Alumni Oration

"Address Under the auspices of the Associated Alumni Society of the University of New Brunswick, June 2nd, 1892, by Wesley Mills, M.A., M.D., Professor of Physiology, in McGill University" (2 June 1892). (UA Case 67a, Box 1)

The invitation from the Alumni association of the university of New Brunswick to deliver an address on this auspicious occasion came to me as a pleasant surprise. I feel it equally an honor and a pleasure to be here today. It is surely an honor for any man to be privileged to utter his convictions on human affairs before those with the learning, the culture and the higher aims that characterize a progressive university.

It is to me a special pleasure to be with you, because the university of New Brunswick has furnished so many graduates that have proved themselves worthy of their Alma Mater, to the Faculty of Medicine of McGill University, to which I have the honor to belong; not to mention those bonds that unite those engaged in the noble work of education everywhere. I feel that the man who assumes the role of addressing a body of young men with life before them in its higher possibilities, as it is with those to whom I speak today, takes upon himself a great responsibility. Young men, moreover, are keen critics. What faults, weaknesses or foibles can escape them? But they are also forbearing and generous. They are ready to overlook a great deal in him who is earnest, honest and sensible, if not brilliant, especially if he does not weary them with a tedious recital of an oft-told tale.

Gentlemen, I will try and avoid the latter, and I shall give utterance to nothing today that does not constitute a part of those convictions which have entered into the very framework of my thought. While sufficiently far removed from the period of undergraduate life to look upon it with corrected vision and estimate its bearings with tempered feelings, I am not so distant from that period as not to be able, I hope, to put myself in your place and look upon the world and life in some such fashion as the young man has done, does and ever will continue to do. How many times have I admired that inimitable description by our great dramatist of the ages of man. No one can hope to rival that in prose or verse; but it has occurred to me that I may choose a somewhat new and little trodden path today suggested by Shakespeare’s description. We all recognize in some hazy way the relation of mind and body. Only the rankest materialism now-a-days confounds mind and matter, but I venture myself to think that the close dependence of mind and body in the light of modern science has never been adequately recognized. The essence of either mind or matter we can, of course, never hope to know, and it is not worth an earnest man’s while to trouble further with such unprofitable problems. We may well repeat:

"What is mind? No matter.
What is matter? Never mind."

I propose then to address today more particularly the young men and young women constituting the undergraduates and the present graduating class on the subject of the College Epoch in a practical way from the point of view more especially of the biologist and psychologist. In other words, I shall endeavor to give to my views of life a sort of scientific basis, and if they seem to savor somewhat too strongly of biological doctrines you must deal gently with me, as we all have our prejudices, and quietly make the necessary corrections for yourselves.

In the first place it cannot be too clearly realized, I think that we only know the minds of others through the body—through some physical manifestation. Mr. Blank may be the perfection of intellect and moral worth, yet we can only learn this through some look or word or deed, and so far as his fellows are concerned he can only influence them directly through his physical being. But there is another truth that I wish more especially to emphasize today, viz: that the mind and the body unfold or develop together and that for all practical purposes this associated development is of the utmost moment and, as I think, has never yet been adequately recognized, for if it had our views of mental and moral development would have been greatly different and much misdirected energy would have been saved. But it would be scarcely fair toward the close of a session of hard work to invite your attention to an abstract discussion. Allow me rather to draw some parallels and deduce some practical conclusions based on the general doctrine that I have ventured to set before you.

The changes that take place in the physical constitution of a human being before he is twenty-one years of age are altogether more pronounced than at any later period; and we find a corresponding difference in the non-physical part of the man—his psychic nature, using that term to include the mental and moral. Suppose we now inquire whether there is any real scientific basis for the belief that the period of an individual’s life between say sixteen and twenty-one is the most important to himself and ultimately to the world. It is generally recognized that during these years the boy passes into the man, though not all that this implies. These years mark and epoch of great physical growth. As a matter of fact it is not the period of absolutely greatest growth, though this is more pronounced than at any later age. It is a period of extraordinary physical vigor, and is marked by a surplus of energy. But above all it is a period of development, characterized indeed by great external change in the form and proportion of parts.

But of still more consequence are the tissue changes. The brain usually increases considerably in size, yet not so rapidly as in some former periods. The greatest change seems to be in the hidden molecular life of the cells of this great organ on which all its higher manifestations depend. Two watches may in size and external appearance exactly resemble each other, yet be of very different value as time-pieces. The head-pieces of the graduates going out today, if they have undergone a healthy development during their college career, should be machines of a very different sort from those they were some four years ago. If we could but get a glimpse of their complex machinery as it was and as it is we should doubtless perceive wonderful rearrangements of the molecular movement of the brain cells. For real efficiency in the world the graduate should be and notwithstanding all the defects of our methods of development, generally is an organism capable of vastly more than he was as a freshman, whether we regard the quantity or the quality of the work, and especially the latter, which is, of course, of most importance; for the value of work, like that of other things, depends, as you know, very much on demand and supply, and of some kinds the supply is always short of the demand. At the present time in Canada there seems to be a remarkable shortage in this respect in the realm political.

It seems to be very hard to get the politician head-piece to work right; and one never knows the time of day by the indications of the political time-piece. The arithmetic of the politician and that of other people seems to be in strange disagreement. You will perceive now, and throughout my address, that one conclusion is inevitable, if my premises are sound, viz: that harmonious and full physical development is not only of great but of absolutely vital moment, if the young man is to make the most of himself in the world, and as this is to be accomplished or the opportunity for ever lost during the college epoch, we should bring our educational methods to this test. Are we as wise in this respect in our age as he Greeks, who laid the greatest stress on this harmonious development of body and mind? Why should physical development be left to haphazard at that period of a youth’s life when his whole organism is most plastic, and most susceptible of improvement or injury? Nor should the development of the student’s body be entirely according to his own direction any more than the development of his mind. We prescribe courses of study, we lay great stress on discipline as determined by methods. Why then do we not in like manner in all our institutions for education, and especially at college, look to bodily discipline to produce that vigour and development on which higher ends must, as science seems to teach, greatly depend.

To be clear in our discussion, let us inquire what is the object of a college career, or more broadly, what is the object of life? To such inquiries many answers, all containing more or less of the truth might be given. I suggest as one that will bear the test of scientific examination the following: The object of life is perfect development. The development of the individual man can only be perfect when his relation to his fellows and to the whole universe are considered, and this at once gives us a touchstone to which to apply all educational methods, indeed all methods in every department of human interest. We are now in a position to consider details—to return to that college epoch on which so much of future happiness and success necessarily depend. The period of early youth is characterized by a keenness of the senses usually not equaled in later life; we might almost say a preponderance of the senses. The receptivity of the organisms is boundless. Impressions stream in through every avenue by which the inner consciousness can be reached. If this condition of sense activity is not maximal during the college epoch it is productive of greater results than every before. For a perfect sensation, let me remind you, we must have on the physical side a sensory organ, a sensory nerve and a collection of cells in the brain (a centre). It is upon the latter the perfection of a sensation most depends, and when we take into account that any one centre in the brain is in relation with innumerable others, it will at once by clear that we have datx on which to found certain conclusions as to educational methods.

But time will not permit us to tarry long on these. One of the most important and obvious inferences is, what any attempt to get knowledge which can legitimately come through the senses in any other way must lead to failure, and worse, because of the injury it does to our nature. All our real knowledge of the external world must come through the senses. Hence the idea that acquaintance with any branch of natural science of physics can be acquired through books alone is radically opposed to the structure of our whole organization, and as a large part of literature, even in the most restricted sense of that term, deals with descriptions not alone of men’s motives but of his actions and of external nature, even the pure litterateur cannot afford to ignore this conclusion. Shelley’s Skylark is no poetry to the man blind and deaf from birth.

A way to knowledge by books alone may sometimes seem to the student a short cut—and in this bustling age how great are the temptations to take short cuts—but in the end the man who acts on this believe suffers worse than disappointment; while he who has the patience to commence with nature learns a thousand things that no book that was ever penned can tell him, and acquires them in ways that are pleasant and give strength, because in harmony with the laws of his organization.

Another result that follows from this keen activity of the senses during the college epoch is that, largely in consequence of this, but partly from that vigour and growth of the cells of the organization, there is a purely physical basis for enjoyment there never can be at any later stage. So that to shut off the student from the world, and to try to make a book worm or recluse of him, is to attempt to put his organization into swaddling clothes, and it is not surprising that young men so treated never have any very great influence on the real world about them. Young people, whether at college or not, are entitled to those enjoyments of which the possession of youthful vigor and keen senses render them peculiarly susceptible. And here let me point to what I believe to be a very important law to be observed in development, viz., that the peculiarities of the organization at any one period must be met or the omission can never be entirely remedied at a later period. An individual can do but little to develop his physical man after fifty. The pleasures of reflection are, or should be, more to him than the pleasures of sensation; but not so at eighteen. To put the matter otherwise, I mean to say that if a man has up to fifty developed himself according to the laws that apply to all the prior periods, he will go on to develop in all alter periods in a more healthy and complete manner, and that, with a sound constitution to begin with, and suffering no undue strain, he may reach an old age that will be fraught with usefulness and happiness in a degree which cannot be the case with those who have neglected this law.

How many, for example, have transferred the methods of development suitable for one of fifty to the period of the twenties? The man who fails to enjoy what is peculiar to the twenties will not be fully prepared for the duties of the fifties, because, among other reasons, he will not comprehend life. Much of success depends on the capacity to understand human beings of all ages and of many environments. A young man cannot be too earnest; but he may be too serious, too industrious, too much of a recluse; It will now be plain that if the work imposed on any young person at school or college is such as to interfere with that free and full development of the body at its most important period of growth, inasmuch as mind and body are so closely related, a serious injury has been done the whole man. We know nothing of good minds apart from good brains, and the latter work but indifferently if the related parts of the organization—if the whole organization in fact—is not in vigorous and harmonious development. We live in an eager age, an age of competition—one might say, considering the results—of fearful competition—and our college courses reflect the spirit of the age.

Yearly the burdens imposed on the student are heavier, while the methods of teaching him to carry them are not, I fear, correspondingly improved. I wish, in the name of sound healthy development, to protest once again, as I have often done before, against the driving method of the age being applied to education of any kind, and above all to higher education. Let us not crush out from the life of youth either the capacity to enjoy as only a well-balanced organism with a surplus of vigour can, or reduce the opportunities for such enjoyment to a minimum; for, as I have said, to enjoy rationally is in itself to be educated. The unhealthy pressure referred to is to be set down to the spirit of the age. The authorities and professors of a college cannot always regulate its affairs as they would—and your professors do not build as wisely as they know, simply because they cannot. Neither this nor any other university is free from the influence of public opinion, which is always below the highest ideals. But you, ladies and gentlemen undergraduates, can and must, if you would develop in the best way, take the matter in part into your own hands. You must correct and supplement methods which an unwise public opinion prevents being the best.

Enter not too keenly into competition for the sake of place and honor. With a keen relish for real knowledge work earnestly, and by the most enlightened ways, to secure knowledge, but always place this as your aim and not the worldly advancement this knowledge or power may bring. Do not, like a miser, make even this good in itself your only object in life. Your aim should be development, which implies much more than I have time even to sketch. It implies being a man and a gentleman; and this result cannot be achieved by a headlong race for anything, be it wealth, power, fame or knowledge. The college epoch is marked not only by great growth and development, but by a plasticity unequalled at any later period. The young man is more influenced by his surroundings, by men and things than he will ever be again, a fact full of meaning and anxiety. The change from the quiet of home, from the lesser world of school, to the greater world of college, is very great. Life comes to him now as a flood tide; and happy is he who is borne along to higher things and not swamped or cast aside on shoals and rocks. But the last one to recognize this in any clear way is the student himself. With that confidence begotten of the inexperience and vigor of youth, he holds himself equal to anything that can arise; and perhaps he may be, and then again possibly he may not.

The father, and especially the solicitous mother, haunted with vague misgivings, would fain have some friends in the university town to share a little of her anxious care. I have noticed that young men are slow to perceive the importance of one thing of which they have heard so much, viz., the formation of good habits, perhaps because they have heard so much on that subject with little basis in either sense or science. Yet what mature and thoughtful man but will admit that much of the success of life depends on early habits. What is life in the main but the expression of our habits? As we habitually think so do we act. Allow me, young gentlemen, in a few words to give you a scientific basis on which to ground some conclusions bearing on this weighty matter. Physiologists recognize what they term reflexes. A reflex act is, as you know, one that results from a nervous impulse emanating from one or more cells of the central nervous system, not independently, but in consequence of some other impulse or stimulus reaching it from without. The former is dependent on the latter. Now it is a law of all brain cells—indeed, of all cells—that the oftener they function or discharge in a certain way the more do they tend to repeat this. So far as a physical basis is concerned this is the explanation of the law of habit. Now it seems perfectly clear that we cannot escape habits, and not only so, but if we could, we would be greatly the losers, for habits are the greatest possibly economizers of energy.

Between our habits and our physical reflexes there is not always a sharp line of distinction. When a man treads the path of rectitude with the same ease as he does the street leading to his own home, it is well for him and the world. Those unfortunates that must have the ten commandments always dinned into their ears and be reminded of something not very pleasant to come if the disobey, are not usually recognized as the most valued class of citizens. But you will perceive that we should extend the popular notion of good habits not only to the observance of the decalogue, but to all that pertains to the entire being of man—his physical, mental and moral life. I little doubt that many of your professors would greatly like to have directed your habits of study at a time long prior to your entrance upon college life. In truth the subject now under consideration might form the topic of a series of addresses instead of a small part of one. However I hope the young men before me will perceive that we have the very best basis for a belief that habits are inevitable, and so of unlimited importance. If you could only change some people’s habits you could speedily mould them to your wishes; but after a certain age the hope of that is about as ill-founded as gathering grapes from thorns or figs of thistles. On the other hand, the young man’s habits are in course of formation and determined by two factors, chiefly heredity, to which I shall presently refer, and environment, which cannot be well considered apart from the former.

My special studies and my thinkings on the problems of life have gradually led me to certain conclusions on the subject of heredity and its relations to environment which seem of so much consequence and are so little realized that I feel that I have nothing of more importance to lay before the young men whom I have the honor of addressing, than some views on this subject. A child comes into the world freighted with the results of all preceding ages. The ages of the vast past are expressed in its organism. It is like a great machine, capable of the most wonderful performance, able not only to influence the world of today but also that world which will be when it has left the scene. The parts of the machine tend to arrange themselves and to run in a certain way. This has been predetermined by other machines and these again by others ad infinitum. We must remember than any living organism may be compared to a machine that will only run in consequence of external interference. The mechanism must be started and kept going by something external to itself, yet to all appearance it runs entirely because of its own inherent power. But, strictly speaking, life is the result of the reaction between certain internal (molecular) and certain external conditions. The former are predetermined by that long chain of events that lie at the root of the development of life on this planet.

Anyone of us is today the expression of countless reactions between the life-stuff that has made up our ancestors in the widest sense of the term, and that ever-varying environment, including not only food, climate and soil, etc., but all those influences which reach from other sources, including our fellow creatures. If you are a believer in the evolution of man from lower forms you simply extend the meaning of the term ancestors; if not, you confine it to our human ancestors who will be deemed more or less remote, according to your views of the length of time man has existed on this planet. But in any case each one of us extends back into the ages, and in like manner we must, in amore or less direct way, extend forward into the as yet unfolded world of human things that is to be.

To illustrate my meaning by an example: An individual A is known as a middle-aged gentleman of pronounced literary tastes and ability. Enquiry into his ancestral history shows that his ancestors for generations were scholars. When at school and college this man did not turn to science or philosophy, but to classics.

When at school, and still more when at college, he every now and then astonished his friends by sudden outbursts of passion on slight provocation, or he might relinquish his ordinary pursuits and become careless as to his dress and external appearance generally. Though he does not drink intoxicating liquors to excess, some of his ancestors did, and that accounts for these periodic weaknesses in his own nervous system, which explain his temporary aberrations. Mr. A., married a woman of the soundest physique, belonging also to a family of scholars. She has a son that masters the classics with a still greater ease than his father. He is at times slightly irritable. It is but a momentary affair, and so far no one has ever been able to say more of him than he is one of the finest of fellows, with a tendency known to his intimate friends to brief periods of despondency, and under provocation to be a little hot-tempered. On the occasions of a great excitement the scholar A was noticed to behave in a crowd just as recklessly and as unlike his ordinary self as the others that made up that, for the time being, barbarous throng. A, like the rest of us, had ancestors that were the most thorough-going savages; and this crowd did things of which no individual among them was ever known to be guilty before; they acted like wild beasts. Will a reference to any more primitive ancestry explain this, or will you resort for a explanation to that ancient and much-feared, if not much-respected, personage that it is not necessary to name?

Now let me formulate this little history in the light of modern science. The qualities of A’s intellect and character are expressed through the cells which make up his physical organism, and especially his brain. These cells tend to work in a certain direction with great ease and effectiveness; but if their possessor had been brought up all his days in the backwoods, the world would never have learned this, nor perhaps even A himself. A college was necessary to furnish the environment for the development of these cells—i.e., to set the molecular machinery going; but this environment did not determine the manner of their action; that was settled by the action of environment in previous generations of ancestors, and what applies to A gold for every human being. A’s in an assumed case, but I could have supplied an actual one if it had been thought best. So much for heredity on the one hand and environment on the other. As you all perceive, no doubt, certain most important conclusions follow from such views—views which I have myself come to hold only after the most careful study of the subject, and views which I think are destined, when more fully realized, to greatly modify our notions of human affairs generally.

In the first place it is clear that no man can possess so great a fortune as one who comes into the world with an organization the result of a happy combination, of what you will allow me to call the heredities. He is of all men the richest. Some men are, in this sense, wealthy from the cradle, and some bankrupt. The great mass belong to that large and respectable middle class. As an example of the first, we may perhaps instance Shakespeare and Mendelsshon; of the second, those that, in spite of everything, find their way to the gallows. I do not refer to the few that reach that unhappy elevation by accident, but to those in whom no environment that this world every ordinarily affords, can prevent the development of innate criminal tendencies. They are naturally criminals, and well for the world and themselves if they had never been born. Next, perhaps, in importance to the wealth of heredity is the value of a knowledge of our hereditary or innate tendencies. Unfortunately the human race keep less account of its immediate ancestors in most cases than breeders do of their cattle or horses, and with the natural result that we can far more readily predict results in the one case than in the other.

An eminent American professor of psychology has suggested that if a written account of those actions and sayings of a member of a family from infancy to manhood, or till he left the parental roof, were kept and presented to the subject of these notes when about to leave for college or select a calling, it would furnish a most valuable guide. Most persons even who study the subject only learn their tendencies by painful mistakes, and when sometimes it is too late to correct what might have been easily set right at an earlier period. How many people are pursuing callings for which they have not the slightest aptitude. There are lawyers that can never make a point clearly, doctors that cannot diagnose the disease till the patient is beyond all surgery; and worst of all, preachers with about as much power to produce conviction or touch the finer feelings of men as the corner lamppost—while again we find man in some humble walk of life with abilities that would adorn any profession. All this is painful and in a measure preventable. For my own part, I feel so strongly on this matter that I have come to be very candid with parents and students when my opinion is asked. No man can be really happy who is out of place. He is always working against his own organization.

You will now perceive the significance of a previous remark, that habits should be formed in relation to our hereditary tendencies—sometimes in harmony with them and at times in opposition to them. But let no one suppose that we are the slaves of heredity. We are not bound hand and foot by our ancestors. Though our hereditary tendencies, like Banquo’s ghost, will not down, we can get such control of them that they are in no small measure subject to us. This can only be accomplished by resolutely and persistently choosing an environment that is favorable to the preservation of all good tendencies and the starvation of all unfavorable ones. Mr. A’s son should avoid exhausting his nervous system in any way if he would rise above the weaknesses of his father and his father’s ancestors. He should have deeply impressed on him the nature of his peculiar weakness and avoid exciting discussions and causes of provocation, while he cultivates the virtue of taciturnity when he feels the danger-tide rising within. We may remember for our comfort that man of all creatures can choose his environment. The individual that cannot live in this latitude without being a prey to the microbes of tuberculosis may remove to a suitable climate (environment) and in some cases it would be well to do so ere the attack begins. So a man that cannot under certain surroundings avoid giving way to idleness, dissipation or passion, should choose others, and indeed in this lies his only escape. The only safety for a young man is in occupation, be it work or recreation; and if a youth is inclined for neither he should consult a doctor and find out, if he can, what is the matter with him; and in the near future it is hoped that both the divine and the doctor will study heredity more and apply it too.

To have insight and skill to guide a young man to a knowledge of himself—of his real moral tendencies, and the courage to utter one’s views, is an accomplishment, or rather implies a host of accomplishments, unto which few have yet attained. How happy a state of things if the students and professors of every college were on confidential terms, so that the student might unbosom himself to his senior freely, knowing that his case would meet with intelligent and sympathetic recognition. This is probably one of the good things coming when professors have more time for that communion with their students which, as was the case of the disciples with their Master in classic times, will produce no doubt a higher type of men and will dignify the teacher, while it helps the taught. But before this comes to pass we must realize that the attainment of knowledge merely to advance a men in the world is not the highest aim of education. We must worship less at the shrine of Mammon and more at the altar of a noble manliness.

Allow me to touch briefly on one other subject never of more importance than during the college epoch. It is that of self-control. Usually the more powerful and effective a machine the more important and the more difficult it is to control. A railroad train is more difficult to control than a wheelbarrow; and when the speed rises to fifty miles and hour all the best appliances of air break, etc., are required. Some young men are compared with others by reason of the intensity and vigor of their nature as the train is to the wheelbarrow. When these fellows of powerful nature are on the right track and the speed is under control, they constitute most valuable human mechanisms, but when they run off the track destruction follows to themselves and often to others. If a man of forty does not find his nature easier to keep under check than at eighteen, there must have been something seriously wrong in the intervening years. The boy is often a perfect example of lack of control. He is a bundle of activities without any definite guidance. And at that period when the boy passes into the man, he has the hardest task of his life before him, and reining in the steed is no easy work on all occasions, though essential if grave injury is not to follow. To be vanquished once brings in that inexorable law of habit. Young men at this period deserve the sympathy of all. It is the epoch of keenest struggle, and mighty issues hang on the result. But a knowledge of one’s tendencies, discretion in regard to work, recreation, sleep and diet, with a high ideal of life, will be as ballast to the ship.

But, ladies and gentlemen undergraduates, the time fails me to further develop my theme for you. I have in some measure, I hope, convinced you that the college epoch is for you the most important part of your lives, just because of the peculiarities of your nature at this time; because it is a time of wonderful growth, plasticity and development. To attain to a vigorous broad and well-balanced development, is to start in the struggle of life with the best possible fortune. I have endeavored to found my arguments on the law of our organization, for I know of no other sound basis on which to appeal to rational beings; and whatever may have been the defects in my presentation of the subject, I hope I have given you some foundation on which to base conclusions for yourselves.

Ladies and gentlemen graduates, may I as a university graduate of twenty years’ standing address a few words to you. You are now about to set sail on the broad sea of life. This fact leads us to think of what you are and of what the world is. To understand the age in which we live and to endeavor to adapt to it is to court, it not to meet with success.

There are two views of our own time that are equally faulty. The one that the world never was in so unsatisfactory condition as now; the other that everything is just about as it should be, and we have only to fall in with things just as we find them, and if we do not, if our nature does not square with this idea, to force ourselves into the mould. The pessimist and the optimist, the cynic and the one who regards our time as a sort of realization of the dream of the ages, are both far enough from the truth. Our age is not too earnest, but it is too eager. It pursues too keenly even what is good in itself. Individual and professional pursuits are carried on at a rate that our organization cannot bear, hence nervous breakdowns of one kind and another are alarmingly common. Otium cum dignitate—leisure with dignity—is almost unknown. The measure of a man’s real wealth of any kind is not what he has but what he can appreciate. A peasant may walk over an estate and get more real enjoyment out of it than the lordly owner. In that case the peasant is the only true possessor. Do we not greatly overlook this in our time?

Our world is largely free from the grossness and cruelty of a past time, but with the progress in refinement has come also an extravagance, a departure from that simplicity of living that leaves time and energy for weightier things. Young men are frequently deterred from obeying the laws of their nature and entering into the fully existence that marriage implies, because of the dreaded expenses which modern style so often involves, from which follows a most unhappy check in that development of which I have had so much to say.

And this reminds me that there are two choices, a young man is called upon to make which outweigh in importance all others of his life. The one is the choice of a profession and already allusion has been made to the evil consequences of a mistaken career, the other is the choice of a life-partner. At best male human nature left to itself is poor coarse stuff. We only get the ideal of a perfect human being by a combination of the qualities found in each sex. Even the most perfect man we can conceive of is not the psychical equivalent of a good man and a good woman. One must supplement the other. This partnership makes the finest combination known in human affairs; and happy is the man that enters into it with instincts that are a true guide to his views of life. If there is as much in heredity as I have endeavoured to make clear, then, so far at all events as the world is concerned, no choice can equal in importance that of a wife, for through this the individuals are represented in the active world long after they have left the scene.

Gentlemen, you will perceive that such vital matters should not be determined by any mere change meeting, much less by the arguments of Mammon. But you, above all men, should study such matters profoundly, as in them lies, more than in all else, the future of the world.

Gentlemen, the University of New Brunswick has placed you under great obligations. A man can no more relieve himself from such a debt than ignore what he owes to the mother that gave him birth. Should you be fortunate in the acquisition of wealth, do not forget the needs of your university. Wealth may not, likely will not, come to all; but bear in mind that the best way to help you Alma Mater is to prove yourself men of the highest stamp. In these days if there be light in a man it cannot be hidden, and especially at the beginning of your career you light will be regarded as the reflected light of the University of New Brunswick. How great the responsibility involved! At the period corresponding to the college epoch the ossifying process in the framework of the body is going on to final completion. The youth becomes comparatively set and rigid in his frame. So in a healthy moral organization a man’s moral instincts and principles become defined and fixed if they are ever to be so. But in what a cartilaginous age do we live? How many individuals seem never to get beyond the embryonic stage of moral cartilage. A man without sound moral instincts, sensitive as the magnetic needle, steers wide of the highest human destiny. There is an uncertainty about his course, if not positive deviation, that robs life of all true dignity.

In our age and especially on this continent we are much influenced by magnitude in human achievements. Should we not look more to the quality than the vastness of result, to the direction in which energy is expended rather than the amount? Napoleon swept like a tornado over Europe, but as the world gets older and better the more will his name be held in abhorrence, while that of Florence Nightingale will be a sweet sound in men’s ear to the end of time.

Ladies and gentlemen, consider well the direction in which you spend your energies. Undertake only that which you feel worthy of your best efforts; cultivate the habit of thoroughness. Let no man feel that there is any uncertainty as to where you are to be found when an answer is required to any question involving moral issues; and how few do not. With kindliness of heart, perfect candour and uprightness of life, moderation and caution in your conclusions, whole-heartedness in what you undertake, be your abilities only mediocre you will gain the respect of your fellow-men, the approval of your own conscience, and leave the world better than you found it.

Notwithstanding those faults peculiar to or exaggerated in our time, I congratulate you in entering on life at a period the best and most hopeful, I believe, that the world has ever known. Think of the amazing improvement in material conditions, so that the citizen of today lives in a greater comfort than a prince once could, owing to the application of science of domestic life and to the improvement of cities; think of the diffusion of knowledge, the spread of refinement, the means for public improvement and enjoyment. In our age education is within the reach of the poorest, in fact, if, as I said before, appreciation is possession, how great in this day may be the possessions of any man irrespective of the extent of his personal means. Above all, think of the intellectual freedom and personal liberty of every kind which characterizes our age. In this respect you will find that there is still much worth your striving for alike for yourself and your fellows; but doubtless you will live to see what those noble men in every age beheld afar off, but did not realize. Call them what you will—inspired, enthusiasts, dreamers, idealists, geniuses, poets, seers, prophets—their thoughts and aspirations have fertilized the human soil and have led at last to that momentous development we witness today. But we are yet far from the ideal of human civilization, and the great question with you is: How can I best do my part, or, as I have put it, how can I best reach perfect development? For that worked out in the individual brings the perfection of the race.

Our age is earnest and full of questionings. Men are not satisfied with what has been attained. It is not surprising that occasionally things that need only modification are torn up by the roots. Be slow yourselves to follow this example, when cherished beliefs and human feelings are concerned. The creed that helps one may prove a hindrance to another. Allow all that liberty that you should claim for yourselves. Force your convictions on no man, for if he is not in a position to assimilate them they can do him no good, however useful to you. Distinguish well between matters of faith and demonstration, between non-essentials and those fundamentals which lie at the root of right-doing. "By their fruits ye shall know them" is still a good doctrine, indeed one especially appropriate in this age of change and transition. If your education has been a good one as I would believe, if you are as earnest as I hope you are, the great problems that engage the minds and concern the most vital interests of mankind will seriously engage your attention.

Change there must be. It is implied in the very nature of progress. What is best will continue to be as it has ever been, a question with all men who have insight.

Exact agreement need not be expected. We must first ask for in the light of the latest science, the best that I can see or know, I must still believe, and I know you will agree with me, that, in the language quoted by that noble poet of sturdy, earnest, good old Scotland:

"And honest man’s the noblest work of God."