Page:Convocation Addresses of the Universities of Bombay and Madras.djvu/372

Rh you for the right and keep you from the wrong. True, she has no historic name which she commits it to you to keep unsullied; but she has her name to make, and it is you that must make it for her. True, there are no associations of antiquity clustering around her, such as throng upon the hearts of those who bid adieu to academic life, where placid river and fruitful plain and "tall ancestral trees" enshrine as in a "haunt of ancient peace," the lordly magnificence of Oxford; or where upheaved rock and dark ravine and frowning battlements that carry down into the present the constant memory of a stormy past surround with a beauty that is all her own the humbler halls of Edinburgh. But in the very want of memories like these, is there not a summons to us all to labour together in order that our successors may enjoy them? And for their absence, has not your University something of a recompense in the hopefulness, the buoyancy, and the glorious possibilities of her youth? She may yet be all that her elder sisters are. She may yet effect as much of solid good, and that in a far wider field than almost any of them can boast. But it all depends on you. Her revenues may be large, her Senate may be learned, her colleges may be crowded, yet in spite of all she will win no fame because she will deserve none, if you, who are the outcome of her labours, are destitute of that power to wield the minds of men which nobility of character and nobility of aim can alone bestow. But once let it be found by proof that those whom she stamps with her approval are men of high-toned principle and lofty purpose, to whose influence and guidance their countrymen joyfully submit, and soon will your Alma Mater gain for herself far-spread renown, and gain thereby a power unimagined hitherto to carry on successfully the mighty work that has been entrusted to her.

And now, gentlemen, farewell! From the calm heights of study and of thought, descend into the arena of the world, there to live and strive as the sons of learning ought, and so to take an effectual and an honoured part in irradiating with the light of knowledge an ancient and a famous land.

 

Mr. Chancellor and Gentlemen,—Barely fifteen years have passed away since the foundation of this University, and during that time it has developed from an experiment into a strong and vigorous Institution most powerful for good throughout the length and breadth of the land. It is indeed almost impossible 