The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1891-05-19
SUPPORT OF COLLEGES,
President Dwight Says Their Main
Dependence Is Upon Men
Not Graduates.
Much Expected From the Scheme
of Annual Contributions
From Alumni.
Why College, Bred Men Do Not Enaow
1nstituti0ns-Ths MnniAcenco Of
Daniel b. ~Fayerwcather.

On0iol d. EAverWcNNuoTs
President Dwight of Yale University, in
his last annual report of the condition and
affairs OF the institution, lately distributed
TO the graduates. makes this suggestive OBJ
~servation: yale university, like all our
collegiate institutions, must depend very
largely for its success and development on
the generosity of mon who have not them-
Belves participated i'll its undergraduate life
during their early years." He goes on
to instance Joseph +. Sheffield, Henry Far
mum and Frederick Marquand as examples
of men of this class "who are among the
founders and builders of our university
All this is said in connection with common
dation OF a newly-organized scheme Of
annual contributions by the alumni to the
general funds of the university by which it
ia hoped to secure, in time, a very hand
some increase to their aggregate sum.
The reason why college-bred mon do not
and connot themselves found and endow
colleges is because they seldom accumulate
the means which enable them to make such
large gifts as are requisite for the purpose.
Most of them are all their lives servants of
the public in ways which do not result in
the accumulation of great estates. The
majority engage in professional work. as
ministers, lawyers. physicians, teachers,
editors, authors, etc., and are dependent on
salaries and fees which commonly enable
their families to live in prudent comfort,
but do not make them rich. They may do
much good in the world, and in some cases
they achieve high Office and noble fame,
but it is seldom the case that they obtain
the wealth which warrants ma king munih-
tent gifts. Therefore, if colleges are
worth having, they must be founded and
supported by those who successfully engage
in more gainful occupations.
College men we'll know what others who
have not carefully considered the facts are
disposed to doubt, that no student in col
lege pays for his education what it costs to
furnish it. AL! the students are charity
students, whether they pay tuition or have
it rsmitted, and only those render an ade-
quate pecuniary return who contribute in
other ways than by payment of their term
bills az they are presented. Ones debt to
alma mater is discharged. according to
his natural parents, by constant affection
n favor, by honorable living, and by do
ing for others what has been done for him
in some appropriate and adequate way.
The conduct of a college is not a business
for making money, but for wisely spending
-~OASJ GAVIN ~ q bHVOAAAO OAAas AVo p1AhVVCo
do not represent their own investment.
They are almoners of a bounty which they
do not supply and Of which they receive no
share.
Probably there is no investment which
makes better returns than the endowment
of institutions of sound learning; not, in
deed, directly to the investment, but to the
community. The return is not in the same
kind, but is transmitted into a higher kind.
The investment may be in gold, the return
10 in hpp ~ no utl .,>r-o, Nd ,A-o-
in public spirit, in conservative forces, in
saving wisdom, in sagacious leadership, in
noble example, in a pervnding refinement
of rmanners and exaltation of ideas. Not
all educated men are scholars or saints,
but if our world were suddenly deprived of
the guiding and ameliorating influences
which its educated men now doing their
work exert, it would be approximately less
civilized, more sordid and hopeless, and an
altogether worse living place.
In the report of President Dwight, to
which reference has already been made.
there is another passage pertinent to this
subject. Speaking of the extent and use
fulness of the late Daniel B. Fayerweather 8
munificent requests to many colleges,
amounting, with the additional appropria-
carrying out his expressed desires, to more
than four million. perhaps ultimately to
five million, dollars, he says:
ut Is a very interesting fact which has
come to the knowledge of the president
since Mr.. Fayerweather's death, that he
was moved to give so large a part OF his es-
tate to the higher institutions of learning
by his observation of the good which they
had done for educated men of his acquain-
lance who had begun life at the sane time
with himself. The testimony which the
lives of these men. and their success
in the way of the best achievement
seemed to him to bear was too emphatic to
be Inexperienced. The richest results
and the greatest influence of life were to
be discovered in the history of college grad
yates. These graduates by reason of
having shared in privileges of u peculiar
order, as, compared with others, their early
associates, had become, in the largest
measure, forces in the world for its we'll
being, and forces, also, whose effectiveness
for good was widely understood and appre-
in the generations following his own the
opportunities not enjoyed by himself,
which the colleges and universities may at
ford. Such was his declaration as to his
own feeling in the review of life, and such
his generous purpose for others whose
early years might. he thought, be
filled with light and hopefulness by
reason of what he could give Thorn,
The witness borne by such a man ut the
end of his career, and made doubly i'm
pressive by his princely requests, is of pc
culiar interest and worth in it's bearing on
the question OF the usefulness of college
training to business men,
1t is plain that Mr.. Fayerweather did not
measure success in the way of the best
achievement by ability to make money.
Probably the fortune no had acquired was
larger than that made by any college grad
uate whom he knew; but his action wit
nesses his recognition of higher s~atisfac-
tions in life than those of m~oney-getting.
He has made his great wealth perpetually
useful by deyoting it chiefly to increasing
t1hn - a,tol1,,Inl .AAs-..
!, of the higher education. So invested, it
will nay ANIMAL diyidands To nostaritu For