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I am not aware that the map of the world shows at present any great nation more unfavorably situated in a geographical point of view. I hold, therefore, that to a country liko British America, an independent national existence, for any useful or good jmrpose, is a difficult achievement, and that in the present etate of our population it is probably impossible. Wo must, »t least in our present condition, either remain a dependency of the mother country, or fall into the hands of the United States. Yet this situation, while it affords no present hope of great political eminence or military success, is not without counterbalancing advantages. It gives us a position of 'humble and pacific usefulness, respectable if not great, and tending to induce us to cultivate the arts and sciences of peace, rather than those ambitious projects which agitato greater state?. Again, British America is not one state. It is a rope of 5and, made up of a number of petty provinces, and peopled with dissimilar and often anfca^jonistic races. Here again is small prospect of a great national existence ; and in the want of united action in matters of public concern, in the jarring views and little hostile, local and race policies of our present politics, we see but a foreshadowing of what might befall us, if present restraints were removed. Even herj, however, there is room for consolation. The rivalry of races and localities, if unpleasant, is stimulating. It prevents stagnation, and so long as it is conducted with intelligence and honesty of purpose, it promotes general prosperity. < )nly wlicn it places itself in opposition to public interests, and is dishonest in its moans, does it become a destructive nuisance. Tlio states of Greece, and the Repub- lics of Italy, afford us historic mstances of national life of the highest order, amidst these elements of weakness and disorder, yet with drawbacks and failures which wo should not desiro to imitate. Britain itself is an eminent instance of the most discordant and hostile populations, fused by time and training into a harmonious whole, yet by a course of education so long and painful, that we would do well hero to avoid as much of it as we can. Again, British America is a now country. It is but a colony, not bocausc any one forcibly keeps it so, i)ut because this is its nature. It is merely an oftslioot of tlio redundant population of other lands, with everything noAv and incom- plete, without old institutions, or heart-stirring traditions ; destitute of nearly all those things around which, in older countries, the popular mind clings as the centres of its unity and patriotism. The want is great ; but then we have the advantage of the experience ul' the mother covmtrios of our population ; and we have our ovn\ history to make in the present and the future. In doing so, on tho one hand, we are free to choose our own plans, and, on the other, the lessons of all history are before us, and we can borrow wliat suits us from the arts and customs of every older people. Canada has two emblems which have often appeared to some to point out its position in these respects, — the Beaver and the Maple. The beaver in his sagacity, his inf^^'stry, his ingenuity, and his perseverance, is a most respt 'table animal; a much Jietter emblem for our country than the rapacious eagle or even the lordly lion ; but he is also a type of unvarying instincts and old-world traditions, IIo does not improve, and becomes extinct rather than change his ways. The maple, on the other hand, is the emblem of the vitality and energy of a new country ; vigorous and stately 8 111 its growth, changing its hues as the seasons change, C(iually at home in the forest, in the cultivatv'^'l field, and stretching its green boughs over the dusty streets, it may well be received as i type of the progressive and versatile spirit of a new and growing people. Some of our artists have the bad taste to represent the beaver as perched on the maple bough ; a most unpleasant position for the poor animal, and suggestive of the thought that he is in the act of gnawing through the trunk of our national tree. Perhaps some more venturous designer may some day reverse the position, and represent the maplo branch as fashioned into a club, wlierewith to knock the beaver on the head. It is the part of a man of taste to avoid both extremes. In other words, we are placed in a position in which either unprogressive stolidity or rash innovation, either bUnd adherence to precedents or self-confident aban- donment of them, may be fatal to us, and in -which the steadi- ness and prudence, and the enterprise and energy of our people have equal scope for exercise. The conclusion to which I wish to lead by these preliminary remar' - is, that, m British America, mind, and especially cultivated mind, is the chief of the native resources of the country ; that, with this, we may hope to overcome all the disadvantages of our position, and to achieve a greatness all the more stable that it has not been thrust upon us, but has cost us something ; that without this, we shall be poor indeed, — a mere foil to set off the superior progress and prosperity of other lands. Educated mind, and, above all, the educated mind of those young men who are natives of the soil, — who must own British America as their country, — is that upon which under God's blessing, we must chiefly rely for prosperity and progress, and without which even those great natural resources which our country possesses may be useless, or may be used only by others. But what is education ? Education has different degreesi. I 9 I hold to be uneducated men, those whose opportunities of training have been limited to the mere imitation of their seniors, — those who, practically, cannot or do not read and write in their own mother-tongue. Such persons must, with few exceptions, drift with the current. In their habits, their tastes, and their capacities, they will b'^ what their prede- cessors have been ; or, in the more free states of society, in recently-settled districts, a little lower. Such men may, by their physical powers be of service to society ; but, in the present stage of the world's progress, they are mentally and morally a dead weight upon it ; and they are liable to strange delusions and wild excitements, which make them, under certain circumstances, an unstable and dangerous mob. To them, their country has no past and no future ; their live? and thoughts cling to the present alone, and to this in its narrowest sphere. It is to be hoped that, in British America, few persons now grow up m this condition. To these we may add as practically uneducated men, those whose education has fallen short of enabling or inducing them to acquire knowledge by reading, or to think for themselves ; or, again, those who, having abandoned themselves to sensual and immoral habits, have lost all control over their appetites and passions ; or, again, those who have thrown themselves into the vortex of dissipation and frivolity, and are whirled around without any steady perception of their true interests, or those of others. Such men may come out of our schools and institutes of higher learning, though the greater part of them are, in this respect also, uneducated men. The educated men arc, then, those who, having been trained to some useful profession, and pursuing this with dili- gence and skill, ere at the same time familiar, to some extent, with science and literature, and are in a position to exercise a sound and honest judgment on their own affairs, and those of their country. Such men may exist in various social positions. They may, or may not have been trained 1 10 at colleges and higher schools ; but, wherever educated, they arc the true strength of a nation growing from infancy to maturity. It is not too much to say, that every college student and graduate should bo such an educated man. He, if any man, should be learned, useful, energetic, and thoughtful ; a leader of men, to be relied on as an effic'ent member of our British American Commonwealth in this its cri- tical stage of formation and growth. If ho falls short of this he must be regarded as a wretched abortion, a failure in the' circumstances most favorable to success, a piece of worthless material, proved unserviceable by the very means employed to render it useful. If he Avho has been selected to receivo a culture not accessible to one in a thousand, should provo unworthy of that culture, a mere drag upon a progressive community, the contrast between his opportunities and his performances only aggravates his failure, and makes him the more despicable. To you, therefore, students and graduates, as having enjoyed the highest privileges, and, for that reason, liaving the gravest responsibilities, I would especially address my practical deductions as to the duties of the educated man in this country. 1st, then, I would say that our country expects of you that you should prepare yourselves thoroughly for, and pur- sue earnestly and perseveringly, some useful walk in life ; having due regard in this to your own powers and tastes, and to your highest usefulness to your relatives and friends, to society and to the cause of truth and righteousness in tho world. British America has no room in it for idlers. There Is more than enough of work for all, and if we do not find it, It is because we perversely put ourselves in the wrong places. There is, perhaps, at the present time too great a tendency to seek one or two professions ^s the sole avenues to success in life, not remembering that in any useful calUng there may be ample scope for the energies of even the ablest and best •^ducatod men. There is also an unsettled and restless dis- 1 11 position, >Yhich induces young men to strive to enter into tho active work of life before their education is completed, or their faculties matured, and which in like manner causes them readily, and with slight inducement to forsake one calling for another. These things are in the atmosphere of new countries. They are incidental to unformed and changing states of society ; but they often tend to permanent weak- ness and ineflSciency. Young men are, no doubt, precocious in America, and can judge for themselves at an earlier period of life than in the old world. There is also less of that pressure of labour to the level of the demand for it, which, in older countries, makes it so difficult to obtain eUgible openings for young men. Hence, perhaps, there are fewer misplaced men here, but still their number is too great, and much of this is to be attri- buted to the desire to enter the business of life at too early a period, and with too little preparation. One of the first duties of tlie educated young man is thus to find, if possible, his true place in our social system, tho gap in the great army of progress which he can best fill, and in which he may best do battle for his country and himself. He will most certainly do tliis well if he consults his powers rather than his propensities, his duty rather than his selfish interests, and if he regards the leadings of Providence, and takes counsel of those who have greater experience than he. 2nd. It is the duty of educated men to cultivate the highest standard of professional excellence. It is disgraceful to the educated man to sink below others in this respect, to .be content merely with the name of exercising some useful tcalling, and to be incompetent to the proper discharge of its duties. Suck cases as this are rare ; but there are other ifailures in this matter scarcely less culpable. There are some men who are content with the mere rou- tine performance of the duties of their profession, who aspiro Ao nothing beyond mediocrity, and are in consequence, 12 tempted to court success by mean arts and personal influence, rather than by an honest effort to attain to eminence. There is also a tendency to seek for the easiest und shortest courses of professional training, to think the end is secured if an examination is passed and a title gained ; and this kind of entrance into professional life is generally followed by the dilatory and inefficient prosecution of it to which I have just- referred. Again, wo are too often content, even if we aspire above ' mediocrity, to limit our hopes to the level of those who hare immediately preceded us. There may be circumstances in in which this is allowable, but they rarely occur in our time and in this country. Our predecessors have generally had fewer advantages than we, or, if not, these have, to a certain ex- tent, been neutralized by the difficulties of an early strug- gle in a new country and in untried circumstances. If we are simply to copy them, we shall surely fall below them ; and the progress of the arts and sciences among us will be arrested, or will give place to premature decay. A mere imitator can never attain to excellence. lie who, in a coun- try like this, sets before himself only the standard of a pre- vious generation, will be a dwarf in the generation to come. It is this consideration which best shows us the folly of those who, in this country, make war on our professional schools, and would narrow down professional training to the mere serving of an apprenticeship. Were our legal and medical practitioners, or our land-surveyors, for instance, to be trained merely in this way, they would, as a matter of course, fall below the level of their masters ; or, if they attained thereto, it would only be by superior abi- lity or desperate efforts. The general standard of the profes- sion would be lowered from time to time. Mere examinations, however severe in name, always descend to the professional level of the period ; and there would, consequently, in the higher professions, be a gradual decadence, until we might 18 with truth look back with regret on bygone days, and moum the intellectual giants who had given birth to a race of pig- mies. The true interests of a profession require that some of its best men should be selected, and furnished with every means for keeping up and extending their professional know- ledge and skill, and for communicating these to others ; and that in this way the standard of professional attainment should be raised progressively as the country and the world advance in civilization. It may be a cause of mortification to some jealous and selfish persons that young men better edu- cated than they should enter into professional life ; but the truly patriotic will resist all efforts to repress professional education, as being steps backward toward mediaeval barba- rism. Nor would I limit myself here to schools for the so- called learned professions. We have not in British America a sufficient number of schools of art and practical science, which could bear directly on the fine and useful arts, and on the growth of our manufactures. In this University we have endeavoured, even at the risk of overstepping at once our means and our true function as a collegiate institution, in every way in our power to stimulate public opinion in this direction, and to do some of the work ourselves. In prac- tical chemistry, in geology and mining, in engineering, in the art of teaching, in agriculture, we have striven to con- nect scientific teaching with the arts of life. We have met with some success, though we have found that in some res- pects this country is still below the point at which the want of such training is felt. But this infant state of our society is passing away, and the time may come sooner than we expect when British America may have not merely schools of Law and Medicine, and Ergineering and Normal schools, but Mili. tary, Mining, Agricultural and Technological schools, and schools of fine art and ornamental design. Not long ago the Duke of Newcastle, in opening a new School of Art and Design, stated that England has now 40 such schools with 1 14 7000 pupils, J md France, Belgium and other countries on ill :! I the continent of Europe, are even better provided than Eng- land hi this respect. Saxony, with a population of about two millions, had several years ago more than one hundred such schools, beside a number of gymnasia, and its great Uni- versity. The natural talents of British Americans may be great, but we cannot expect them to excel in such pursuits while we have not one government school of practical science. The point from which I have been led into this digression is the statement that the educated man should not be content with professional mediocrity, but should rise as high toward eminence in his profession as possible. I shall close this part of my subject with impressing on you, as a farther reason for such ambition, the duty of leaving your country better than you found it, of leaving in your walk in life some imprint of a permanent character, which may mark that you have been. In a country like British America, whether a man can dig out a stone or a stump, or can introduce a new art or profes- sion or build great improvements on an old one, he is bound to do his part in the work of progress ; and this applies with peculiar force to the man of education. 3rd. It IS the duty of every educated man to extend his culture in fields that lie beyond merely professional pursuits. To these last, an enlightened self-interest would be thought sufficient to ensure attention ; but since this, sometimes, fails ^f its effect, we need not wonder that many men, supposed to have been educated in their younger days, contradict this belief by a mental torpor in their maturer years. The uneducated man, who remains untaught, is simply more or less a barbarian. The educated man who stops short where the school or college hfe ends, and thenceforth devotes himself exclusively to the narrow field of professional life, is either a mere specialist or a pedant. There are countries in the world where the ,somi-barbarian may be equal to the duties required of him by society. There are, perhaps, countries 1 i ■« p i can un- 1 regard by the istitutes kg men. ote and J life of • 1 should aid, the I would I desire here to say to our own gi-aduates, that I think the time fully come when they should, as a body, do something for its advantage. Hitherto, men who have not received its educa- tional benefits, have been toiling and making sacrifices for its maintenance, and amidst many difficulties have been develop- ing its powers. If its graduates would now endow one of its chairs, or establish a bursary fund to aid poor students, or give it the means to increase its library up to the require- ments of the university and the city, they would not only do a graceful and useful thing, but would earn a better title to have a voice in the management of its affairs. If our grad- uates have not already done such things, it is not because they are too few, too poor, or too unintiuential, but because they have not thought of them. Their educational mother expects, in her present struggles with narrow circumstances, such fruits of her past labors. I may also call your attention to the fact, known, perhaps, to some of you by experience, that the laws of this country attach too little importance to a superior education as a pre- paration for public employments ; and there appear to be among our public men some who would even take away the little value that such distinctions have. If we have any pro- vision for educational qualifications in the civil and militf ry service of this country, it is a dead letter; and my attention was only a few days ago called to the fact that in Lower Canada a university graduate has not even the poor privilege, accorded to a nun or ecclesiastic, of teaching a school without a preliminary examination. This is also a matter affording some scope for the action of our educated men, on behalf of our higher institutions. 6. Our educated men should not be insensible to the social and political interests of their country. This opens a wide field for useful exertion, ranging from what may be done to improve the sanitary and domestic condition of our poorer people, up to the highest departments of the public policy of ^m •20 the country. All matters of Hauitary and social arijingonient are in this country in a very crude state. Our people havo been huddled together from various places and states of Hociety, and have not yet settled down into any regular sys- tem of social order. Our civic regulations, the rlrainagc of our streets, our lodgings for the labouring classes, our moans of controlling vice, our arrangements for instructKo or health- ful recreation, are all in an imperfect condition, and many zealous workers are needed to bring them to a respectable level. Those are all matters claiming the attention of the benevolent and thinking man, for they all tend Inrgely toward the sum of human happiness or misery. The sphere of political life is a troublesome and anxious one, and the man who selects this for his field of action is, perhaps, in the present state of this country, less to be envied than those who devote themselves to more quiet departments of exertion. Still some must work here, and it is a field spe- cially demanding the services of the truly educated man, who, whether, properly speaking, in political life or not, should always take some interest in public affairs. There are two great evils incident to the efforts of a young, poor, and partially educated country to govern itself, which eminently merit the attention of reflecting men. 1 mean the influence of prejudices and of mercenary motives in our provin- cial councils. I do not wish to insinuate that these arc the exclu- sive possession of any political party. On the contrary, it is certain that in a country where the population is scattered over a wide area, where much of it is uneducated, and where it has been derived from the most varied origins, there must of necessity be a mass of local and tribal feeling, destitute of sound reason and of expediency, yet influencing men in their political relations, and affording great facilities to the design- ing demagogue. It is equally certain that where nearly all are poor and struggling, and where men's action is not hedged round by class distinctions and by old precedents, and espe- 21 i I ciiilly nlic'i'o thon> li not a .sufficient reading and thinkinj^ population to utter a united and just public opinion, there will bo a tendency for liunmn welfishncRS to mistake personal for ))..blic nitereats, or so to niinglo the two, that the boundaries between political integrity and dishonewty may be readily overpassed. It is the part of the truly educatert and patri- otic to contend against these inlluonces, and to strive, however apparently hopeless the case may be, for the influence of rea- son and justice in our public affairs. Another phase of our British American political life merits consideration hero. An almost universal suffrage extending over a population wiicre no class rises far above another, ensures the full weight of the popular mind, whatever it may be, in our public councils. Now such a population may be in any one of three states. If entirely uneducated and ignorant of public affairs, it remains in a state of stolid quietude, unmoved by the greatest evils, and only stimulated to action when excited by the leaders in whom it confides. If a little farther advanced in intelligence, it becomes excitable, quick to action, readily moved by every new tm'u of public affairs, and broken into many conflicting parties ; a state of matter;: often more diffi- cult to deal with than the more debased condition of total ignorance, though still to be regarded as a state of progress toward that enlightened public opinion which can proceed alon» from the judgment of an educated community. That we in British America have arrived at this last stage it would be rash to affirm ; that we shall reach it I believe, but not without strenuous exertion and much self-sacrifice. In the present imperfect state of society here, as in other' countries similaily situated, we may expect public opinion to run into violent extremes, and perhaps its only apparent law to be, that if it sets very strongly in one direction to-day, it will be pretty sure to set in the opposite way to-morrow. Still, in all this there is more hope and progress than in mere stagnation. Tlie current of our colonial feeling is like that of 'M ) ' I One of our great rivers, — rushing from side to side of its rocky bed, now in one direction, now in another, now gliding quietly along, now lashing itself into foaming billows. We may not arrest its coui j, nor is it desirable to do so ; but we may lead its waters gently aside, and make beside its most dangerous rapids peaceful highways for our commerce. No man can in a country like this check or control or repress the will o^ the people, but any wise man may guide it to useful ends. Every wise man may contribute something in some department to this result. But to do this eflfectually, the wise and good man, while sympathising with every popular emotion, must keep himself above the mere driftage of the current. He must not be either repelled or seduced by the varying course of the unstable waters. He may find those who to-day see safety and progress only in union, to-morrow ready to quarrel with their nearest neighbors or get up a strife of races — those who to-day are annexationists, to-morrow clamoring for an American war — those who now would break every link of connection with the mother country, to-morrow ready to submit to or welcome a despotism. No one who has lived long in this country is with- out such experiences ; and when we think of them and at the same time of the fatal effects of such sudden gusts of public opinion in the case of other countries, we shall be thankful that we have been prevented from yielding to these impulses, and shall resolve if possible to exercise a sound and calm judgment in such matte/s in the future. Oft the precise position of the educated man, with regard to these shifting phases of our political life, I would not dare to venture into details. I may, however, state two results of some thought on this subject. One is, that we should strive to form as rapidly as possible, a truly enlightened public opinion, as distmguished from merely local, personal, race and class prejudices and interests. Just as the engineer, in every curve which the surface of the country obliges him to 28 i rocky quietly aay not ay lead ii'cnnis I can in . of the Every oent to 1, while himself not be instable progress nearest day are 1 war — nth. the come a is with- le same opinion that we nd shall HQcnt in regard ot dare ssults of strive public il, race neer, in him to cake, turns as rapidly as he can back to the straight line leading to the point he has to reach, so should the true lover of his country make the moral and mental progress of the people af a whole, his line of direction. It may often seem the less direct way, but it is the only one that can be tinily successful. The second is, that in our present stage we should keep constantly in view the links of connectioi) which bind us to the great British Empire, and strengthen them as far as may be in our power. It is no small thing to be members of an organization the most stable and powerful in the world, and, at the same time, that which allows the greatest amount of libefty. Independently of all national prejudices, or patri- otic feelings, or difference of origin, we cannot be too thank- ful for the privileges we thus enjoy ; or too willing to concri- bdte our part, however small, to the welfare and honour of the empire ; and if we can desire anything further in this respect, it seems to me that it should be sought, in endef.vouring more completely and closely to unite all the British colonies and dependencies in one great colonial and imperial council, having its seat in the metropolis of the Empire, and binding together all its scattered parts in closer union with one another, and with our common head. But lastly I would direct your attention to the duties of the educated man in his relation to his God, and to the example that he sets before his fellow-man. The religious life of a people is its only true life. If this is wanting, or if it is viti- ated by infidelity, by superstition, or by any of the idolatries which are set up between man and his Maker, nothing will avail to give prosperity and happiness. On this great matter it is the part of the educated man, if of any man, to exercise an independent judgment. Honestly, solemnly, and as in a matter of more concern than any of the passing things of earth, he must set himself to form fixed and certain opinions, which commend themselves to his own calm judgment and conscience, and which he can vindicate ' I f il 1 1 I l(: :;; 24 before otheivs, on his own monil relations to the Supreme Judge of all, and on the way which He has fixed for attaining to happincjis and heaven. The man who has no thought of these thingsi, is noL an educated man in the highest sense, because lie is not educated for eternity, and because ftiiling this, he lacks the greatest and noblest motive for good — the love of his God as a reconciled Father, and the love of his brotlier man. The rude and ignorant unbeliever, or tlie degraded votary of an liabitual superstition, is simply an object of pity. The educated man who pretends to doubt tliat which he lias not humbly and carefully studied, or who is content blindly to follow others, where God has placed the truth before his own mind, scarcely deserves our pity. I do not speak here of the mere sensualist. If there ig any young man so vile, so unworthy of his higli calling, ns to devote himself to vicious pleasures, to waste the flower of bin youth and the prime of his life in sinful indulgences, he is not to be reckoned as truly educated, but only as one who has trodden this pearl under his feet, and who turns to tear the hearts of those who have sought in vain to enrich him. I speak not of such a man, but of those who, however high their standard of conventional morality, yet fall short of the highest style of humanity, that of the truly Christian and God-fejiring man. In this character are summed up all the love and purity, all the self-denial and earnest exertion, all the careful thought and sound judgment, all the culture of our highest endowments, which I ask of our educated young men, and which, if they were the common possession of all the young men of British America, would be to us the surest guarantee of God's blessing, of our own highest success, and of the future greatness of our beloved country. v^ V # c Supremo haa fixed man who cated man )r eternitj, nd noblest ed Father, f there ia ling, ns to w'cr of hiy ces, he is one who ns to tear rich him. ever high )rt of the 5tian and ip all the 3rtion, all mlture of ed young ion of all he surest cess, and