Address in Praise of Founders

Encaenial Address of William Brydone Jack, A.M., D.C.L., Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, At King’s College, Fredericton, Delivered June 24th 1853 (UA Case 67, Box 1)

“Some men covet learning and knowledge out of a natural desire and inquisitive temper; some to entertain their minds with variety and delight/ some for ornament and reputation; and some to enable them to victory of wit and contradiction; many for lucre and a livelihood; and but few for employing the divine gift of reason, for the benefit and use of man. As if there were sought in knowledge a couch whereon to rest a searching and troubled spirit; or a terrace for a wondering and variable mind to walk up and down with a fair prospect; or a tower of state for a proud mind to raise itself upon ; or a fort or commanding ground for strife and contention; or a shop for profit or sale; and not a rich storehouse for the glory of the Creator and the relief of man’s estate”** [from Bacon’s Advancement of Learning] Such, according to Lord Bacon, are the various causes which prompt men to desire knowledge. Most mistake its ultimate object, and value it only so far as it may be conducive to their personal gratification or advancement in life.

It is true that at the present day, there may be little danger of our confounding ignorance with innocence, as was done at a no[t] very remote date by a certain class of fashionable and sentimental writers. Now, we are all agreed that education is a prime good – a good that ought to be dispensed liberally to nations as well as to families, to the poor as well as to the rich. Even Mr. Hume, the very type and embodiment of public economy and retrenchment in England, has declared that “no price can be too great for the inestimable advantages of education.” We may, therefore, fairly presume that few or non will now be found to echo the sentiments of Jack Cade, who on ordering Lord Say’s head to be struck off, thus addressed him: “I am the besom that must sweep the court clean of such filth as thou art. Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm, in erecting a grammar school; and whereas before, our forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, Man has caused printing to be used; and contrary to the King, his crown and dignity, thou hast built a paper mill. It will be proved to thy face that thou hast about thee, that usually talk of a noun, and a verb, and such abominable words as no Christian ear can endure to hear.”

Nevertheless, I am afraid that the old leaven is not yet quite dead amongst us. Besides, it may be asked, how comes it that such an outcry is so often raised against seas and seminaries of learning? The question can, perhaps, be more easily and satisfactorily answered that might at first sight be supposed. They do not, nay they cannot, fulfil the requirements of each and all of the various and often conflicting standards of education, which every individual complainant has set up for himself. And be it remarked, that this is a subject on which everybody can play the critic. It has become the grand topic of the day – it inspires general interest and in the abstract, is the theme of universal and enthusiastic praise. It is one, moreover, which seems to require neither talent, instruction, nor experience to understand, and hence, in discoursing upon it, every one feels himself at once at home. But observe that sleek, comfortable, jolly-looking man, who has apparently made his belly his god, and who without much effort on his part, has had a lion’s share of the goods of this life; and consider whether his idea of the mental, moral, and physical perfection of our nature can accord with that of younger pale, pious, struggling and self-denying minister of religion. Or does that sage, whose noble and venerable head is whitened with the snows of age; who in various languages has explored the records of past generations, and become familiar with their science and literature; who has succeeded in detecting the few simple elements out of which all this wondrously harmonious but beautifully varied framework of external nature is built up; who has learned to distinguish the different parts and functions of the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms, and to divide them into their distinct classes, tribes and families; who has ascertained the velocity of light, and of electricity; who has calculated the movements of each member of the solar system, and verified it as in a balance; who has measured the enormous distance which separated him from the nearest fixed star; who has forced the sun to pain for him, and the lightning to carry his messages; but who sighs and confesses his limited capacity and the little he really knows, as he reflects that after all his toil, he can neither tell whence a single blade of grass derives its vitality, nor yet determine anything of the nature of that mysterious and invisible cause which makes the loosed apple fall to the ground. Does he, I say, regard knowledge in the same light with that pert but pretty and withal loveable miss who having just returned from a finish school, thanks her stars that her education is at last completed and that henceforth she has nothing to do but to exercise her various accomplishments? She has learned to dance, and play, and sing; she can chatter French and Italian; she can copy a drawing with exquisite minuteness and paint “a love of a rose”; she has been taught to embroider, knit, net, and crochet; and as for such common-place things as History, Geography and Philosophy, she is well assured that she has thoroughly mastered them all. In fact, as she sums up her acquirements she feels highly elated at their extent and variety, and would perhaps be fairly puzzled to name anything of consequence in which she thinks herself deficient.

Although opinions concerning education must, then evidently be as numerous and diverse as the minds that entertain them, yet writers on the subject have not found it difficult to give almost countless definitions of it, any one of which in the abstract, would probably obtain the willing consent and approbation of all parties.

Thus, on pithily declares that the end of education is to secure human happiness; another that it is to elevate above the spirit of the age; and a third that it is to develop all the faculties of the human being, mental, morel and physical. But what is happiness, and how is it to be attained? Has any one plan for elevating above the spirit of the age been agreed upon, or is it likely to be? Are the best means of developing our faculties so patent that “he who runs may read”? Unless these questions can be answered satisfactorily, we are left in as great doubt and perplexity as ever in regard to the subject which ought to form the basis of education. These, indeed, are infinite, and out of this infinity each individual picks out whatever seems to him best, and has the presumption to expect that every body else will make the same selection. It is not, however, my intention to discuss the matter of education in general. Leaving that portion of it which relates to our physical and moral nature, I shall confine myself to what regards our intellectual, and more especially to that section of it, which is usually assigned to Colleges and Universities. Even this is more than sufficiently comprehensive, and the views concerning it are abundantly numerous and discordant.

We shall, perhaps, obtain a clearer insight into the origin of the conflicting ideas of what studies ought to constitute a College course and better understand their mutual bearings and relative importance, if we examine the subject under the following heads:
1st. That which is to train, strengthen, and develop the different powers of the mind, so as to fit it for the acquisition and appreciation of learning of every kind.

2nd. That which is to be useful to the individual man as qualifying him for some special business or profession, whereby he is to gain his bread and play his allotted part in life with credit to himself and advantage to others.

3rd. That which is to benefit society in general as conducing to him progress and the elevation of mankind.


For the attainment of the object proposed under the first of these heads, it is evident that the due cultivation of the faculties of language and reason must be of primary importance. This cultivation is a duty imposed upon us by the very conditions of our existence, a debt due by us for having been made men and not brutes, a tribute we are called upon to pay for the glorious boon of being formed after the images of our Creator. But in addition to these considerations, language and reason possess a universality that is little thought of. Every emanation from the diving essence, every spark from the supreme intelligence, the rational inhabitants of the remotest star revealed to man by the telescope, whatever may be their bodily organization and the constitution of the physical world around them, and the consequent peculiarities in their physical science, all must have the same grammar or universal laws of language, whether by sound or signs; the same modes of thinking; the same pure Mathematics; the same ultimate perception of the true, the beautiful and the good.

Now it is generally admitted that the most clear and correct view of the nature and structure of language, and the greatest precision of thought conjoined with facility and elegance of expression are to be gained by the study of the Classical authors of ancient Greece and Rome. And the advantages of mathematical instruction in invigorating the reasoning faculty, in inducing systematic procedure in all processes of ratiocination, and in securing the utmost possible certainly in the successive steps of induction, have never been questioned. Classics and Mathematics have, therefore, very properly been accounted the basis of all sound education, the most efficient instruments of intellectual training. But that they may worthily occupy this important position, the Classics must be studied, not simply with a view to exercise the memory and cram it with words, nor yet merely for the purpose of quaffing from the sweet and sparkling fountains of beauty and wisdom with which they abound; but also philologically and relatively, as the most distinguished members of a large family of languages. Mathematical knowledge should not be regarded as an end, but rather as the means to an end, since it is not its quantity so much as its quality, and the mode in which it is obtained, that renders it chiefly valuable in the science of education.

But the requirements of the age, and the inevitable law of progress seem to demand that classics and Mathematics should not reign the solitary and unassailable despots they have hitherto been considered. They are now called upon, and the summons is not always couched in the blandest and most conciliatory terms, to yield a portion of their power to sciences, which perhaps justify in the eyes of this eminently utilitarian generation, are yearly becoming more and more important, and which have the very [taking?] recommendation of bearing more directly upon the wants of every-day life. It is, however, not a little difficult to determine to what extent they can safely share their sway. The sciences alluded to, certainly want the requisites of fixation and permanency, which Whewell considers as important elements in the subjects of education. In teaching them there is, without doubt, more room and greater temptation to loses sight of the main object we have at present in view, namely the training of the mind. The danger, and it is one into which many educational establishments, more especially on this side of the Atlantic, are only too prone to fall, lies in confounding a bare collection of remembered facts with science. For lumbering the mind with such a collection, called from every brand of knowledge, the popular publications of the day afford but too many facilities; and as it may serve on any special occasion, to make a grand and imposing show, and even excite rapturous applause at the vast amount of learning exhibited, it is but too greedily sought after. But a magazine of mere facts, names and things, is only the material, the confused mass of stone, wood, and lime out of which the edifice is to be built. Before it can become really useful, it requires the hand of the mechanic to shape and fit it together, the action of a well regulated and properly disciplined mind to reduce the chaos to order and form. The facts thus accumulated for vain parade may be forgotten, and then they leave not a trace behind, but when they have been carefully deduced from, and referred to certain elementary and well-established principles, they may, it is true, fade from the memory, but in their acquisition they have stamped an indelible impression upon the mind – they have imparted to it an abiding healthy tone, the benefit of which it will ever after continue to experience. Were such always the sure result of the study of these highly important sciences, their claims not only as purveyors of really useful knowledge but also as promoters of mental discipline, could not be too fully recognized. I rejoice that they are steadily gaining ground, and advancing into favour; but at the same time I must confess my fears that they are likely to induce many to build upon the quicksand I have pointed out.

Of the necessity for the utmost possible extension of University studies, and for intellectual training as preparatory to all professional instruction, I cannot refrain from quoting the opinion of that clear sighted and calm judging philosopher Lord Bacon: “First, therefore amongst so many great foundations of Colleges in Europe, I find it strange that they are all dedicated to professions, and none left free to arts and sciences at large, for if men judge that learning should be referred to action, they judge well; but in this they fall into the error described in the ancient fable, in which the other parts of the body did suppose the stomach had been idle, because it neither performed the office of motion as the limbs do, nor of sense as the head doth; but yet notwithstanding it is the stomach that digesteth and distributeth to all the rest; so if any man think philosophy and universality to be idle studies, he doth not consider that all professions are from thence served and supplied. And this I take to be a great cause that hindereth the progression of learning, because these fundamental knowledges are studied but in passage. For if you will have a tree bear more fruit than it hath used to do, it is not anything you can do to the boughs, but it is the stirrings of the earth and putting new mould about the roots that must work it.”

From the preceding extract, it will be perceived that Bacon does not object to learning being applied to action; but that he insists upon the primary importance of that intellectual training which alone will enable us to digest and turn to the most profitable account the instruction which may be required for any particular profession. Our common schools may be as to dig the foundation and bring together some of the materials, but as yet they neither lay the foundations itself nor rear the structure of education. Were they so improved as to be able to perform the duty required by the first of the thrice heads I have mentioned, then, but not til then, could Colleges safely begin with the second.

This is more in conformity with the utilitarian spirit of the day, which losing sight of the foundation to be laid, or undervaluing the mere preparatory process that ought to be undergone, sees only for such specific knowledge as will ensure “quick returns.” On it, therefore, we must now, as proposed, make a few remarks.

In the two great English Universities very little attention has hitherto been paid to professional training; and although in the Scotch Colleges and the Gymnasia on the Continent of Europe, it is regarded with more favour; yet everywhere it is considered at least ostensibly, as something which must rest upon or be supplementary to mental culture. The actual amount of this culture ought, of course, to be in some measure determined by the circumstances, the prospects, and the peculiar genius of the individual. Yet it should ever be remembered that it is common ground, and that the labour bestowed upon it, however great may be its amount, will always be productive of both pleasure and profit in any situation of life. In strictly professional education however, the case is somewhat different. Here we have to deal with youth of every variety of destination. But the same instruction will not enable one man to cure the diseases of the human frame, and another to administer consolation to the wounded spirit, or one to draw up a well and another to construct a suspension bridge. Hence, were it even deemed desirable, it would manifestly be impossible to find time to make every man his own physician, his own lawyer, and his own engineer. Each profession in fact requires a course of study peculiar to itself; and consequently a body of teachers who have made it their especial business. Besides, institutions for such purposes should be so situated as to have at command certain facilities in regard to means and appliances for ensuring the requisite training. And, after all, it must be considered, whether each or any of the departments will be attended by a body of students sufficiently numerous to warrant such an outlay from the general funds as may be necessary to maintain it in a state of efficiency. Occasionally, the wants of the time and the place may create a greater demand for instruction in some one professional pursuit than in another; and care should then be taken to have such wants supplied as far as it is possible to do so. This feeling seems to have actuated the members of the College Council when they recently made an appropriation for providing instruction in Civil Engineering.

I trust that many of our young men will avail themselves of the advantages which our University may offer for gaining a knowledge of this now, to us, important profession.

Nevertheless, we must not neglect general studies. Our College curriculum ought, in my opinion, to be so regulated that it may especially serve to expand and invigorate the various powers of the mind, and incidentally to impart the greatest possible amount of positive knowledge that will be practically useful to all our students, whatever may be their intended destination. Now everybody has to do with the science of estimation and measurement, and therefore, ought to be acquainted with certain parts of Mathematics. All the changes that are continually going on around us are referable to motion, which is the consequence of the applications of force; and hence Natural Philosophy ought to be a subject of general study. It is important that each individual should have a knowledge of the structure of his own body, and the functions of its several parts; and therefore some acquaintance with anatomy and physiology is valuable to all. A knowledge of Zoology and Botany is also universally useful and is, moreover, a source of never-failing pleasure to its possessor. No one will question the benefit that the farmer, the mechanic, the merchant, the lawyer, the engineer, the clergyman, as well as the physician must derive from the study of Chemistry. Every man, too, is interested about the structure of the globe he inhabits, and of the Universe around him; and hence he ought to learn something of mineralogy, geology and astronomy. With all these subjects in their general bearings, our students have an opportunity of becoming more or less familiar, and the knowledge thus gained, in addition to its having been made an agent of intellectual discipline, will be of advantage to all, however different their vocations in life may be. Let it not be supposed, however, that I am averse to the introduction of professional teaching into our Colleges or Universities. On the contrary, I think it highly desirable, but I would have it done in its proper place, and to such an extent as the wants of the time and the country seemed to demand.

But I must now hasten to make a few remarks on the third and last of the heads under which I proposed to examine the subject University education.

The silent though sure and important influence which the cultivation of the more exalted regions of philosophy and of taste has on the stability, civilization and permanent prosperity of a nation, is too commonly overlooked. The higher intelligence, which is the offspring of the higher institutions or learning, is the source and fountain head from which the most sound and elevated system of national education among the mass of the people must proceed. Accordingly it will be found that the common schools are in the most healthy and flourishing condition in those countries which afford the greatest encouragement and support to the higher seminaries of learning; and that in proportion as the latter elevate their standard of acquirements, in the same proportion will that of the lower institutions be raised.

Humboldt has enunciated the comprehensive truths that knowledge and thought are not only the delight and prerogative of man, but they are also a part of the wealth of nations, and often afford them an abundant indemnification for the more sparing bestowal of national riches. And the Great Exhibition lately held in London *[The first Great Exhibition in London was held in 1851.] seems to have impressed upon the minds of the most intelligent and exalted men of Great Britain the momentous facts, that in an advanced stage of civilization a competition in industry must be a competition in intellect; and that to secure continued success in such a competition it is absolutely necessary for the state to promote to the utmost and with far greater zeal that heretofore, the cultivation of abstract science. But, perhaps the so styled ‘practical’ man will here triumphantly ask, what benefit is society likely to derive from the theories and speculations of philosophers, and of what possible use can the study at College of the loftier and painfully accessible branches of learning be to mankind in general? This question could be most readily and satisfactorily answered by an appeal to facts, by showing that most of the grand discoveries, which have contributed so largely to the advancement of the age, and which form at once its glory and its boast, have been the fruits of purely theoretical investigations. In proof of this assertion it will be sufficient to cite one case, and that not the most striking of hundreds that might be adduced. What could apparently be more remote from any useful practical application than the investigation of the curious phenomena of polarized light? Who could have believed that the track of observations opened up by a young officer [*Malus] of Engineers , looking through a prism at the windows of the palace of the Luxembourg, would have taken such a direction as to furnish the navigator with the means of detecting rocks and shoals in the depths of the ocean, and thereby preserving him from their lurking dangers; as to enable the chemist, with unerring certainly and a rapidity undreamt of to tell the amount of sugar in the cane, beet, or parsnip juice, at different stages of the growth of the plant, and thus to point out to the manufacturer when and on what article he can most economically bestow his labour; as to assist the Engineer to discover the laws of tension in beams and thereby give additional security to life and property; as to provide the astronomer with a new method of measuring the dimensions of unapproachable objects, and even of marking the passage of time, as well as of deciding whether you [sic] shining point he has just discovered owes its brilliancy to light proceeding from itself, or borrowed from other bodies. Theoretical science is, in fact, the basis of all progress. It is the life-blood of practice, the prime mover, the fire which generates the steam. But as I cannot flatter myself that anything I may be able to say on this point will have much weight with those who look for an immediate and definite answer to their ever ready, though not always sensible, questions of cui bono, I prefer quoting from Mill’s Political Economy, the calm and deliberate opinion of that distinguished writer: “In a national or universal point of view, the labour of the savant, or speculative thinker, is as much a part of production in the very narrowest sense, as that of the inventor of a practical art; many such inventions have been the direct consequences of theoretic discoveries, and every extension of knowledge of the powers of nature being fruitful of applications to the purposes of outward life. The electro-magnetic telegraph was the wonderful and most unexpected consequence of the experiments of Oersted and the mathematical investigations of Ampere; and the modern art of navigation is an unforeseen emanation from the purely speculative and apparently merely curious enquiry, by the mathematicians of Alexandria, into the properties of the three cures found by the intersection of a plane surface and a cone. No limit can be set to the importance, even in a purely productive and material pint of view, of mere thought. In as much, however, as these material fruits, though the result, are seldom the direct purpose of the pursuits of savant, nor is their remuneration in general derived from the increased production which may be caused incidentally and mostly after a long interval by their discoveries; this ultimate influence does not, for most of the purposes of political economy, require to be taken into consideration; and speculative thinkers are generally classed as the producers only of the books, or other useable or salable articles, which directly emanate from them. But when (as in political economy one should always be prepared to do) we shift our point of view, and consider no individual acts, and the motives by which they are determined, but national and universal results, intellectual speculations must be looked upon as a most influential part of the productive labour of society, and the portion of its resources employed in carrying on and in remunerating such labour, as a highly productive part of its expenditure.”

A love for labour of this kind and ability to perform it, are most likely to be acquired in Colleges and Universities. It is therefore a mark of sound policy in a nation to establish and foster such institutions, and provide them with the means of directing and encouraging in their onward career of study those whose talents and acquirements promise to contribute to human progress. So, with the advancement of civilization, the lower seminaries of learning occupy higher and higher ground, the glorious task of elevating to a yet loftier summit the science and literature of the land will devolve upon the Universities, and this task they should be fitted to perform.

We are this day met to celebrate the praises of the men to whose exertions and zeal for their country’s welfare, New Brunswick, is indebted for the establishment of King’s College – and institution intended for the benefit of the whole population of the Province, having nothing sectarian in its character, but ever open to and ready to welcome as pupils youths form every denomination of Christians, and therefore entitled to look for aid and patronage form all parties alike. To these men let us accord all honor, and let us who are in any way connected with the institutions they have founded, strive, each in his place, to make it a worthy and lasting monument of their enlightened policy.

If I have succeeded in my attempts to unfold the great variety, and the relative bearings and mutual dependence of the subjects which fall within the domain of University education in one or others of the three provinces I have successively examined, I trust that those who have hitherto either actively opposed the College, or passively withheld from it their countenance and support, will see how it is possible that it may be doing much good, although not proceeding exclusively, or even very far, in the one particular track which they themselves might deem the best. Finally let them consider that:

“As water, whether it be the dew of heaven, or the springs of the earth, doth scatter and lose itself in the ground, except it be collected into some receptacle, where it may by union comfort and sustain itself; and for that cause, the industry of man hath framed and made spring heads, conduits, cisterns and pools; which men have accustomed likewise to beautify and adorn with accomplishments of magnificence and state, as well as of use and necessity, so knowledge, whether it descend from divine inspiration or spring from human sense, would soon perish and vanish to oblivion, if it were not preserved in books, traditions, conferences, and places appointed as Universities, Colleges, and Schools for the receipt and comforting the same.”

SOURCE: New Brunswick Museum. W.F. Ganong Collection, F445.