Alumni Oration

"The Alumni Oration" University Monthly 21, 8 (May 1902): 212-213. (UA Case 67a, Box 1)

The address of His Lordship the Bishop of Nova Scotia, the Alumni Association orator at the encoenia at the U.N.B. on Thursday, was an eloquent effort, full of ripe thought, pregnant with ennobling ideals, delivered with earnestness and in His Lordship's rarely interesting manner. Bishop Courtney first referred to the combines in commerce and industrial enterprises effected through the genius of J. P. Morgan. He saw no cause for alarm in such combinations of capital, as much more can be effected in the way of cheapening products for the masses through concentrated effort than can be done by individual effort. An aggregation of individuals in association can achieve what is impossible of accomplishment by isolated individuals. The Alumni Association of this University is a combination of individuals striving after the accomplishment of certain objects, the attainment of which would not be possible to the individual members of the Association. Two things are necessary in such an association:—

Each individual shall be willing to set aside his idiosyncracies and to associate with the whole body for the common good.

It seemed to him that this world is constituted for the purpose of exciting inquisitiveness. Madam How and Lady Why constantly ask questions. The attainment of knowledge is exceedingly slow. How long a period had elapsed since history began and yet how little is known.

One thing we are just beginning to clearly know and as yet only partially understand is that there is a perfect unity in all knowledge He would urge upon the class which had today graduated from the University the importance of cultivating the ability of observation. As they would proceed from step to step in knowledge this ability of observation would be developed and trained. There are other faculties to be cultivated and trained if one would be a true student. There is the ability of investigation; the ability of acquisition and it is true that the further one delves in knowledge the easier does the ability and power of acquisition become; the ability of classification; and the ability of patience. A student must be a patient man. The fact of a man's being slow to arrive at a conclusion is evidence that he had weighed the facts and evidence and his conclusions are more likely to be accurate and abiding ones. Then there is the ability to think, to concentrate thought, to classify, in a word think. People nowadays do not think enough. They allow others to do their thinking for them. The speaker referred to the value of experiment and said that the student who delved and experimented was the one who would accomplish something of worth in the world. He urged upon his hearers the value of honesty in thought and endeavor, and pressed upon the graduates the importance of being honest in their thoughts and accurate and fearless in their achievement of knowledge and in the expression of what they know, whatever might be the results to preconceived notions of truth. The true student is humble, reverent, not unmindful of or disrespectful to the things about us or to the God above us. The recognition of the unity of all knowledge will keep one humble.

His Lordship touched upon the necessity there is at the present day for honesty of thought and endeavor in the domain of practical politics; and he urged it as a fitting life work for some of the trained minds before him to enter politics and to assist in working out the problems which make for the true development of this Dominion of Canada of ours. He pressed upon the students the importance of being workers in the world and urged them to strive for the higher life and not to be content to see how little they could get along with in life, nor yet to devote their energies and talents to trying how much money they could make in the world. All should be loyal to their Alma Mater and all graduates of the University should become members of the Alumni Association.