The University daily. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 18??-????, 1889-06-11
Annual Address before the Literary
Societies.

"A large audience assembled in
Commencement Hall last evening to
hear the literary address BY Hon. j.
P. Dolliver, NJ. @, d member Of the
class of 10.
DIR Turner introduced the speaker
in brief and fifty spoken words.
Mr. Delivers address was at once
eloquent, logical, philosophical, pro-
found-a thing Of masterful power.
For more than one hour, bis yigor-
GUS and polished oratory held the
larger attention Of the audience and
the time seemed all TOO short when
he closed amid hearty rounds of
general applause. II
His style is unique and inimita-
BILE. He speaks extempDraneo usly
and it is impossible for the editors
of this paper to give an adequate
report or even just outline of such
an address, from the hurried notes
that were taken. After aIfew happi7
" expressed personal "reminiscences,
Mr.. Dolliyer announced as his
theme The Relation Of the Moral
ty and Virtue of the People to Secu-
lar Politics."
We are rightly nation of politi-
clans. American babes are born
and created in an atmosphere con-
tinually blue with the smoke of POI
liitcal warfare. And we have been
greatly benefited by the Struggle.
Weput more practical wisdom into
practical politics than any other ma |,
ton, ancient or modern. The nine
teenth century has developed more
sound common sense in public at
fairs than all preceding time. With
valorous hand we have thrust into
slavery the old masters Of men, and
have achieved liberty Of mind and
soul and political estate. We are far
in advance of the Englishmen whose
most radical leaders are not now up
to the craftsmanship Of John Mil
ton. And yet in the Denmark Of
our politics something has always
been rotten. 1t has always been so
the world over. Lewis could say II
am the State and Napoleon could
declare that, with the armies Of
France behind him, he wax always
right. But royalty is everywhere
Idismantled. The. great, divine
thing We call The Age, and the
greater diEiner thing we call Our
Country have thrown OF the bonds
Of kingly tyranny. Men care not
now what comes to the palaces, if
only virtue and peace abide in the
cottages. And yet there are still
vast and ominous evils that threat
en- society in it's centres of popula-
tion. r. ...y.H t. 81. g.
Among them is ntiousness,
that monster of monsters, that Col
gotha which for centuries has re-
ceived the skulls Of men and women
cast out. by society and by the di-
vine law Of purity itself. Whole ma.
tions have been plague stricken and
ruined by it. eI 4%t
Then drunkenness is another aw-
full menace to political purity. Some
states, like the one to which I be-
long, have already ~outlawed that
great criminal of modern society
the liquor saloon. 4.
Then there are crimes against life,
citizenship, the ballot box, capital
and labor. The moral condition of
any country finds expression first, in
the character Of its laws, and then in
the vigor and business Of their exc
'cution. ~+ II f. / II T.. r.
When good laws are badly exc
cuted, when as in Cincinnati, the
very magistrates of law abdicate in
favor Of the criminal classes, virtue
and progress become impossible.
The mills of man grind slow, and they
grind exceeding course. #I
Forces which are to produce re
sponsible and worthy citizenship
must be found somewhere above the
court house and above the State
house. .s
Mere education will not purify so
eiety. 1t never has. In polished
cultured Greece, mad, awful internal
things were done within the very
shadow Of the academy and the
porch Infinite spaces may come
between what a man knows and
what he does. The dialogues of
Lucian, the defensive victims of
Cicero, the Medieval theatre and
the present political complexion of
France, illustrate this truth. Edu-
cation is right. Let all men have it.
! hope to live long enough to see
illiterate suffrage put away, and to
see this noble University a
well as every other in the
land, opened to all races and to both
sexes, as mere matter of general
right.
But secular education must not
| ignore the moral sense of mankind
must not put out the souls eye, and
then graeiously hold out its candle
to the minds eye.
l The world has struggled on in Pa
gan darkness from al mighty need
| to a mighty hope. And there were
voices in the midnightthat the sages