Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-01-01


We're proud, in this progressive age to rear
noble structure for nobler aim
Where earnest students lovingly draw near,
And tread IN "classic shade" the path to fame
BE this our hope, that in these stately halls
A broader, wider scope of thought shall rise;
That when the need of our great future calls
Responsive hearts shall recognize its cries.
We cannot tel. how wondrously sublime
The story We commence to-day may grow;
The scenes lie folded IN the coming time,
And only time its characters will show
0gr darling sons and daughters fair will find
Their places in the plot which years unfod;
Their genius, taste sand specialties of mind
Develop here to grace the tale when told
Fresh kInded eloquence will move the throng,
Aud silyerY speech will float upon the air;
Here hrst may soar the new-tedged bird of song,
Or, trembling, breathe the sweet confding prayer.
Art will awaken, stirring in the breast
jealous passion, ardent grand divine;
Struggin ing for birth, ambition will not rest
Til fame Or fortune occupy her shrine
Out from these scenes emerge our girls and boys
To battle IN the great worlds hurried strife;
A few in scholarly pursuits and joys 49,
The many in the rank and file Of life
The shops the trades, professions and the press,
Shall swell Their ngr25ers with these strong re-
Let hone5;t-S5urage aud true manliness
nN& well their training for these high pursuits.
Our girls viii brayely take up their career,
Wearing through AL true wOman's gentle grace,
The scnOO, the desk, or that more sacred sphere
OF home shall prove her tender loneliness.
Oar sons VIII WOO them. They'll be won and wed,
Their chidren's voices fill these halls anew;
The story told Of generations dead,
The old, sweet story, Will again be true.
So, on and on, beyond all human ken,
The tale unfOids, the deepning plot expands;
Its influence thrills where'er the sons of men
Abide, and lifts It's benedictive hands.
It's for such work we conseerate this pile
To help our youth heroic lives to know,
Whose tlses and brave ambitions shall beguile
Tolls hardel led hand ard sweaed brow of woe
| And this is onr5, the peoples work and care,
70 guard with jel Gus. watchfu honest eve
| The bloom and fruisage from this structure fair
| 0nr birtnright glory and our legacy.
| Hon. Alexander II. Bullock was then intro.
duccd to the audience.
ADDRESS OF HON. A. II. BULLOCK.
| dr. 5tayor-In promising the committee of ar
rangemens to bearan humble part in these exercises
| I did not mediate an attempt to add anything of
interest instruction to the remarks of others who
are familiar with the present system of schools
in the city, but aimed rather to manifest personal
sympathy with y0n in the reflections naturally sug-
ge.ted by this important occasion. The men, women
| and children of Worcester may Justly indulge in
mutual felicitation over the completion of this
building In point Of slghthness it affords needed
relief to thu somewhat ureary aspect of our public
architecu re. If il could have been placed on some
ODen square its proportions would have been more
easily appreciated, but even in its present situation
it cannot fail to be regarded as by far the hand.
soonest and most impressive building we have 1t is
| credable to those who have managed this work,
and to the people who have supported it, that this
local arclItecura superiority should have been re-
| served for house ofeducat1on. The finest modern
buildings in Europe, as class, are the railway sta
tiOn-houses the finest in New England by all means
are the latest sChOOlhouses. More than once when
passing by this edhce have thought how the great
reiormer of our school SYSTEM Mr. Horace Manu. If
ne could have lived tt see it, would have feased on
the sight should deem these ceremonies of dedca-
ton altogether incomplete without the expression
OF our grateful Obligation ior his great service in
| awakening the whole state to the actual and the
needed condition Of the public school buildings 1t
IS fresh in my recollection how the three thousand
sehO0lhouses of Massachusetts, in his time of red
gray and color at all, utterly inadequate and I'M
comfortable many of them indecent, were depicted
by HIM before his many audiences with such rhe-
torica arraya to excite the wonder of everybody
that they con d be what everybody knew they were
We are immensely indebted TO him for the incacula
Bile blessing OF the new era In this class of arch
! lecture.
/ have spoken of this occasion as an important
one and it would not be ezl travagant to pronounce
the browning event thus far the history of the
| place. I remember the difficulty we encountered
twenty-five years ago IN getting the former house on
this site, a cost Of twenty thousand dollars, and
| now so quickly ii is succeeded by another which
really looks like temple Of learning, costing
| hundred and sixty thousand This signifies not
| only great growth of the city, bnt expansion
| of the minds and the hearts OF the inhabitants.
And the dedication Of the house, the opening of it
for an enlarged aud reorganized high school, is be-
| any one has ever witnessed here. You scarcely
need to be reminded that you are a thirty-fourth
part Of the population Of the commonwealth, the
second city IN 1t, and that there are lii advance of
You only tWenty-nlne citles,-yOurs is the thirtieh
in the whole United States; and that by the trans
action of this day such a city and such a neople not
only dedicate the temple of their faith to the cause
of which 1t a symbol, but oOnseCrate themselves
in all their present relations and i'll all their rela
tons to future generations to the work of free pop
| par education SO far as your interest and those
| of your children are concerned, the event which
these proceedings celebrate more important than
could be the addition OF nall dozen new states to
our federal Union, or the eXtingushment of lead
| ing nationality in Europe, or entire change Of
| the map CT the eastern world,
| While the duty and policy Of common school edu.
cation - awakening in other countries an interest
meyer felt before u good fortune to occupy
| position Of two centuries of advanced progress iu
! the recognition and praed'e of the duty. Unlike
! the people of Austria we need no field of Sadowa
unlike the people Of France we need no overthrow
Of empire at sedan, TO turn thoughts, as theirs
arr now turned 10 the policy of general education
for national strength. Happily for us we do not
| even need any such tentative measures those by
which the people of Great Britain this very year
| trying to reach system of common schools, set in
motion by a no less wise and phlanthropic reformpr
| than Mr. William E. Forster, but as yet so impeded
| by the traditional prejudicas and antagonisns Of
religious seets as to leave the body polite agitated
and fretted rather than greatly benefited by the eX-
pertinent. We started more than two hundred
| years ago upon grounds which those countries are
just beginning 10 debatei the policies aud duties
just euuneiatcd by their wisest men, by i1eust
IN AulAil3j III FfAOcH, ana Forster IN
! England and not yet even successful there, have
| among Us long since been TyokOned as axiOuls and
truisms. Aud for the very reason that they are
| such tam1lr com nOn-plac9s IN our thoughts we
need as often ut least every quarter OF century
IN every state, in every city some extraordinary eX.
penditure and tax appeoling to pockets for the
maintenance OF oar principles some dedicatory SER
| vice more solemn tnan any before of some school
| temple more commOdlous and tasteful and impress
siye than any Deforeo recall to the felio-
ity oi our situation, the birthplace and the dwelling
place OF the free school system, the field of It's trle
| and It's triumph. TINS hour sets US apart to that
! appreciation. frequent recurrence to the estab-
lisnment OF that system will revive our love of It,
lessen the danger of departing from IT, and
! increase our lineraity In applying and extend
ing 1t. II Is great deal to say but trust that with
| ne you believe 1t-tuat everything good and ex-
| pInded and enduring here, which has come in the
! in5 OF inheritance from the. eoony of Massachu-
sets bay, dates 10 the founding OF its university,
| and to the law ordering a common school TO be es.
! tablished IN every town-and in every town con-
tainiDg hundred families, a school in which youth
! could "be ntted for the university"
| This then Is our landmark the law of 16i7-from
| winch we have never wandered away.
| "Ihere the sons OF thens set
The stone that freedom stands on yet"
| Every be-Jtroke from this conspicuous cock-tower
beats the cheerful echo of this age to that primitive
aud formative age when the principle now become
historical lrst cstablished,-h the advantages
| OF scnool educaiOn should be accessible to every
child il the state, and that the property OF the state
snOuld support schools enough 10 furnish the boon.
| in no other country before was ever anything like
tins 10 be found nor in similar degree in any other
! country 5luCa' III olutt NATIONS tlefe nave Deen
| many schools and universities, endowed from vast
private fortunes aud sometimes by the state esab-
| ii.hed not for the wide diffusion Of knowledge but
! for the luxury Of education enjoyed by limited
! number, and rather separating the classes OF men
| than conming.ing them into one brotherhood of
| humanity. Not such has been our historic policy,
| winch has aimed to make the development OF the
whole mind Of the state part ofthe public economy
and the knowledge Of every child a portion of the
| public wea Ia, thus rearing commonwealth upon
| lndespucuble foundations. The advantages of our
oase,in comparison with the other are stated Of
| the broad CONGRATULATIONS of Sir james Macintosh
that "a literature which 70 confined TO few may
be destroyed by the massacre OF scholars the
Migration Of libraries, wniie tue dilused knowledge
OF the present day co ia only be annihiated by the
| extirpation Of the eiyi zed part OF mankind" Let
| which Is founded on the conviction that
common school education Is distinct from
] university or collegiate education, The two coin