Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1872-05-09
THE GREAT MEMPHIS UNIVERSITY.

THE GREAT MEMPHIS UNHNERsITh'
The convention which determines the
future site Of the Southern Baptist Uni
versity sits at an early day in Raleigh,
North Carolina. Baptists of this and
adjoining States have promised To Gre
ate fund of two hundred thousand dol
lars. ON condition that this potent Chris
tian denomination establish at this city
a magnificent university. 1t is not
merely a college in which young men
are prepared for ordinary business avo-
cations, and simply taught how to 60
about the task of seeking information.
On the contrary, it is proposed to edu-
cate instructors Of youths, and to train
men for tie active avocations of profess
sional and business life. Schools of civil
engineers and mechanics and for the
training Of preachers viii eOexist, and
the purposes proposed TO be achieved by
jefferson, when he founded the Uni
versity of Virginia, are contemplated
by excellent gentlemen who would en-
dow a university in the suburbs Of
Memphis. Why this site is selected by
the Baptists of the South for their IA
vored seat Of learning will be apparent
when we reflect that Memphis is the
central city Of the South. Not many
years ago, Pittsburg and Richmond
were centers of American wealth
and population, but the majority of both
have crossed the Alleghanies, descended
the Ohio and Tennessee, and the tide of
emigration crosses the Mississippi, and
i now building railways and cities in
Arkansas and Texas and in multi
piled States west of Missouri. As st.
Louis becsmes the capital city Of the
Northern States, even so Memphis be
comes the metropolis of the South.
Give US just and equal governments, les
sen countless numbers of Office-hOlders
Of all conceived sources Of power that
prey upon Us, teach people to rely
upon themselves and not upon offices
for support, reduce intOlerable burdens,
horrible legacies bequeathed us by
BrownlOws, Scots, Claytons, War
moths, multiplied robbers of desOlated
States, make Greeley President and Re
form the watchwond, and Memphis
will become as proud a capital, bOasting
Of richer resources, of wider, more exu-
berant commercial domains than any
central American city except st. Louis.
st. Louis fiourishes and grows apace be
cause every eXtraneOus force Of
commercial power, good govern
ment, wisely administered laws
and comparatively light public
burdens promote the matches eity's
prosperity Memphis grows, even with
greater relative rapidity in wealth and
population, despite every possible obsta-
Gle which unwise government, countless
Office-hOlders, and burlensOme systems
and codes, inf.ct. Our lawgivers
have not moral courage to apply the
knife of thorough reform. They find
themselves paralyzed by the clamOr of a
mighty combination, welding the
wealth Of the State. Whenever they
propose to cleanse the Augean stables,
bywhich Brownlow and Grant fed their
long fetlocked cattle, all the bulls Of
Bashan and of Wall street below.
But the age of reform has dawned upon
the country. The energies of the people
will be endued with unwonted
vigor; public burdens that now ex-
clude wealth from Memphis, and from
the South, will be constantly lessened
in magnitude, and natural, geOgraphi-
cal, climatic and commercial laws will
he suffered TO exert their force, and
Memphis must become the chiefest city
in the Southern American States.
The founders of this University would
have themselves deemed statesmen in
the coming yearsof American grandeur,
glory and good government They
should reflect that a Southern University
worthy the name must find its resources
on either side Of the inland sea j." that
divides the empire centrally from the
Great Lakes to the Mexican Gull, and
the potent denomination that under
takes the .benefeent task Of upbuilding
such an institution will win little fame
for prescience if it defy geographical,
climatic and commercial facts which
make Memphis the central metropolitan
city of the Southern States. II the
learned divines who propose 10 fix the
location Of the Baptist University would
win honor for themselves, and found an
institution that may become an endur-
ing monument to their own and the
cOuntry's greatness, they viii lay its
corner stone on the heights
on which Memphis stands, at the head
ofperennial navigation on the Missis-
sippi, where the ice-king never inter
diets commerce, and where railway
builders have already compelled the
conveyance Of the railway system Of the
South by the achievement Of the task
of bridging the lowlands Of the
Mississippi. There is no other spot
fit for the establishment Of an Univer-
sitv Of the South, and its endowment at
any other point would be effected with
the consciousness that every natural
law governing the aggregation of our
race points TO Memphis as the central
seat Of commercial and intellectual
power in the South. The Baptists must
dig here the foundations Of their mas