The sun., 1910-01-31
'NDWINTER BACCALAUREATE
pBESEDENT FINLEY SPEAKS AT
CITY COLLEGE.

TRIL
:" Guard the English TOng1e-sllD-
shop speech = Real Evil-Duty Of q
democratic College 10 Prevent II.
President Finley in his baccalaureate
address at the City College yesterday
turned somewhat aside from the GUS
,ornary line Of these sermons and devoted
himself 20 urging the young men to speak
veil and to guard and respect the English
tongue. Addressing himself TO the men
of February. lslO,' he said in part:
You must be missing this week the tradi-
tonal and delightful aCcompaniments OF the
Accalaureate ceremonies which your June
mothers know. But l want to help you
10 feel the JOY OF the commencement none
the less You will he pioneers of the new
tradrions in the American college calendar
and wish that you may make them happy
tradl ions.
Ihave wished many times during the last
three or four years that ] could find some
distinguishing name for you who go out
in winter, when one has to shake the snow
from the laurel in gathering even the leaves
for your graduation. But l have thought
Of none that will be permanently distinctive
In the procession Of the equinoxes your
February successors will some day III we
assume the continuance OF the college and
graduated under the star and zodiacal sign
of your June brothers and you under theirs.
And the procession OF our thoughts travel
lNg more quickly over this cycle OF 10, 900
years sees you all OF one company and under
one star and sign.
shall disappoint you when tell you
thai what | am thinking of is your duty
TO he English tongue, the tongue which
was mother to the first speech OF some of
xnh haa ha
mother TO others. For think of the signifi-
canoe of this miraculous mysterious gift
made as commonplace as light by use.
: Aoftsn u~ly and foul by abuse and frequently
hateful TO the ignorant or indOlent by its
grammatical restraints of law and custom
How important becomes the word-that
expression of yourselves ia which your
nesh becomes spirit and wanders free of
YOU TO work good or III in the earth among
men. And by its Importance am justified
in asking your special pledge of devotion
as / speak for the last time to you as a class
before you go up for your degrees, your
devotion 10 the beauty. the purity, the
integrity. the vitality OF the tongue in which
oil your knowledges are latent, without
which thought itself is impotent-to the
protection of this tongue from the sloven,
the ignorant. the vicious; to its ennobIi ng
among the arts. And IL Is not an appeal
10 a ion of mere forms. for words are
living things. since in them and by them
alone for most Of us can thought climb
10 the higher levels of existence and breathe
there
When the Gileadites stood at the fords,
the passa Res where the fleeing Ephraimites
would cross, they asked every man to pro-
'nounce the name for stream. and when one
could not frame to pronounce it right.
bur said "Sibboleth" instead of "Shibboleth h"
he was straightway slain. How fortunate
that the Gileadites in America. the early
Comers to this land. put no such phonetic
test at the passage TO this continent. II
they had neither your ancestors nor mine
would have come in.
| have come into a greater respect for
my tongue when | have heard il spoken
accurately and with distinction by one
who vas not to the language born, but who
lea rned il in democracy's school
! wish this were the whole story: that
lCould even be sure that il was the greater
part Of the story. But l shall not recite
thai remainfng part here this afternoon.
You have read some Of IL in magazines
IN educational journals and the daily papers
You have even heard some part of il in the
careless, slovenly. ungrammat.aal. form
I less, Inaccurate speech that occasionally
sssais your own ears. even within these
walls You have perhaps heard echoes
81 he cry in France and Germany that the
demoCratiCiZation OF learning has been
followed by deterioration in speech
This is a charge which a college supported
Of democracy must answer. There is much
10 he done but what has been done and done
50 srlsndidy can he done, yet only by con-
stsnt insistence on the part of the teacher
and hourly persistence on the part OF the
taught.
was reading last night in a recent maga-
zine poem several pages in length written
h. Helen Keller. both blind and deaf from
infancy. And when | realized IN this
beautiful example OF the written word what
zone could do who had neither sight nor
hearing and remem bered how accurately
t4,mechanically she uttered the spoken
word found myself having little charity
with the shortcomings tsome reputed and
some known of the American college man
u English
In book Of letters from Egypt which
Tread years ago remember that the writer
Lady Dun Gordon. tells Of a native of Luxor
who always made a prayer over her ink
bottle as he filled il with fresh ink | have
forgotten the words of the prayer, but il
was In substance such a prayer as | would
have said over every inkwell and can OF
that which the poor man of Luxor knew.
But would have a like prayer made daily
O. er the speech that goes from our lips,
that j. shall say what we mean, at any
1ate when We mean our beat. and that il
shall mean 20 others exactly what We say.
! would have you go out lovers of your