The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-06-04
Powerful Address to
Graduating Class.
Continued from First Page.)

You are rich IN mineral resources.
The wealth of your mountain ridges III
ores and earths which the world needs,
and the riches of your coalfelds have as
yet scarcely begun to be developed. Here
is an opportunity for the man OF aUalfs
who combines necessary knowledge Wlth
energy to make great advances ana 70
add greatly to the wealth of the nation
Have you ever reflected upon the IdcV
that the coast line of what are common
lly known as the Southern States greatly
exceeds in length the coast line or Ell
other portions of our land, If Alaska be
excepted. At a multitude of points alons
this line of coast are admirable harDors
THE invitation comes to you from the
highway of the seas to enter upon the
worlds traffic. AS the States OF the
northern seaboard face toward Europe, so
vour State faces toward the great con-
tinent on the south. richer far III un-
developed resources than India or China.
And when the canal through the lsthmus
shall have been finished and the dream
of centuries of a quick passage for ships
/ from Europe to Cathay shall have been
| by American energy and capital realized,
vour harbors will face not merely the con-
tinent on the south, but viii be portals
through which the traffic of this great
land will find an outlet to Asia and the
islands of the Pacific.
But what are mere material resources,
if there be not the guiding mind. the CON
trolling intellect, to utilize and employ
them for the good of man. Man is ever
greater than his physical environment.
The supreme care of the State should,
therefore be first of all to develop man
hood. The greatness of a community and
OF a nation is measured, not by the length
of its coast, the fertility of its soil, the
buried wealth in its hills and mountains.
the accessibility of its ports to the traffic
of the world but by the intellectual and
moral character of its inhabitants.
CAS- legislators your duty will be to see
to it that so far as possible the physical
well-being of the masses is concerned;
sanitary conditions not merely in school
houses, but in towns, cities and on farms
deserve the attention of the State. All
legislation looking toward the conserva-
ton and the improvement of public health
is educational legislation, which tends to
the lettering of manhood.
But it is not enough to aim at mere
physical well being. as you all know. The
supreme care of the State should be the
cultivation of the intellect. In this South
to be great you must see to it that her
people are educated and in pleading for
education here / plead for the education
of all the people within your borders, II
respective of race or condition. AS the
result of events in the past-historic
forces at work-your population here is
even as our population IN the region from
which l came composed of exceedingly
diverse elements. You have with you an
African race even as we also have 1T with
US. while we have added to it in asst
numbers an immigrant population coming
to us out of homes OF squalor and wretch
edness from all the dark and drear places
of Europe and OF Asia. Inherently &c
problems from an educational standpoint
which confront the South do not strike
me as being different from the problems
which we must meet in the North. What
is to be done is to so raise the average
of intelligence among all the people that
the institutions founded by our fathers
may be conserved and that the blessings
which they are intended to convey from
generation to generation may be reaped
in a happy, harmonious and prosperous
national life. Gentlemen of the Univer-
sity, the burden that is laid upon your
shoulders is the burden which is laid upon
patriotic Americans everywhere through
out our land today-it is the white mans
burden.
ut calls for the spirit of self-renuncia-
ton 1t calls for the outgoing of gen
erous kindness 1t calls for hope. 1t calls
for charity 1t calls for the spirit OF
brotherly kindness and of love. AS
Southern man, full of the high and gem
erous impulses of our race, l know that
when ] ask you young men in coming
years as patriots to plan and toll for the
uplifting Of all men among US, my plea
will meet a responsive chord in your
hearts. You will, in coming years do your
best, confronted with difficulties that at
times seem almost inseperable, to BRING
about conditions which will make the
lives of all men within your borders,
whether they be black, prosperous and
happy. / should do violence to all that l
knew of Southern men if ! were even to
insinuate that anything else could be
In the prayer that l was taught to make
at my mothers knee when l was a child,
was a petition in which / besought the
blessings of Heaven upon two persons
whose faces were black as ebony, vino
loved me and who, because they loved
me had a right to be remembered before
the throne of Heavenly grace when
pleaded for me and mine.
"Once again let me plead with you that
you will endeavor to secure the cduca
ton of the masses, intellectually and also
morally Mere intellectual culture without
culture of the heart is in vain. We shall
fail to do our duty as citizens of our
land if, having done all that we can for
the bodies and for the minds of men, we
fail to teach them the blessedness of
doing each to the other as he would also
that others should do unto Him. Young
men, standing with ardent brow looking
forward into the coming years, let me
ineite you by all the love that you bear
to our common land to be strong and
courageous. filed with holy purposes of
duty, actuated by sentiments of the
broadest mercy and highest philanthropy.
Yours is the blessed heritage of oppor-
/ tunity. God grant you wisdom and grace
to use these opportunities Alright to acquit
yourselves like men, and in the broad
arena of life so to discharge each task
that those who come after you may rise
up and call your memory blessed
Dr. yenable announced that the Hun
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