New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1868-08-21

Cornell as he marks the gradual consolidation
of his plans, and sees his college springing at
once into usefulness, like Minerva leaning
from the brain Of Jupiter-as he view.
the treasures of the library which be
has caused to be transported from foreign
lands, the venerable and valuable chronicles OF
the worlds wit, wisdom, and universal culture
as learned professors cOngregate at his bidding
to impart TO swarming learners the fruits Of
long researches-as ample means widen the cur
riculum of study and lend to severer labors the
graceful alleyiatiOns Of art. His part, be may
feel has been nOby performed. He has estab-
lished no starved and stinted seminary which
might find its nOblest ambition continually
thwarted, its most brilliant hopes perpetually
disappointed, its influence limited and its use
fulness curtailed, 10y the pressure of an ignobls
poverty. Pleasant as it has doubtless been for
him to endow, there is greater pleasure yet
in store for him. 1t is to see the young per-
sons 10 whom his bounty has afforded such
brilliant opportunities wisely improving
them, and proving by enthusiastic dill
igence that the wealth so lavishly given has
been given wisely. 1t is a genuine and lasting
fame which such benefactOr secures-a fame
which cannot be lost save by the lapse of soci-
ETY. into its elemental barbarism. Far be it from
us to depreciate the worth of those who heed
the material wants of mankind, and, needing,
take care to supply them but he surely is more
worthy of unstinted appreciation who, by as
sisting in the progressive developments of the
human intellect, diminishes the chances of physi-
cal suffering and makes wrong and injustice
less probable in the time to come. The charity
which supplies an immediate physical want be-
gins and ends in its own bestowal; but he who
aids in eleyating by fit education the higher
nature of man, establishes propagation of in
teligence, and in the culture of the present gen.
Grafton makes probable the culture of many gen.
eratiOns to come. 1t is not strange that in
America, a country which knows hardly any
thing of the curse of pauperism, and in which
poverty can scarcely exist save as the penalty
of Incidence and folly, those rich men who arc
bencvolently disposed should give their money
to the cause of education-a disposition of their
superluous means which is made the more
readily from the widespread conviction that
our political institutions are based upon high
degree of public intelligence, and cannot be
maintained in its absence. Mr.. George Peabody
saw at glance the pressing want of the South.
and he fastened to supply it, while upon bis
native town in New England, which was already
amply provided with schools, he bestowed
library. Guided by the same spirit, Mr.. Peter
Cooper of our own city established and en-
lowed the institution which bears his name.
Both these gentlemen, in their lifetime, can
witness at least the foliage and the blossoms.
if not the mature fruit, of the trees which they
have planted. They can feel too, that they
are fixing precedents and setting a worthy ex-
ample which capitalists who may come after
them will be likely to follow. There can be
no purer pleasure than this. The tremulous
satisfaction of boarding and the isolated pride
of possession, the childish amusement of adding
dollar to dollar for the sake of the dollar only.
the triumphs of avarice, of which the very
qualification is itself a pain, what are these to
the consciousness of having unrolled the ample
page of knowledge, and melted that genial
current of the soul" which Perjury had frozen