Alumnus

“ The ingenuous student, having completed his term of years—a classical Olympiad—amidst the restraints of the academy, in the daily pursuits of the lecture-room, observant of forms, obsequious to the college curfew, at length renounces these restraints, heeds no longer the summoning bell, throws off the youthful gown, and now, under the auspices of Alma Mater, assumes the robe of manhood. ”

“ Once upon a time a certain old graduate found himself in the midst of a beautiful college campus. On all sides he beheld old beloved scenes and well-remembered landmarks; but also he discovered new haunts, new places, unfamiliar and somehow unwelcome to him. And about him, as he stood there gazing, came and went many of the same recognizable types of lovable undergraduate humanity; and yet here in the crowd strolled one sort and over there across the way stood another sort that seemed strange and unexpected. ”

“ A representation was made by my master, that he saw in me, indications of qualities and talents which pointed to some better station, than that of a village apothecary, and he recommended the sphere of my education to be enlarged; that I should be removed to a great school, and finally to the university. Whether I should have been more useful to the world, or intrinsically more happy in myself, if the humbler path had been pursued which was first chalked out for me, He only knows from whom no secrets are hid. ”

“ Beloved instructors, it is character not less than intellect that you have striven to develop. As we stand at the end of our college course, and turn our eyes toward the scenes forever past—as our memories linger on the words of wisdom which have fallen from your lips, we are more and more deeply impressed with the true conception of duty which you have ever shown. You have sought not to trim the lamp of genius until the light of morality is paled by its dazzling brilliance, but to encourage and strengthen both. ”

“ Leaders in the stirring world of to-day return at each commencement to share the fresh life of the new class. Books, pictures, music, collections, appliances in every field, learned teachers, mirthful friends, athletics for holidays, the best words of the best men for holy days,—all are here. No wonder that men look back upon their college life as upon halcyon days, the romantic period of youth. ”

“ Whatever degrees you carry from school or college, whatever distinction you may acquire in your career, no title will ever mean quite so much, will ever be quite so noble, as that of gentleman.
"A keen and sure sense of honor," says Ex-President Eliot, of Harvard University, "is the finest result of college life." The graduate who has not acquired this keen and sure sense of honor, this thing that stamps the gentleman, misses the best thing that a college education can impart. ”

“ At thy name all our hearts own a thrill, We turn from life's highways, its business, its cares, We are boys in thy tutelage still. And the warm blood of youth to our veins, as of yore, Returns with impetuous flow, Reviving the scenes and the hopes that were ours In the vanished, but sweet Long Ago. Once more through thy walks, Alma Mater, we tread, And we dream youth's fair dreams once again, We are heroes in fight for the Just and the Right, We are knights without fear, without stain ”

“ We can conceive of a college freshman attaining perfection in his class; yet the honors of the upper classman are beyond; and graduation, though to him remote, is assured if be do but maintain his high standing to the end. ”

“ What the old man has to say to the young man, the teacher to the pupil, the father to the son, at the moment when the gates of the great world are flung open to the college graduate, has undergone but little modification in a thousand years, and has become very well known to all collegians long before they take their degree. ”

“ Heroes and scholars have gone forth from their studies here, into the great field of the world, to seek their fortunes, and to conquer and be conquered. As I surveyed the exterior of the different Colleges, I could here and there see the reflection of the light from the window of some student, who was busy at his studies, or throwing away his time over some trashy novel, too many of which find their way into the trunks or carpet bags of the young men on setting out for College. ”

“ As we meet in thy name, Alma Mater, to-night, All our hearts and our hopes are as one, And love for the mother that nurtured his youth Beats high in the breast of each son. The sweet chords of Memory bridge o'er the Past, The years fade away like a dream, By the banks of Cephissus, beneath the green trees, We tread thy fair walks, Academe. ”

“ In college mind meets mind in the severe competition of recitation and annual examination. The bright boy—one of a small class at home, who had it all his own way there—now finds a score or more of leaders whose unvoiced challenge he is compelled to accept, and how he does knit his brow, close his eyes, summon his strength, school his will, force his flagging energies, and grapple problems that he may hold his own, outstrip his rivals, and win prize and place for the sake of his family’s fame and for his personal satisfaction! ”

“ May each of you be a gem added to the bright crown with which the glory of her sons encircles the gray head of the venerable and kindly old college. If ever there was a heart in walls of brick and mortar, it is surely there; and cold is he whose heart does not warm to it. ”

“ You can not separate and classify these acquisitions and tell who taught you this, who gave you that, but the diploma you receive witnesses your possession. To-night your novitiate ends. Your Alma Mater will watch anxiously, lovingly, the line of light which marks your past. Think not, it makes no matter if your taper vanish. One spark extinguished, leaves darkness in its place. Each new thought which you may awaken, each new aspiration you may enkindle, each new impulse for good you may stimulate, flashes back to her a thrill of joy and makes the fire on her altar burn more brightly. ”

“ Over there was the university. It had been a busy day at the university—old faces and new faces, all the exuberance of a new start, the enthusiasm for a clean slate—students anxious to make some particular class—how well he knew it all! Who was in his laboratory? Who working with his old things? To whom was coming the joy he had thought would be his? What man of all the world's men would achieve the things he had believed would crown his own life? ”

“ Indeed, the mark of the undergraduate almost covers them, especially of the undergraduate as he fondly imagines himself in his callow days and as he is foolishly instructed to regard himself by the more vinous and more hilarious of the old graduates who annually come back to a college to offer themselves—though this is not their conscious purpose—as an object lesson in the loud triviality peculiar and traditional to such hours of reunion. ”

“ FATHER or PRÆLECTOR. In the University of Cambridge, Eng., one of the fellows of a college, who attends all the examinations for the Bachelor's degree, to see that justice is done to the candidates from his own college, who are at that time called his sons.—Gradus ad Cantab.
The Fathers of the respective colleges, zealous for the credit of the societies of which they are the guardians, are incessantly employed in examining those students who appear most likely to contest the palm of glory with their sons.—Gent. ”

“ Thus will you draw down upon yourselves the continual blessings of heaven, and will go on daily increasing in virtue and knowledge, till you arrive happily at the close of your probation.
"4. Regardless of the distinctions arising from the diversities of nation or country, let charity and perfect concord reign among you; for, in a college, all are brethren one of another. Far from you be all contention and vain-glory, each one making it a rule with himself to behave towards every brother with the humility of an inferior. ”

“ In every word uttered by the Academic Teacher in the exercise of his calling, let it be Knowledge that speaks,—let it be his longings to extend her dominion,—let it be his deep love for his hearers, not as his hearers, but as the future ministers of Knowledge:—Knowledge, and these living desires to extend her dominion, let these speak, not the Teacher. ”

“ For we are in a time when nearly every important educator, president of a university, dean of a department, old-time teacher or old, thoughtful pupil with the interest of Alma Mater at heart, who has had something to say with regard to education has said it in rather derogatory fashion. ”

“ Is there not then a fitness that the portrait of the master by one distinguished pupil should be presented by the surviving pupil to the Academy over which he presided in its infancy, as well as assisted in its birth, and, although divorced from Art, cannot so easily be divorced from the memories of an intercourse with these distinguished friends, an intercourse which never for one moment suffered interruption, even from a shadow of estrangement? ”

“ And if I discover for the Scholar a vocation most honourable, most lofty, and distinguished above that of all other classes of men, how is it possible for me to lay it before you without exceeding the limits of modest expression, without seeming to undervalue other vocations, without being apparently blinded by self-conceit? ”

“ Then the Supper and then home to the dormitory again—with a pain of happiness filling him, the rest and the unrest of consecration.
Many other scenes he lived through in memory this morning—once lived in reality amid that brotherhood of souls. His tenderest thoughts perhaps dwelt on the young men's prayer-meetings of Sunday afternoons at the college. There they drew nearest to the Eternal Strength which was behind their weakness, and closest to each other as student after student lifted a faltering, stumbling petition for a common blessing on their work. ”

“ These youths, though passing through the curriculum of the University, were students merely in name. They did almost everything but study. Bless you! how could you expect them to do otherwise? What charms could they find in musty, out-of-date Latin and Greek works? They were young, [Pg 99] healthy, spirited, and rich; and the bright and breathing world lay around them. Everything within them and without them called upon them to enjoy themselves. They, indeed, went through the farce of attending chapel in the morning, and lectures in the forenoon. ”

“ Interest in school life is perpetual. The young student, facing new surroundings, finds an element of romance and strong appeal; and to the older graduate college days recall some of the most pleasant memories of the past. ”

“ You will soon learn, my son, that college men are, as a rule, sound in body, sane in mind, in heart pure, in will vigorous, keen in conscience, and filled with noble aspirations. Such men usually interpret life, both academic and general, in sanity and in justice. ”

“ Thus I was made to live nobly and honorably, not only for my religion and country, but for my alma mater as well. The "college-spirit," outside of baseball grounds, is a noble and Christian sentiment, which if loyally stuck to, should alone be sufficient to keep her sons from demagogism, cloth-worship, man-face-fear- ing, and meannesses and unmanlinesses of very many kinds in this world. ”

“ The college year has begun, and at its end the young man will vault over the bars;, and, pointing his diploma at the world, will shout, "Hold up your hands." But, alas, the world will not stand and deliver for a volley of sheepskins. ”

“ They are distinguished by fervid and impressive eloquence, and set forth the dignity and duties of the Scholar, as deduced from the idea of his vocation, with clear, but sublime and spirit-stirring earnestness. He leaves no place for low motives or degrading propensities, but fills up his picture of the Scholar-life with the purest and most disinterested virtues of our nature. These lectures, and his own personal influence among the students, were attended with the happiest effects. ”

“ It’s hardly a college since it has no student body nor faculty. Rather, both are one at the haven. Anyone admitted is a scholar or potential scholar anxious to devote himself to learning. I mean for its own sake. ”

“ The alumni are the best possible sources of keeping the faculty informed as to what the world really wants in the way of trained men and women, and, for the students, of information, suggestions, and jobs, both temporary and permanent. ”

“ For I have heard it said by those who have to do with college discipline that their alumni are no longer invariably distinguished by 'a gentle nature and studious habits'--qualities for which, as the Warden of Merton says, colleges were originally intended to provide a welcome haven of rest, and which are now the especial and gratifying characteristics of that whilom roisterer and boon companion, the Unattached Student. ”

“ In climbing up a ladder that reaches to a diploma you must have some easy rungs. It's all a part of your education and we've gloried in it. Whenever you've fetched home a new music instrument, or any other fixing, your father has always been pleased and vowed you should go through college in a pleasant way. ”

“ I have now to mention for your encouragement that the same qualities, Student, the father of man. mental and moral, which give success at College, will in general be attended with a like result in the severer struggle on which you are now entering. And, though alas! there are cases in which the future contradicts the past and a blight comes over the promise oli youth, the ordinary rule is otherwise. The student, if I may parody the words of the poet, is the father of the public man. The habits of ten years are not forgotten in a day. ”