Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-04-13
Ambassador Bryce's Remarks.


lows:
No one can stand here without thinking
much and wishing to say much about
Thomas Jefferson. the founder of this
famous university. and next to George
Washington one of the two or three most
remarkable men that Virginia has given
to the United States and to the world.
Yet must refrain from attempting to de-
scribe his striking personality. This at
least may be said as matter of uni
versal agreement: Jefferson was a man
mind-a man of infinite curiosity and in
finite activity. Scarcely subject of in
quiry lay outside of the range of his versa
tile intellect. Whether you like him or
not, you cannot help being attracted by
him. Whether you think his influence on
America wholesome or pernicious, you
must admit that influence to have been
pervading and permanent. How far it is
still a really effective influence. amid cir
cumstances so unlike those which sur
rounded him, I will not attempt to deter
mine. His writings are no longer widely
read: his name Is more on the lips than
are his ideas in the recollection of those
who claim to be his disciples. But that
men should still call themselves his dis
ciples and should nearly century after
his death claim to be maintaining his ira
ditions Is remarkable tribute to his
gifts-a remarkable evidence of the power
he exerted on his contemporaries.
"Of all OF JefferSOn's ideas and projects
none lay nearer to his heart and none ue-
serve such unqualified praise as his faith
in education and his efforts to diffuse it,
He desired to establish a system of gen.
eral elementary instruction and to create
system of upper secondary schools cor
responding to the grammar schools Of
England and then complete the fabric by
a university whose aim should be COM
mensurate with all human knowledge and
which should recognize both in the vari-
ETY. of its studies and in the width Of the
field for selection among those studies. as
we'll as in the absence of ecclesiastical
control and even of coercive discipline
those principles of liberty which he held
so dear.
1T was fine and fertile conception. 1t
does all the more credit to Jefferson be-
cause most of the colleges of the United
States were In those days classical or
mathematical academies attached to par
ticular denominations and with narrow
range Of subjects, drilling their pupils
thoroughly, but drilling them on old-fash-
toned methods Ardently interested in all
sorts of studies. natural as we'll as civil
or hunanistic. Jefferson desired uni
versity which should take, as Bacon said.
should provide instruction in every SUBJ.
ject that men sought to study. This view
Of university-the cd true view of those
early middle ages when universities first
arCSe-naO Deen 1OrgOtten. we are so
familiar with it now that we scarcely
realize how novel 1t was when propounded
by Jefferson. and how much 1t transcend
ed the common notions Of those times
when in England Oxford and Cambridge
were just beginning to awake from their
long torpor. days during which it had
been left to the universities of Glasgow
and Edinburgh to keep ablaze the sacred
torch In Britain. Jefferson lit the torch
afresh in the south. In 1910 he tried to
secure a scheme for establishing popular
education. In 1904 he sought to transfer
bodily to Virginia the whole faculty Of
the University of Geneva. Never there
after did he desist from his efforts till
IN 1919 the legislature passed an act which.
while providing primary schools crowned
the ediffce by making an appropriation for
the University of Virginia You remembe
his own words: Our university, the last
of my mortal cares and the last service I
can render to my country