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Caption: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1870
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251 THURSDAY EVENING, 7 P.M. Dr. J . M. ture on GKEGORY, Regent of the University, delivered a lec- ORNAMENTATION OF GROUNDS. There is a hunger of the eyes as well as of the stomach. " Let me see, let me see," is a cry as natural to childhood as its cry for food. And it is not confined to childhood. " Show me something new, something beautiful, wonderful, picturesque or grand," is a perpetual longing of the heart of man. To be blind is counted the most pitiable of defects; to be immersed in t h e dark, the most dreadful of punishments. To see—to enjoy strange sights—is t h e most coveted of pleasures. To gaze upon Alps or Andes, to explore London or Paris, men travel at great expense to remote lands, braving all perils of land and sea. Millions are expended annually to witness shows of all sorts, and he who can feed the hunger of the eyes reaps larger and more freely given rewards than he who feeds the ears or fills the mind. The great primary use of dress is not to warm the body but to gratify the eyes. People will sooner run the risk of freezing than meet the eyes of their fellow men in unfashionable clothing, and the national debt costs less t h a n the colors and cut of the people's clothing. Every artizan, after fitting his products for their uses, doubles his care and toil to make them beautiful to the sight. Instances might be multiplied without end, to exhibit and prove this mighty and insatiable hunger of human eyes. And the food of the eyes has a market value. Beauty is as merchantable as beef. In the markets the best looking article, other things being equal, sells quickest and for the best price. Red apples sell quicker than white or russet. The beauty of a horse adds often a hundred per cent, to the price he would otherwise bring. A farm in fine appearance will sell for as much again as the same farm in a slovenly condition. I n advocating, then, the ornamentation of grounds, I am not advising to an idle and profitless expenditure of money—a useless waste of labor, permitted to the rich, but ruinous to the poor. If you and I had farms lying side by side, of nearly equal value in site and soil, and you should spend $500 in solid improvements—in drainage and manures—and I should spend t h e same sum in ornamentation—in drives, walks, evergreens and shade trees, and in making tasteful and neat fences and buildings—my farm would sell soonest and for most money. Nay ; you yourself would give more. Nor is all this unreasonable. The hunger of t h e eyes is as real as t h a t of t h e stomach, and its gratification is as important not only for our pleasure b u t to our power and progress. If I eat bread, it affords a momentary pleasure, and helps to maintain my animal life. If I see some scene of beauty or rare product of nature or art, it affords a higher gratification and aids to maintain and enlarge the higher, intellectual life. Digested food forms flesh, blood and bones. Digested visions give ideas, arts and civilization, motives, aims and mental power; and these, in turn, are easily transmuted into solid
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