H. B. Grigg

“ But "Humanity has two sides: one side in the strength and intellect of manhood; the other in the tenderness and faith and submissiveness of womanhood. Man and woman, not man alone, make up human nature." Gentlemen, will you whose lips have tasted of the "new joy ineffable" of the feast of knowledge, keep the nectar and ambrosia of that feast selfishly to yourselves and not invite to join you at the board the other half of your humanity—your wives, your sisters and your daughters? ”

“ If you are to succeed in your profession you must not only continue the study of engineering and architectural literature, and of drawings of the noblest engineering and architectural work, but you must cultivate this enthusiastic and passionate feeling which will give you eyes to see, and a brain to imagine things, which would never strike across the brain of the uninspired engineer. To be a great engineer or a great architect you must have a powerful imagination, and that quality can be cultivated like any other of our mental gifts ”

“ But, gentlemen, the act of your rulers was nobler by far—for they, when the mutiny was at the flood, with a splendid faith in their divine right to regenerate the people of India and to rule them that they might regenerate them, with an exalted charity and an unexampled liberality, founded, not for their own sons, but for the benefit of the very people whose soldiery were waging a cruel rebellion against them, not one University but three. ”

“ Now, gentlemen, it seems to me but sound policy that gradually this University should seek to gather within it at Madras a congregation of learned and scientific men as the centre of its corporate life. Without such a heart I do not believe that the body can ever become the centre of light and knowledge, and without such a centre I cannot believe that scientific thought will ever be established on a true basis in this country. ”

“ I have often, gentlemen, felt my heart fail me for the future of your people when I have observed how that not one teacher of English in a hundred has been sufficiently inspired with the love of know ledge to have armed himself for his life's work by studying the languages on which our composite tongue is built—but that instead they should be dreaming of passing examinations and tests which may bring to them a few more pitiful rupees. ”

“ In woman this aptitude for the perfection of some of the qualities of our nature is stronger and capable of a higher development than our own. To these virtues, the distinctive virtues of womanhood, how much does the world not owe? To the influence of woman is due in no small measure the exercise of those gentler virtues which have become characteristic of the most progressive races on this planet. To woman are they indebted for much of that reasonable spirit of self-sacrifice and obedience which is rendering the social, nay, the political, progress of mankind possible. ”

“ Even in literature you should have your own department, your own book-case, so to speak, in the world's library. But do not narrow your sympathies. Most of you will make your living in the Public service. That service more and more needs cultivated men, men full of the thoughts of others as well as of their own. If you would be useful in your day and generation, if you would leave the world a little better than you found it, make the acquaintance of great men in their books and never tire of their friendship. ”

“ Of the cultivation of the Beautiful through Literature I have already spoken. Bear with me whilst I urge on you to cultivate the other branches. The history of a people may be read in their arts as clearly as in their language. And no people can reach a high standard of culture, or fully develop the social and unselfish elements of its character, the aesthetic side of whose nature is left uncared for. ”

“ No one can feel more strongly than I do that, if the peoples of India with their numerous Vernaculars are ever to rise to a nobler life and to greater wealth, the proportion of those who know English must be ten, nay, twenty-fold of what it is, and be equally distributed amongst men and women; but no one more strongly believes that the great mass of people can never be truly regenerated until each Vernacular is made a fitting vehicle for carrying on that knowledge. ”

“ The ground-work of all higher education must be the study of the noblest thoughts and of the noblest exemplars of mankind. But no society can advance unless it has in every branch of scientific knowledge an adequate number of persons possessing such knowledge. Now the branches of knowledge, which at present are necessary, so far as higher education is concerned, seem to me fairly well represented by the various branches of study in this University. It is true that the necessities of the people are as yet simple, in that nine-tenths of the population live by agriculture, on a small scale. ”

“ You have laid the foundation in the schools of this University for the school of life. It is but the foundation. I know full well that temptations to a vain spirit are many and peculiar. You have come, many of you, from what you now regard as ignorant homes and you are surrounded too often by unenlightened relatives and friends, whilst a graduate in Europe would live amongst those whose knowledge and experience of life he cannot for a moment afford to disparage or dispute. ”

“ Your task is to fan this smoking flax into a flame, and thus like true lovers of your people to seek through scientific instruction, however humble, to do for the ancient industries of India, what scientific scholars are doing for its literature. And I doubt not with the marvellous manual dexterity, and patient industry of your workers, who love like true artists to linger over details which would weary the artizan of the West, that India may regain her place as the mother of the finer textile, and of other minor arts. ”

“ It may be too late for any but a few of you to study Latin and Greek, but I would advise all of you who intend to take to the profession of Teaching, or of Law, or of Medicine, to study one at least of these languages. Remember that admirable as is English literature, and powerful as is English as a vehicle of thought, you can, unless you know Latin and Greek, only get the thoughts of the peoples who were our spiritual and social forefathers at second hand ”

“ If you will keep only those which have taken the greatest hold upon your mind, even this is better than a wholesale passing by the plank of all the words and thoughts of the men, whose minds during the past few years you have sought to understand. Unless you continue your study of the language and its literature, your English education will prove of little use beyond providing means of earning your daily bread. ”

“ By Sculpture and by Painting mankind is enabled to body forth and express its sense of what is highest—its ideal—of the Beautiful in the world around. No nation can rise high in civilization which does not cultivate this divine faculty —nor can any art be satisfactory which does not gather into itself and reproduce what is most refined and best in a people's life as in that of the individual artist. ”

“ But assuming that this is not so—that woman is but "undeveloped man" and feebler intellectually and morally. Are you even so acting wisely in not educating her, in not strengthening her intellect, in not substituting principles on which to base right conduct for moral rules of thumb? It is the boast of the people of Madras that they of India's peoples have been the first to welcome the rays of this new gospel—for of the two hundred and fifty thousand girls who are under instruction in India one-third appertain to Madras although its population is but a sixth of the total population. ”

“ For it is folly to imagine that the rapidly increasing millions of South India can ever be English-speaking or depend mainly on English literature. The growing circulation of Vernacular Journals and Leaflets show how rapidly this demand for something to read is spreading especially among the Tamil population. Gentlemen, to whatever Faculty you may belong, if you would spread abroad some rays from your own lamp of knowledge do not fail to gain such a command over your Vernacular that what you write may be read and understood. ”

“ Architecture should appeal most directly to your sympathies. For what is it but the art of making the building in which you have to live and work, or to transact your public affairs, or to pray, as convenient and as beautiful as in the fitness of things it should be. ”

“ If you have imbibed any true love of English literature, and is there a soul among you so dead that it has not been stirred to its depths by some of the works you have studied, —you cannot part with these books without a sigh. ”

“ Thousands of young men, often artizans and labourers, are attending the language courses in the various institutes, such as the Working Men's College and that of the London Society for the extension of University Teaching — many of them — not to better their material prospects in life, or even to fit themselves for the peculiar work they have to do, but to cultivate their minds so as to live better the lives of rational beings and to drink deeper of the stream of knowledge. ”

“ In asking you therefore to develop on scientific lines your system of music, I am only asking you to add to your means of promoting the union and regeneration of your people, —and I would add of strengthening your human sympathies and your sense of order and proportion. ”

“ Therefore I urge you to take your fitting place in the work of levelling down your knowledge, and of permeating all classes of the community, from the conservative temple Brahman, to the poor extern Pareiya, with this new leaven of light. Your duty seems to be clear, if you accept the doctrine that a people rightly taught is more industrious—more productive and happier than a people untaught, or wrongly taught; that the ryot, the artizan, the cooly, who can read and cipher, will, other things being equal, be a better ryot, a better artizan, a better cooly than he that can do neither. ”

“ But much remains to be done, and it rests with you, gentlemen, to supplement the liberal action of the Government and the work of benevolent societies, by helping to break down the conservatism of the large sections of society which at present form the great obstacle to the progress of these poor and unreasonably despised people. I say unreasonably because there is ample evidence, witness the Madras Sappers, that when given a fair chance in life they can prove themselves valuable members of society. ”

“ It was Created with the intent not only to provide a course of study, which should prepare you adequately to fulfil your high calling, but also to add dignity to your noble profession. It is strange in a country in which the Guru is regarded with the greatest reverence and is not permitted by public sentiment to barter his knowledge for fee, that the teacher of knowledge on new and scientific methods should be so little esteemed; and that a profession, on which the future of India so greatly depends should attract to it but few of the best of the rising talents. ”

“ To this sentiment is chiefly due the erection of some of the noblest buildings in the world,—Churches, Palaces, Courts of Law and Houses of Convocation. Music you have cultivated from generation to generation, but as yet it has only reached the point at which the Greeks left it. And now it remains for you to add to melody harmony, without which Music can be but the art of the individual. Melody is the most perfect expression of emotion, for where words end music begins, but without harmony music can hardly be a great social cementing force. ”

“ Every day the world is recognising more fully that the education of the rising generation is the chiefest among duties, that "the child is father of the man," that that work is the most difficult problem society has to solve, and that its solution depends rather on those to whom you actually entrust the teaching, than upon the literary knowledge imparted. Your profession is not therefore one that can remain ill-esteemed. ”

“ It rests with you, gentlemen, by requiring for, and affording to your women the highest instruction in knowledge, especially in those branches which chiefly concern their side of humanity, to make these "hues of the rich unfolding morn" brighten into a glorious flood of sunlight which shall illumine the homes of the poorest and meanest of your people. ”

“ Law embodies the energies of social-life. By its operation the old civilization of India is giving way to the new, not so much as the result of the written laws of your legislators, as by the new ideas and new sympathies of those who administer justice, and of those who are directly or indirectly connected with that administration. How great then is the necessity that you, who will be in a way leaders in your profession, should by continued reading and studying of the best masters, fit yourselves for this beneficent work. ”

“ Have you seen a tree produce more fruit by special cultivation? Try the system. Do you know that certain sanitary regulations ensure the health of a household? Prove your faith by adopting these regulations. This experimental attitude of mind, spreading through the people,— will work changes in their economic and industrial proclivities, which will not only ensure vast increase and greater variety in India's productiveness of raw material, but also wonderfully develop her power of converting by the labour of her own people these products into manufactured articles of commerce. ”

“ But you should be for ever grateful that the scheme of higher education marked out for you was at once modelled on more scientific lines than those which till then prevailed in some of the leading Universities of Great Britain, Your fathers were not limited to instruction in ancient Languages, and Letters, or in Mathematics, but they were at once given a course which compelled them to study not only Language or Mathematics, but also History and Moral Philosophy, with an option of either Natural Philosophy, Physical Science, or Logic and Mental Philosophy. ”

“ It must, as knowledge advances, be held in greater honour. With you is the future. Prepare yourselves for it, by learning, by virtue, by industry, by sympathy, by unselfishness; and seek to win for yourselves that place in public esteem, which is now held amongst the great mass of the people by the Guru. ”

“ It is for you, wherever you are placed, to seek to establish schools, and to make these schools as efficient as possible, and to help by your example and by your work to make the people believe that what is being done for the education of their children is for their good, that school training sharpens the intellect, strengthens the reason, and produces better manners. ”