The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-05-18

was heartily applauded.
1nen Df' Nann announced the names
OF the young ladies who had been
awarded certificates of proficiency in
the business department. as follows
each one going forward and receiving
nef diploma as her name was called
Misses Margaret D. Allen, Daisy
Brooks. Maine E. Gardner and Sue
Hortense Watkins.
Ceftliicates in china painting were
awarded to Misses Hester Allen and
Sarah Elizabeth Highsmith.
Inc degrees of Bachelor of Arts
were then awarded to Misses Carrie
Lee Booker, Laura Virginia Cox. Lizzie
Il. DIXON, Virginia Adelaide Eye, on
-, margaret ferguson, Isabelle Gulicy
martina Haynes and Maggie Nay
Lewis.
DR.. IL. T. Vann.
Or. Vann then delivered his fare-
Wen ADDRESS to the graduates.
He said in part
VINO and what are YOU? For one
thing, you will henceforth be number
ed among women; young women, with
much of the spirit of girlhood and
something of girlhood's lightness, but
still women, holding womens places
and responsible for their achieve
ments. You are educated women to
Whom much has been given and of
q.
are Christian women, to each of whom
life has come to mean something more
than meat and the body more than
ralment. You belong to a section
and State set apart by certain mark
ed peculiarities.
The age upon which you have fall
len is in transition. Passing by the
lneW social and economic conditions
the heartless competition that re-
| D1OrSplnSGlV CT
sensuous commercialism that para
lyses spirituality, we may concern
ourselves now with just two distin-
gushing signs of the times.
First, unprecedented intellectual
expansion, especially in your own
State The people are aglow with an
educational fervor. Beginning some
ten years ago among few elect souls
/ with vision clear and far, it has swept
the State, more slowly but as steadily
as a prairie fire. The decrease of our
illiteracy from As to rs per cent in
the last twenty years, the rise of the
state three spaces in the educational
column of States in that time, the
popular demand for teachers of learn
ing and character for the common
schools, instead of the stupid SlOthS
of former years, the building of new
and well equipped school houses at
the rate of more than one for every
working day in the year, the 81 per
cent of increase in the enrolment of
the public schools, the multiplication
of academies and colleges, with con-
stantly rising standards and growing
| patronage-what do all these mean,
| but that we are passing under the
empire of mind, and that the trained
thinker is to dominate the future
| Nor is this tendency manifest only in
the study, the forum, the pulpit and
the legislative hall The colossal
business combinations and the I'm
lparalleled achievements in mechanical
and scientific inventions proclaim the
primacy of the thinker. The de-
mand for education is entering the
trades, and even the kitchen. a rail-
road iron is dug 'out of the earth in
crude ore, smelted, rolled into shape,
and shipped ready for the track, with
out the touch of a human hand, all by
| scientific machinery. The average
cook can saw wood, wash, iron, milk
and cultivate the garden as well as
cook, and commands sometimes as
| much as Sc month, because he can
do nothing well. a certain cook in
| New York city, a man of culture and
an accomplished chemist, undertakes
nothing but cooking, but he can cook
| because he has learned how. He
commands a salary of $4,000 year.
/
eral culture. There is never much
depth without considerable breadth,
whether in the study or on the farm.
! The man behind the pillow has found
out that farming is no longer mere
routine, but has taken it's place
among the sciences: for God will not
| let things grow under the hand of
| Incidence and ignorance. Indeed, as
some one says, agriculture is thought
germinating a steam engine is
thought in steel; a great steamer is
| thought on the wing; a printing press
is thought inspired; a telegraph in
strument is thought on fire This
intellectual growth has not been rapid.
The tide rises slowly but it is rising,
and some of you will live to see the
| incoming of the fullness of the sea.
THAT other characteristic of the
age is Altruism; the mind to consider
| the things of others, the heart to
pity, and the hand to help. Schools
| heavily endowed for the benefit of
| the poor, reformatOrieS for criminals,
houses Of refuge for outcast men and
lost women, homes for orphans, socie-
| ties for the protection of children and
animals, are all products of this age.
And whatever ones views of certain
l modern business methods, he must
have observed that to a degree I'M
dreamed of in other ages, great for
tunes are being layished upon the
poor, the helpless the ignorant and
the fallen. The money thus invested
in the last eleven years aggregates
nearly $70O,OOO,O00.
| Three courses are open to you:
/ Cd Resist and be submerged in the
whelming flood; CD fling yourself on
the current and float with the stream;
/ CD set yourselves earnestly to the
task of swelling the tide. The first
course you would not dare; the sec
ond you might selfshy prefer: the
third your high calling Will compel
you to adopt. AS young women with
the best of life before you, as Chris
tan women, as representatives of this
institution, no honorable alternative
lis left you. If you have considered
education as only a means of liveli-
hood and self promotion, your view
has been narrow and low. While
both these ends have been secured,
you were trained not only to make
your own lives happier, but to make
other lives better. You are to shine
not to dazzle and discourage, but to
illuminate and inspire. You are to
teach the world. what some have not
vet learned. thar the So1Il of n biorIn