Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1878 [PAGE 204]

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204

to read the secrets of nature, and to learn his own being's end and aim. The education which seeks in any worthy way to meet these demands, is a liberal education—liberal in every one of the stages at which it may be considered. There is a liberalizing power in large and well equipped educational institutions. The stay of the student in them may be short and his work elementary; but library and laboratory, lecture-room and museum, and, above all, contact with the masters and students of so many diverse branches of knowledge, leave an impression on his mind of the breadth and interest of the field of education that can never be effaced. In rendering possible such foundations and equipments as these, the land grant is making a great contribution to the liberal education of the industrial classes. Far be it from me to disparage or belittle the denominational or private colleges. All honor to them for the grand work which they have done and are doing in the education of our people. Let them lengthen their cords and strengthen their stakes. To maintain freedom and virtue on this continent, where all the winds of doctrine are let loose to blow, will cost the strenuous effort of all who love truth and virtue of whatever name. But, after all, it is to public education that we must look for the chief power in welding and unifying the discordant elements of our national life—and of that public education the State University, properly expanded and equipped, is the summit and the crown.