The news & observer., 1905-05-30
University One Hundred,
and Tenth Commences
ment.
Continued From Page one.)

1t is dismal prospect which lies be-
fore the man who has no vital and
satisfying relation with Him who is
the origin and center of life. He is a
fragment disconnected from the
whole; a planet without a sum- wand
ering through empty space, but held
to no orbit by central gravitation, un-
warmed, unlighted, unvitalized, having
no part in the music of the spheres,
a menace to the glorious system of
circling worlds, colliding with other
sunless wanderers of the universe and
plunging at last into the unlit depths
of the vast abyss.
TO save man from this frightful mis-
carriage of his whole life and to bring
him into right relations with the
spiritual universe is the definition of
his mission which Jesus gave. To eX-
ist without these relations was in his
thought to be without the true life.
There can be no right relation with
any part of our environment, not even
the material, so long as we are not
properly related to that unseen Pres
ence which fills and animates the
whole. Have we not misread the mss
sage of the skies if we do not per
ceive that "the heavens declare tHe
glory of God and the armament show
eth His handiwork?"
And what shall we say of the science
which not only does not see any trace
of the divine presence nor hear the
"Still small voice" anywhere, but actu-
| ally leads the mind of student
| through all the splendid avenues of
the material universe and up the great
| highway of mans history, whose mile
stones are the mighty tragedies of The
human conscience, and at the end
chills the glowing soul of the youth
with the declaration: There is no
God?" Listen to the sad exclamation
of Professor Clifford made in the mid
night of his atheism: I'VE have seen
the spring sun shine out of an empty
heaven to light up a soulless earth;
we have felt with utter loneliness that
the Great Companion is dead" Truly
our life is crippled, yea, mutilated by
mal-adjustment to nature itself, If the
sciences do not become "the altar
stairs that slope through darkness up
to God"
Science is untrue to it's mission and
cannot minister to the larger life un-
less it's last word proves to be the first
word Of revelation: "In the beginning
was God"
This is the true conception of edu-
cation. 1t is a spiritual process; or il
is perversion and mutilation of life;
and life is the supreme good.
With all thoughtful men we ought
to rejoice at the practical tendencies
everywhere manifest in educational
work BY all means let it be practical
But what do we mean by practical
education 2" DO we mean simply that
it is fitting man to be better wealth
producer? 1t is well to make money.
1t is a perverted view of life which
affects to despise it, 1t is a part Of
our task in this world to utilize the
products of nature and to stimulate
the earth to yield yet more to supply
the material of man; to make our
fields green with corn or white with
cotton, to increase the roar of our
machinery and multiply our smoke
stacks. But, if that is chiefly what
we mean by practical education" we
are in imminent danger of making edu-
cation the handmade of materialism,
of making our schools the moulds in
which a small and hard materialistic
life shall be formed.
That is practical education which
gives a student an introduction to life;
and that is the most practical which
introduces him to a proper and pro-
portionate correspondence with all
reality. Perish the education which
mains the life.
TO make life spiritual, to study ma
ture and history in such a way that
the beautiful tender and yet awful
seen to penetrate every atom and
event of the universe to lead the soul
along the paths Of nature until they
shall open out into the expansive pros
poets of the spiritual realm; to train
the emotions until the reverence and
love of the holy shall become the
habitual attitude of the heart; to dis
cipIine the will until the obedience TO
the mandates of the highest shall be-
come its normal action-such is the
supreme privilege and duty of educa-
tion as it is of religion
Judge Il. w. Ninston's Address.
Before coming to the subject of his
toast, Judge r. w. Winston expressed
his qualification that an inter-society
banquet had been inaugurated at
Chapel Hill. In France the banquet
and the Fourth Estate are the hand
maidens of Revolution, when need be,
but in rolicking America, a banquet is
never taken seriously, said a famous
English bishop to his jOcular friend
on q celebrated occasion. Lets be
serious, here comes a fool" May
classic nonsense and social interest
cluster around these annual banquets
until, like the Kit-Kat Club of John
son and Garrick and Burke, it's origin
is lost i'm antiquity. One serious thing
the speaker would ask the privilege
Of saving, how long will the Univer-
sity be shut out from the light of civil
lization, except its own benign rays
by reason of its inaccessibility: He
declared that he would rather have
the seven years itch than ride over
this affair, miscalled the University
railroad, and he called on the trus-
tees to put themselves on record in fa-
vor Of well equipped road with
frequent schedules to Durham and
future commencements will be well
attended, q thing of beauty and joy
forever. Surely a University that can
lower Virginia's colors deserves some
thing better The subject of Judge
Winston's address was:
TIE Point of View.
And he developed the idea that one
must have the correct point of view
If he would succeed. He quoted at
length from Horace Fletcher that all
of the evil passions are traceable to
two roots-anger and worry. Anger
is the root of the aggressive passions
and worry, the root of the cowardly
passions. Eradicate these and the
point of view is clear and unobstruct-
ed. Seneca says that anger is like
rain, it breaks itself on that it falls
upon. The chief little devil in the
blood of anger is envy. Who has not