The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1900-06-12

All Audl dA1 VNO4.Nr1E dA4
that devotion and saving and turning of
old clothes can do has been done. The
great need now Is not 10 crimp and save
but 10 get something to spend wisely for
large growth. Enthusiasm and faith will
not equip Laboratories nor build univer-
siries. We need to know that one hum
dred thousand dollars a year is a very
small income for a modern university.
In the East and Northwest. institutions
are not taken seriously unless they have
that much force behind them. The south
that we may rise sharply from out n
plains, ample and even magnificent. so
that the world may know that this is in
deed the eldest child OF the state. so
that PHILANTHROPY may feel sure of its
gift. so that new departments may be or
gained, old departments may De renew
ed.new teachers employed, worthy teach.
ers better paid. the spirit Of hope and
assured growth spread about
This is the work to be done by the alum
nj and friends of the university guided
and inspired BY the administration. To
that end the executive should be freed
from small details and given some time
TO think. to speak authoritively on edu-
cational questions, TO move helpfully
among the people, to mould larger poll
cies, to represent fully university cul-
uure at home and abroad. And to that
end the alumni should band themselves
together in tight and strong organiza-
tons along the lines suggested last year
and to be further elaborated tonight.
The enormous and sentimental and prac-
~ lOItC VI NDAS SAOoN bOA A44Slrdu VI
wasting itself in memories and ooastings
and amenities or bewailings should find
itself. and know itself as a weapon in
every community, well-knit to alma
mater and clear Of purpose to beat down
opposition and cause this great. noble
state TO sustain and strengthen the in
stitution that gave them their i~ntellec-
tual liberty. Thousands of men who do
not call it mother, but who have got the
religion of public spirit and state pride
will lend a hand. And there is no despair
in tho fnSE or fn NV hear ~ daar r;.n1c
as TO the final results. 1t is absured TO
say that this state will not do the large,
just thing by its institutions when it
knows just what that thing is and our
people have a good Old fashioned of sub
uniting to being talked to. The state is
too great and sagacious not to do right
and the university is too worthy not to
deserve right treatment. There is needed
boldness but kindness of speech and an
end forever to the apologize manner.
The state has a right to build up its un-
iversity. The man that says that it has
not this right is speaking puny words
against a spirit as strong a. COM
mon sense, as solemn as the instinct
of self preservation and as resistless as
the winds of nature. And it has the
wealth to do it too. A new state has
been born in these twenty-five years.
This is not the state that lay barely
convalescent from the fever OF war,
struggling to endure without energy in
law or order in society, when Graham and
Steele and Cameron and Battle and Saun,
oSIS dIIu IlllllpS dLu NllSNOl dIO
Graves and Manning and a hundred
others plucked these buildins from grass
and weeds, and with hope and self
denial as their comrades sought to make
a university with an income of venty
five undred dollars a year. North Car
DINA has become a great industrial COM
munity. The frenzy and fever of accu-
mutation has gotten into its blood. 1t
has learned the hang of industrial sue
cess stolen from it's fathers while they
slept under the deadening touch of slav-
and spindles and whirring saws and
clacking machinery come the shouts and
songs of power and success. Wealth has
come. and il this state with its central
position and breed of strong men. permit
states to the north of it and states to the
south of it to develop their intitutions,
while this stratgetic possibility with its
beauty, with its heroic past is left to
starve in mediocrity and not turned into
a great actually with a splendid pres
ent, this neglect will be the saddest in
stance in the history of democratic coun-
tries, of a failure to use a great, God
given opportunity.
1t has seemed to me to be my duty to
set my hand to work elsewhere in this
southern land. With what sadness and
regret 1 have elected to do this thing, ]
may not speak, but may believe that eve
ry good man sympathizes. / have come to
know afreSh, dear friends, that this is
quite the pleaSantest spot on earth to me
Here l first learned the secret of love and
mere L have made acquaintance with
Siltl. I1eIe lHe scholar > lie ITSI showed
itself admirable and fair to my eyes.Here
In company of unselfish men and ardent
youth 1 have done the days work as the
days went by. / go TO wide and honora-
bic labor, but all the fine aspirations OF
my heart shall. al all times, stretch their
hands h~itherward and lift up their eyes
to these hills for help-in the grim win
ter, when the sun b.aZes against the
panes of the severe Old buildings; in the
soft spring, when ~greenness and bloom
ing falls like magis about the campus by
u We in rho Pm rIp,n r-han -hl -
pie leaves fam red, like fire, in the
eager air. May God put it into the brain
and purpose of our people to cherish this
great school. so that their honorable
men may not be famished and their mul-
titudes dried up with thirst"