is of three short verses, and is found in "Pipes of Pan." It is entitled:

AFTER SCHOOL
When all my lessons have been learned,
And the last year at school is done,
I shall put up my books and games:
"Good-by, my fellows, every one!"

The dusty road will not seem long,
Nor twilight lonely; nor forlorn
The everlasting whippoorwills
That lead me back where I was born.

And there beside the open door,
In the large country dim and cool,
Her waiting smile shall hear at last—
"Mother I am come home from school."

I have asked you, my young friends to look inward, and consider Self-Discipline; to look outward upon society and to recognize your duty thereto; to lift your eyes to the hills from whence cometh your help; and here now, and finally, as a fourth quarter toward which your gaze may profitably be directed, I trust that, as with Columbus you daily "sail on," or with the monk of the legend you listen entranced to the singing lark, you will look backward to the University; you will remember your alma mater, and some day, in the spirit and in language of Bliss Carman you will come back saying: "Mother I am come home from School."

I thank you for your patience, and for having heard me at so much greater length than I had intended at the beginning.