The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-12-10

and universities should teach nationalism,
conservatism and Righteousness" The
Senator's address in full follows:
THE glory of all American colleges should
be that they produce citizenship as well as
culture. And of these citizenship is more
valuable than culture. Culture is important
citizenship is indispensable. Upon the IN
stallation of a new president or TINS lnst-
tuition of learning, we naturally turn 10 the
purposes of education in republlc-ror the
school Is the most active influence among
our American millions except the influence
OF the American home. From the council
that daily gathers around the American
hreside radiate those streams of wisdom
country sane and wholesome. But next to
the American family the school is plainly
the strongest force molding our destiny.
So what the school does is OF vital concern
to the Nation. The word school is used
as the broadest term for all educational in
situations.
of the Republic. That is true if the office
of the school in national life be ac-
curately understood and performed. But
in our hurried way we have taken educa-
ton to mean mere material and practical
instruction. Our general thought has come
TO be, Let us teach American youth geog
raphy, history, chemistry, and the country
is safe. Let American youth learn Latin
and the Republic is SAFE Let us raise up
race of Euclids and the Nation is Sc
cure
But is this a true conception of the
relation of school to nation? There were
few schools among the people when our
Nation was founded. Yet the national
spirit was never stronger than In the
breasts of the people whose purposes Wash
ington, Hamilton and Jefferson formulated.
Many apostles of nationality all through
our history have been men not of the high
est culture. The best and greatest of them
have not been men of finished education.
Con washington Lincoln Jackson n
other lands. OF course, some of them have
been the finest products of university train
ing. But this one truth is common to all
of them-they were inspired by faith In
their people. by the passion for national
solidarity, by devotion to high ideals of
their country's destiny. Each of them in
every land believed in the mission Of his
own people and that in some form that mis-
ison was and is 10 work righteousness in
the world
WHEN EDUCATION HARMS.
Mere learning, then, does not necessarily
make citizenship. knowledge of dead and
living languages, mastery Of the physical
sciences, instruction in higher mathematics
none of these in itself produces Patriot
| ism. And an educated man who thinks of
| nothing but his own success regardless of
| the common welfare is more dangerous to
a republic than an ignorant man, because
| he has more resources with which to take
from the common good for his own adj
vantage. Even If such a man is not active
| against the State and merely contents him
self by. leaving public affairs alone. his very
| example is a negative influence for evil.
| His less fortunate neighb0rs will say, If
| Mr.. -, with all his education, does not
bother myself about t.? IT,: And this " means
/ the beginning of the decay of the civic
| sense-that profound personal interest
which every citizen must have in the Nation
and its destiny il the Republic is to work
| out its theory and purposes.
| so we see that in a republic If the school
stops with Material knowledge, it has rem
| dered the nation no service. In monarchies
| it may be all right for the school to con-
/ fine itself TO science, literature, philosophy,
because such governments do not depend
upon the citizen as with US. But even in
mcnarchies we find the school nourishing
the national spirit The universities of
Germany inspire their German students
/ first, last and all the time with the thought
| of German nationality, German supremacy
But in America this is as much more neces-
sary than in Germany as the life of our
| Nation is drawn more directly from the
hearts and minds of our millions.
| 1T fs plain then, that the American school
must produce something more than book
| culture. The soul of our American instruc-
| ton must be American nationality; or rath-
| er, fundamental and world-righteousness
| expressed through the activities of the
"Your professor of chemistry will tell you
that science has been able to reconstruct
a grain of wheat with all OF the chemical
| properties in the exact proportion i'm which
| wheat. So far science can tell, abso-
| lutely nothing has been left out Yet this
grain of wheat which the chemist con-
structs will not grow. So in a republic the
| school which does not produce the spirit OF
nationality is a dead thing after ALL 1t is
the chemists grain of wheat, not Gods
I'm republic, then, the great mission
of the school is to create the national
spirit. The fruit of public instruction In
| governments like ours must be patriotism
Il nrOduCe uf
| yet If you have made him too dainty fol
the duties of citizensip, you have not only
wTeusht e~ TSe most hishy s aGfHa
| man of loftiest mind who yet has not the
political spirit is not as useful to a free
f tbe latter has tbe civic sense that Lac Lac
him take a hand in politics. For he is 8
good citizen and the educated exquisite Is
not a good citizen.
| MUST LIVE FOR THE NATION.
Your man of culture may march to the
Republics battlefields and die for the Ma
tion but that is not enough. He must live
for the Nation. If his education has lifted
him above the common duties of CITIZENSHIP
it has robbed him of his civic manhood
And civic manhood is the life Of a repub
lican institution.
Let us reduce this to the simplest terms
Citizenship means suffrage. So If the Re
I public is to endure every citizen must no
| only be willing TO vote; he must be willins
TO sacrifice business, convenience, comfor
and every other thing rather than fail {,
vote. We read with tears in our eyes tn,
heroic tales of the men who died to Civ,
US the right to vote; yet as we read, w,
too often neglect IL. Unfortunately, this Il
| true or many college men and increasingl,
true. 1t must cease 10 be true of ever
college man. His very equipment com
mands him to do more for the Nation thar
men less Cultured. Ana that means activit,
in politics; for politics is the metho,
through which our form of government
works. And politics means the machiner,
| or election as much as the formulation O
| politics which the citizen must pass upol
| at the polls So the farmer who answer
TO his political committee for the precinc
Is performing duty to the Nation. Blu
the person whose civic sense has been drug
| ged by the refinements OF a soulless educa
tion until he disdains such work Is a de
serter from the noblest duties and deares
| rights ever bestowed on man. The one de
tends the pillars of the Republic; the othe
applies 10 those pillars the acid of neglec
| which rots their strength.
| Excepting in national emergencies. O
when the political fortunes of some grea
public man is at stake, many people do no
| attend our republican government even I
the extent OF voting. And our republican
| form of government requires the same at
tention that the fields OF the farmer re
duires or the business OF the merchant O
the shafts OF the miner or the tracks an
!. engine of the railroad man. OF course.
even a considerable body of our people IA
to vote We have republic in name and no
in fact And so IL the spirit OF ctizenshi
Is growing dirn the holy flame must b
rekindled
"This is the business OF the school whe
|. A.. In. ~~l4