Bartle Frere

“ No one, I hope, would ever dream of comparing it as a language in completeness, in copiousness, or in all that constitutes the perfection of language, with Sanskrit; but while there is a large majority of Indian youths to whom the study of Sanskrit is natural as the classical language of their country and mother tongue, there are many for whom it has no special fitness, compared with a language like Latin, which has for centuries been the classic language of all the great nations of Europe. ”

“ At the time when our present system of modern European education was yet in its infancy, no scholar ever dreamt of aspiring to eminence till he had not only acquired by reading all the learning within his reach, but had seen the manners of many races in the cities wherein they dwelt, and had exercised his own intellect in personal contact with all that he could reach of the great and wise in other countries. This passion for foreign travel has gone on increasing among all the advancing nations of Europe down to the present day. ”

“ It may be necessary to wait with patience till the prejudices which prevent the gratification of this most natural and wholesome form of education shall be counted among the things of the past; but it would be an insult to the intellect of India at this period to suppose that many years can elapse before men will think with something like incredulity, that it was ever seriously contemplated to treat as out-castes men who had sought to improve their minds by foreign travel. In this as in many other respects the Parsees have shown themselves worthy to load their fellow countrymen ”

“ But certainly India in the 18th century would never have struck a traveller, as we are told it did in the 14th century, as remarkable for the just and equal administration of the law, and I cannot call to mind any single instance in which any nation of modern India could boast of regular courts of justice, possessing the characteristics I have described, as open to all, independent of all external authority, and professing to administer to all alike one known and uniform body of law. ”

“ These gifts were not legacies, given when a man can no longer himself enjoy the wealth he leaves behind him. They are gifts by men in the full enjoyment of life, and keenly alive to all the pleasures that life and fortune can give, but living among you in a simple unostentatious fashion, and setting to the younger members of their community as good an example of steady application to business and unaffected plainness in habitations, dress and manners, as they set to all India in the princely munificence of their benefactions. ”

“ The graduates of this University have now opened to them with a far better prospect of attainment than any other part of the educated youth of this country, the highest posts on the Judicial Bench, and an influential share in the most important functions of the public administration; but I need not remind you that no man who is indifferent to the advantages of a liberal education can hope to fill with dignity or efficiency a seat on the bench, which has been occupied by Macintosh or Sir William Jones. ”

“ The Moulvie who can repeat the Koran with half its commentaries by heart, the Shastree who is a living library of Hindoo literature, men who had long passed in their own courts as miracles of erudition, may find in the young scholar who comes fresh from the teaching of Germany or England more profound knowledge of their own sacred books than they themselves ever dreamed of. ”

“ I hope that many of them will avail themselves of the aid so liberally offered them by the benefactors of the University to travel and perfect themselves in our great practical English schools of law. They will there be struck, as early travellers from our own country used to be struck in India, by the spectacle of a whole people among whom the law is paramount. ”

“ It is no light task which the English Government set before itself to provide laws and suitable tribunals to administer them to so many millions of men; for you must remember that such tribunals as the British Government proposes, require not only a judge to sit on the bench, but a trained bar, and a knowledge of the general principles of the law and practice of the tribunals very widely diffused among the community at large. ”

“ The young stranger knows what they have never learnt, how varied are the aspects, how many-sided the forms, of truth, how unlimited is the field of possible knowledge, how little is the sum of all human science and learning when compared to that which is still unrevealed. ”

“ The landlords, the clergy of all denominations, the schoolmasters, the authors and editors, these classes are surely not unimportant agents in spreading primary or popular education. No man of refined education can stand unmoved by the spectacle of a people wholly in darkness. ”

“ It is not the want of money, but the want of human hearts and heads capable of applying that money intelligently to the work of teaching, which so long has kept, and will keep so large a proportion of the poorer class in every country unable to write or read. Let us consider where in England or in Germany would popular education be were it not for those who have themselves been educated at a University, or at schools which take their tone from the University? ”

“ Many of the elder members of the Senate will join me in recognising the fitness of such a monument to my valued friend the late Framjee Cowasjee, a man not less remarkable for his effective support of education, and of every judicious project of native improvement, than for his genuine originality and sturdy independence of character. ”

“ He will bring, too, learning in many branches of science never before heard of in those regions, all the wonders of physical science, and all the varied history, philosophy, and literature of the great race who govern India. And, withal, prince and peasant, priest and warrior, will, Humility the true stamp of wisdom. ”

“ If you look at the picture drawn by our greatest living poet of him who, from the earliest ages of classical lore down to the present time, has stood the type of practical experience and wisdom, you will find the insatiable passion for travel as for knowledge marked as the one characteristic which age and years could not obliterate or satisfy. ”

“ When England affords you the opportunity of filling offices hitherto reserved for her ablest and most experienced public servants, be assured it is not because she undervalues the office, nor will she continue the offer unless you on your part can furnish men who are fit to sit beside such men as an English University can furnish.
You will not, I am sure, suppose that I would make the University degree Love learning for its own sake. in itself a passport to the public service; it must be sought for its own sake, as the test and in itself the great reward of the best education we can give you. ”

“ Unless he sat himself up within a barrier of entirely selfish enjoyment he must go forth and act the part of a teacher, and he will teach with an intelligent power a thousand-fold greater than can be applied by him who, however zealous in the cause, has himself no more than a perfect knowledge of the bare elements of learning. These are the reasons why it seems to me that it is a very superficial view of the effects of this University education to suppose that it is in any way antagonistic to the great cause of primary education. ”

“ It was a time of darkness and discouragement, when all of us were thinking much more of immediate measures of material defence than of the more peaceful subjects connected with education. It has always seemed to me one of the almost sublime characteristics of that period, that when we were all absorbed in measures relating mainly to the immediate defence and security of the country, men were found who made time to calmly and deliberately carry out the measures connected with the grant of a charter to an infant University. ”

“ One of the most munificent benefactors of the University has been a gentleman well known to me, indeed, by his high repute as one of the ablest and most successful of our great merchants, but personally known to me only at a single interview to which I invited him, that I might myself express to him my sense of the obligations, under which he had placed the University. ”

“ I would urge this with the stronger emphasis on all the under-graduates and younger members of the University, because the results must come by an impulse from within. It cannot be impressed, however much it may be modified, by action from without. No course of study, however elevated, no distinction of separate buildings or peculiar costumes, though all tending to the same end, can avail much, unless there be among yourselves the spirit to create a standard for your own guidance in all minor morals, distinct from and higher than that of men who do nob belong to so honoured an institution. ”

“ We welcome Kerupunt Luximon as the most eminent of native mathematicians in Western India. Dr. Muncherjee Byramjee Cola and Rao Shaib Maheputram, Roopram, have both established similar claims to a seat in your Senate. They have visited the great Universities of Europe, and have thence brought back something of those Western views of true learning and mental discipline on which we must act in this University if we hope to attain that position which centuries of well directed labour and study have given to the Universities of Europe. ”

“ It is in this direction that we may hope the University will prove here as valuable as Universities have been in every country in Europe, as giving that kind of intellectual and moral training without which the most accurate knowledge of the mere letter of the law will fail to make a good lawyer in our English sense of tho word.On the other hand, I believe that, in the profession of the law, the scholars of this University will find, as do their brethren in Europe, a most congenial and useful field for their talents improved and stimulated by University training. ”

“ Every religious and domestic objection which ingenuity could raise has now been dissipated, and the educated youth of this part of India must be well aware, that if they would save themselves from the contempt of their fellow scholars in every other civilized country of the universe, they will talk and think of no other obstacle to foreign travel than such as the benefactions lately made to this University for the benefit of its poorer scholars are intended to remove. ”

“ In all the old European Universities I believe the Degree of Master of Arts is conferred without examination on Bachelors of a certain standing; but it is not so in this University. Here the degree of Master of Arts is only granted after an examination of a very high standard, similar to that required for honours in other Universities, and it is much to the credit of these young men that they should voluntarily offer themselves to undergo such an ordeal. ”

“ It must be an education which, whatever its subject, aims at training, purifying and strengthening the intellect, which seeks not merely to impress on men's memories, knowledge which may be useful and. profitable to them, but which aims at training them, to correct modes of thinking and reasoning, and to fill their intellects with the loftiest and most beautiful results of human thought. I cannot now attempt to discuss the reasons why such training must be useful to the student and profitable to the community of which he is a member ”

“ Whenever the British Government succeeded to the sovereignty, this defect was one of the first which it strove to remedy. From the very nature of things it was often impossible to do more than to provide the most just and upright men the Government could obtain, who knew something of the language and people, and leave them to administer justice as best they could, with no other guide than the light of their own conscience and reason. ”

“ The two fields of study have much in common, and though we may not hope to recover from the lost treasures of ancient Persian and Assyrian literature anything approaching in quantity or value to the stores of Sanskrit learning, yet there is enough to be done^ to fire the ambition of scholars who trace the history of their race and faith back to the early days of Persia and Assyria. ”

“ I think we see around us many reasons for hoping that, in this respect, there is a movement going on in the awakening intellect of India, which, in fact, has marked the dawn of a new era of civilization in every age of which we have any record. ”

“ The first of our graduates who has attained the honours of a Master in Arts, he has Well earned the distinction of being the first indigenous Fellow of this University. Captain Sherard Osborn has already earned for himself a name equally honoured in literature and in the service of his country as a distinguished Naval officer and traveller. I feel assured he will not be a passive member of an institution on which the intellectual development of Western India so largely depends. There are many gentlemen here who have witnessed the architectural glories of our great Universities in Europe. ”

“ Hope. His claims to a seat in our Senate are so well known that I will only bid him welcome among us. Mr. Kursou- dass Madhowdaas has, by a long and consistent course of selfsacrifice, inseparably connected his name with the cause of truth, enlightenment, and civilization in India. I feel assured that the spirit which has actuated him will give life and vigour to the action of the University, and to its connection with a most important section of the Hindoo community, which cannot but produce important results. ”

“ Some discussion has arisen which must, I believe, bear useful fruit regarding the relative merits of the classical languages Importance of Indian classical languages. of this country as compared with the vernaculars, as objects of University study. I will not anticipate the results of this discussion. No one estimates more highly than I do the importance of vernacular education; no one has a higher estimate of the capabilities of some of our Indian vernacular languages; no one has higher hopes as to the space which they may one day fill in the literature of India. ”