The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-06-25
THE CLOSE At BUTLER
DEGREES AYE CONFERRED ON A
CLASS OF THIRTY FOUR.
An Actress by Albion w. Small, of
Chicago University-CoIIege Stock
holders Elect Officers.

| The forty-second annual commencement
exercises of Butler College of Arts. Uni
versity of Indianapolis were held yester-
day morning in the college chapel. The
assembly hall and gallery were crowded
! with friends, alumni and students. The
members of the graduating class and the
members of the college faculty were on the
! platform. The candidates for degrees
numbered thirty-four, the largest class ever
graduated from the college. After the in
vocation and music by the orchestra,
President Scot Butler introduced the
speaker of the morning, Mr.. Albion w.
Small, Phi D., Ii. D., professor of sociol-
ogy at the University of Chicago, who
spoke on Opportunities for a Career"
| Professor Small said in part:
The zest of life to men conscious of la
tent power is not in the amount of work
| already done in the world, but in the
| amount still to do. A finished world would
deserve Dante's inscription over the gate
OF hell, All hope abandon, we who enter
here The illusion that herculean labors
have had their day paralyzes strenuous
| ambition. In place Of this illusion should
stand the recognition of the illimitable per-
| fectibility of human character and human
works. Illustration might be given at
length, on the purely physical side, from
| the increasing age of men in civilized coun-
tries in spite of the facilitating vices which
| civilization DEVELOPS on the mental side
| notice that the intelligence of the average
| schoolboy to-day is more enlightened about
many things than the wisdom of the philos-
| ophers of one or two thousand years ago
| FROM the moral side, see how in the
| progress of time, mass morality, repre-
| sented by the things tolerated or suppressed
| by the laws and public sentiment of ma
tons, has adjusted itself to broader con-
| ceptions and purer ideals. Mems improve
ment in the past has accomplished but a
| small fraction of what is possible. Our lot
is cast in the company of men whose scope
for achievement exceeds any assignable
| limit. The life of man is not 'cabin'd
cribbd or confined except by his own con-
tentment. The best things that men have
ever done and been are but the first notes
in the brief symphony of the splendid hui
man realization that is to be.
linen there is the companion fact full
OF spurs to ambition, the infinite delber-
ateness with which men appropriate sim
gle element of improvement. 1t was six
centuries before Englishmen realized on the
| 1nnvestment they made when they wrested
magma Charta from King John. Baptsts
ana Quakers as well as Jews and Cath
olIcs still live who can tell how long it
was after the declaration of the principle
before there was security of religious toll
Grafton. Five millions of inferior human
beings were made the legal equals, of
5OO00,O00 superiors in this country a gen
Grafton ago. But legal fictions cannot work
| miracles. The wisest teacher of their own
race whom L have met says that the limit
of his hope of success in his life work is
to get the people with whom he labors in
Alabama to stop swarming in one-room
cabins and begin to live like men in two
room houses. For a hundred years we have
had the right in America to be a self
governing people, but we are just getting
our eyes open to the fact that we have ac-
cepted the ballot, the symbol of liberty, as
a substitute for self-government, the ex-
ercise of liberty.
Il do not depore the fact that we are
not come into a complete world, but I cite
1T as an inspiration. We shall not lag SUI
perfiuous on the stage so long as we have
the power of work. There are too many
men in the world trying to do the same
thing but there are Jncompleted tasks for
more kinds of men than can be found to
perform them. One of the demons Of the
student life is the suspicion that there is
nothing left to kindle ardor and enlist de-
Votion; the suspicion that the worlds work
is so nearly done that there is no room for
a career-or perhaps worse, the fear that
mans remaining tasks are so hopeless that
it is visionary to sacrifice ones comfort
in Quixotic attempts to realize ideals. The
world is rude and raw and rough. Your
help is wanted to control and mold and
cultivate. If you can only fashion tallow
dips, the prospect is dubious. The world
is beyond great need of your handicraft.
If you can cheaper. or improve electric
lights, your help is wanted in a thousand
cities You may be Somewhat useful if you
drive stage coach or paddle sl1if across
a ferry, but few people have time to be
blessed by your Anticipated utility. If you
can improve a locomotive or make cleo
tricity available for long-distance trans
portation, your niche is all ready in the tenn
pie of fame. If you will become fit to do
any one thing better than it has been done
before, there are more demands for your
help than encouraged any earlier man.
Each age has its own problems. We
have inherited responsibilities which men
of the past never imagined and perpleX-
tiles from which the traditions OF the past
offer little relief. When the foundations of
the common law were being laid the man
who could write was granted special priv
ilegeS. Now the parents who allow their
children to grow up without learning to
write are criminals. When the Constitution
was adopted the man who lived a hundred
miles from London or Philadelphia or Bos-
ton and had visited either city was the
wonder of his neghborhood. In the year
1892 the railroads of the United States ham
died passenger traffic equal to an eXcur-
sion of one hundred miles and return for
every man. woman and child in the popu-
lation A hundred years ago, where mis-
cry existed it was unattached and unable
to charge itself upon anything more def
mite than the inscrutable will of the Al
mighty. To-day misery claims to be IN
partnership with affiuence. Under the old
regime it took years and often generations
! for consciousness of common grievances TO
spread itself over neighboring counties
To-day a thousand presses forge the mental
bonds of class opinion, that draw together
/
and the world.
'Modern men are bent on changes. They
are not rhetoricians, they are reformers, or
think they are. They no longer dumbly
| acquiesce in the supposed decree of provi-
dence. They are dissatisfied with our pres
ent social order and their criticisms OF So
cety are not groundless. There is nothing
extravagant in the assertion that the So
called better elements of our civilization are
hoping to hold the lusty wine of modern
ness in the old skins of tradition They
are trying to fit patches of eXpedient into
the old clothes of institutions. AS each
age has it's own problems, so each age must
have it's own wisdom philosophy. have
asked you to cast this sweeping view over
our unfinished world that its inviting tasks
might stir your blood and spur your am
bition. The brightest page in history ought
to I'll the blank reserved for the next gen
eration'S record. I congratulate you that
the lines are fallen to you in an unfinished
world Every institution of society signals
to YOU the appeal of the sturdy old apos-
lie. Quit you like men. Be strong!
DEGREES CONFERRED.
After the address President Butler con-
ferred the following degrees:
Bachelor of Arts-Willis Marvin Blount
| Clarence Abram Brady Lulu Belle Bre-
WORT Frank Thurman Brown Robert
! Alexander Bull, James Calvin Burkhardt
| Jessie Lanier Christian, Armstrong Bran
! don Clarke, Walter Clements Clarke
| Ethel Rous Curryer, Virgil Byron
| Cling. Samuel Allen Harler, Carrie Re
| becca Howe Chloe Frances Hull, Moddle
! Alice Jeffries, Walter Scott King, George
! Was hington knepper, John IhomaS Lister