THE BATTALION.
5
turn you aside from privileges which, if you neglect them
now, you will hereafter give anything could you recover!)
You are not required by College law to attend the Sunday
school which meets here every Sunday morning at 10 o’clock;
but can you afford to neglect one of the privileges guaranteed
you as the sons of Christian fathers and mothers, tire sons of
sires who have by emigration, by constitutional enactment,
by resolution, by the gage of battle, wrested these privileges
from those who would have denied them? College law does
not require you to identify yourselves with the work of the
College Y. M. C. A., but, are you not interested, every one
of you, in the things which benefit the corps? If you are a
resident of a plague stricken city, should you not clear up
your premises for the general good? Similarly should you
not identify yourselves, and throw in your influence, and
show reverence to the teachings of your parents, by taking
part in those means, students own voluntary measures, for
the driving out of impurity, the suppression of profanity, the
encouragement of truth and honor, the promotion of Christ
ian principle, here in the College home which is to be yours
for years to come? Young men, this matter reaches farther
than you think and, while discussing it, let us look more
deeply into the meaning of our strange, new, conglomerate,
life here. It is not right for me to admit for one moment
that your student life proper is one thing and your voluntary
efforts for rectitute of character another. Some things which
cannot be legislated upon and formulated in printed laws are
yet implied and understood in every specific work which
looks to a noble end. Our legislature d re not compel every
citizen to be educated, but in their provision for those who
are willing to study in their encouragement of learning, they
imply a multitude of laws and penalties against ignorance.
Are we sure we know clearly for what purpose we are here?
To get an education you say. But the world has quarreled
about the meaning of that very vague expression, getting an
education, from the days of Socrates the Athenian to this