Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-06-21
ANNUAL EXERCISES
Fifty Sixth Commencement
of Gonzaga College.
MEDALS AND DIPLOMAS
ADDRESS TO GRADUATES By MIR.
MARTIN T. CoNBoY.
President Fink 0ficiates as Presiding
Oficer-oficers and Committees
in Charge.

OMcer-OmcerS ana committees
in Charge.
Gonzaga College held its fifty-sixth an
nral commencement last evening in the
| college theatef. and diplomas were award
ed to five graduates. They were Thomas
A. Cantwell. Charles A Joachim, James A.
Lawlor, Richard c. Law. ,r and Francis T.
Marsden. Orations were delivered by the
graduates and medals and prizes were dis
tributed to students attaining a high stand
ard of excellence in different courses OF
study.
The exercises opened at $50 o'clock to
the inspiring strains of Flotow's Overture.
py Samuefs orchestra. There were seated
on the stage, besides the members of the
faculty and a large representation of the
alumni association, many prominent guests.
including Mr.. Hannis Taylor, former min
lister to Spain, and Chief Justice Seth Shep-
ard of the Court of Appeals of the District
of Columbia, and Mr.. William F. Downey.
Rev. Edward x. Fink s. j., president OF
the college, presided. The address to the
graduating class was delivered by Mr.. Mar
tin T. Conboy. former graduate and in
structor at Gonzaga College, of New York
city.
Three orations were delivered. Thomas
A. Cantwell, who captured the elocution-
lists medal, discussed American Oratory
In the Colonial Era" 'The Period of
Transition" was the theme of an grafton
by Patrick A. Madigan. while the ma
tional Epoch was handled by Charles A.
Joachim.
Following the delivery of orations and
the rendering of "Cupids Garden by the
orchestra, medals and diplomas were
awarded by the president of the institution
assisted by Rev. John ]. Fleming. s. j.,
project Of studies and discipline. The Pho
clan medal, the gift of the class of '9S, was
awarded to Thomas A. Cantwell. The gold
medal for elocution, the gift OF the Do
minican Fathers, was also awarded to
Thomas A. Cantwell The gold medal for
competitive drill, the gift of the late Will
lam Gait. was presented to John ]. Nc
Carthy. The competitive drill silver medal
was given to Bernard O'Leary. A gold
medal was awarded Thomas A. Cantwell
for general excellence in freshmen's studies.
Silver medals for general excellence in the
academic class were awarded the following
students: First academic Francis T. Mars
den; second academic, Bartholomew p.
Costello: third academic. Thomas Henry
Springman.
Address to Graduates.
In the course of Mr.. Cowboys address to
tine graduates he said he had come back
to Gonzaga an. old boy, gathering inspira-
ilou lTom the SURROUNDINGS dUOuI MIN anu
renewing in familiar talk the most pre-
cious and tender memories Of a lifetime
While he was present to rehearse the mem
cries of other days he said he would plead
the privilege of older boy and take a
leaf or two out of experience that is so
recent as not to have been more than fair
ly initiated. The speaker declared that he
had become thoroughly saturated with the
spirit of the institution and was in every
sense a fellow student with a proper
l. 1aIp 80 hot ,y,,
probation of their prospective difficulties.
while you must work out your own sal
vatfon,' he said, "even without fear or
trembling, your most helpful lessons will
be the result of your own experience and
will be the result of your own mistakes.
1t is somewhat premature for a man en-
gagged in fight to pass an opinion upon the
relative impenetrability of armor in
which he is clad and the temper of the sword
he is welding, but even while the fight
lasts there must be certain contemplation
of the fighting equipment. and thus the
fighting equipment is sufficiently removed
from the personality of the wearer to make
1t an object of abstract contemplation.
1.-The fighting equipment of which l speak
is that which invests a man after he has
performed the work comprised within the
course of college instruction. No one ques-
lions that such education you have OBJ
tanned is not only valuable, but even es-
sential Every one comedies that a good
common school education is necessary and
1t is quite as generally conceded that an
academic course is equally desirable"
Higher Learning.
The speaker than went on to show the
advantage to be derived from still higher
learning and the clear, conscious view of
his own opinions and judgments which
college course gives the man battling with
man and human affairs. by this training
most college men have become better men
than they would have been had they not
gone to college. Their vision has been
cleared and widened and their aims have
been elevated. Not least of ALL they have
been taught the lesson so deeply needed to
steady them in our fiercely practical
roundngs that the making of good living
Is not important as the making of a
good life.
1.-The first element contributing to success
Is the intellectual element. The leader in
a great business primarily demands of all
the intellectual powers. the power to think.
The merchant and the manufacturer are
called upon in every phase of their BUSH
ness activities to employ the mental
operations of analysis and SyntheSis to
relate fact to fact and truth to truth, to
assess every fact and truth at it's proper
value to reason logically, to relate rule to
principle and principle to rule. to hold to
the necessary and essential and discard the
non-essential under variety of conditions
and circumstances.
1.-THE value of this training is not lin
tied to the improvement of the intellect
merely. Men who have gone out from
this school in years past If they performed
their tasks faithfully and conscientiously,
have carried with them strong wills, and
strong will makes much toward the
advancement of a man as does a clear in
tellect. In strong will are embodied am
bition, diligence, persistence, each of them
an Invaluable quality. These are by no
means novel views. To a certain extent
they are platitudnous but they are also
truisms that have been established as such
by the experience of every man who has
made the observation of his fellow-crea-
lures a part of his business
Three-Quarters Of Century.
This college has been in existence sew
cnty-five years. While this period means
but little in the worlds history, it is an
epoch of far-reaching Importance when you
consider that during every year of that
period 1t has launched upon their careers
young men who have brought to their work
and duties the trained ability of which I
have spoken. Every boy has left this school
an important factor in the welfare of his
community. Here his character has been
strengthened and he has beer, proundod ;r,