own, and many more of the early fathers of New England, were educated, and to which Literature, and Science, and Art are indebted for so vast a preponderance of their treasures. Yes, brethren, wherever, beneath the sky, young men are gathered together for the purposes of a liberal, classical, Christian education, there are our hearts at this hour in the midst of them. While we would never forget our allegiance to the State and the nation of which we are citizens, we yet feel, to-day, that we belong to a republic broader and more comprehensive than either of them;-a republic whose history runs back through centuries and cycles of centuries past, and looks forward through centuries and cycles of centuries to come, which embraces all languages and tongues and kindreds and people, linking together in one great society "the noble living and the noble dead;"—a republic, in reference to which we know no points of the compass, no degrees of latitude, and for whose advancement, prosperity, and perpetual union, we can never cease to strive; -a republic, in regard to which we reverse all our wishes in relation to our own political confederacy, and pray God that its limits may be extended, wider and wider, by purchase, by negotiation, by annexation, spoliation, and conquest, until, bounding its dominions by the seas and its fame by the stars, it shall realize the dream of Universal Empire! And now, Mr. President and brethren, coming here, as I hope and believe we all do, in this liberal and catholic spirit, and recognizing our relations to this large and comprehensive society, we cannot but feel that there are peculiar obligations and responsibilities resting upon us all as educated men; - and it is to a consideration of some of these responsibilities, and of some of the temptations which interfere with their just discharge, that I propose to devote what remains of this address. Whatever may be pronounced to be the great end and object of a liberal education, there can be no doubt or difference of opinion as to one of its effects on those who enjoy its advantages. I mean its influence in imparting to them, in a greater or less degree, powers and faculties of the utmost moment to the welfare of their fellow-men; — in communicating to them, indeed, proportionately to their ability to grasp and wield them, the very instruments by which the condition of society, moral, religious, and political, is, and is to be, mainly controlled. The best result of all the inventions, discoveries, and improvements of modern times has been to give a wider and wider sway to intellectual and moral power. The world is fast ceasing to be governed by any mere material forces. The Metallic Ages, whether of ancient or of modern mythology, have passed away. And we have eminently reached a period of which the great characterizing and governing principle is Opinion, - Public Opinion. Pervading the civilized world like that subtle and elastic fluid which philosophers of all ages have supposed to be diffused throughout the physical universe, it is yet far more than any mere outside atmosphere, far more than any mere circumambient, luminiferous ether. It infuses itself into every joint of the social system. It penetrates the mighty mass of human motive and human action. It shapes, colors, directs, controls, and keeps in motion (under God) the whole course of public events; realizing, so far as any mortal influence can realize, the spirit of the living creature in the wheels of the prophet, or the familiar but sublime description of the Roman poet, "Spiritus intus alit; totamque infusa per artus, It is itself, however, no mysterious, original, or unchangeable element. On the contrary, it is susceptible of every degree of impression and modification; and its alterations and undulations are not only visible in their result, but are open to observation and analysis in the very progress and process of transition, and they may be traced back and referred, directly and unmistakably, to the causes which produced them. Public Opinion, in a word, is nothing less, and nothing more, than the aggregate of individual opinions; the resultant, if I may so speak, of all those various concurring or conflicting opinions which individuals conceive, express, and advocate. And it is from the character of the individual opinions which are, from day to day and from hour to hour, designedly thrown or accidentally dropped into the ever-flowing current of Public Opinion, as it passes along, I had almost said, before our very doors and beneath our very windows, that it takes its color, form, direction, and force. Now the main instruments by which individual minds, in proportion to their natural or acquired energy, are brought to bear upon Public Opinion, or upon the public mind from which it emanates, are obviously the instruments which belong peculiarly to educated men. They are the precise instruments which it is one of the principal results of a liberal education to teach and facilitate the use of. I mean, I need not say, the Tongue, and the Pen. The word spoken, and the word written, these are the simple, original elements of which all Public Opinion is composed; every word spoken, and every word written, entering into the composition, according to its quality and its power, almost as every rain-drop, and every dew-drop, and even every misty exhalation, goes to color and swell the mountain stream or the ocean flood. It is not enough considered, I fear, by educated men, who are often among the most impatient and irritable, when false sentiments and mischievous notions prevail on any subject, that they themselves, in their various avocations and professions, are mainly responsible for their existence. They are responsible, for what they say, and for what they leave unsaid; for what they write, and for what they leave unwritten; for opinions which they take part in establishing, and for opinions which they take no part in overthrowing. It may be difficult for the bookworm, shut up in some dark alcove, and engaged in the preparation of some abstract philosophical or theological treatise, to realize that he has any thing to do with that mighty moral power, of whose edicts legislatures are so often but the formal recorders, and laws but the periodical proclamation, which construes constitutions, controls standing armies, supports or overturns thrones, and rules the world. So is it difficult to realize that the ocean-worm has had any thing to do with the Island or the Continent, which has yet risen from the sea through its labors, and which rests on the foundations which it has laid. But it behooves us all to remember, that consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or accidentally, positively or negatively, each one of us, according to our opportunities, our powers, and our employment of them, is engaged at this moment, and at every moment, in the formation and direction of Public Opinion, and that each one of us has an individual responsibility for its course and character. It is this responsibility, as developed and increased a thousandfold by the circumstances of the age and of the land in which we live, that I desire to illustrate and enforce. Consider, for a moment, the vast power and purchase, if I may so speak, which modern inventions and modern institutions have given to the spoken and the written word! Public Opinion, as an element of greater or less importance in the affairs of men, is by no means a new thing. There never could have been a moment since the existence of society, when there was not something of common sentiment among those associated in the same State or city or neighborhood, and when it must not have had more or less influence on their character and conduct. In the ancient republics of Greece and Rome, it was hardly a less potent engine of authority and government, so far as it extended, than it is among ourselves at the present day. But how far did it extend? What were the means which the ancients enjoyed for instructing, controlling, and marshalling it to a purpose, compared with those which we now employ? Look, for an instant, to the speakers and writers of antiquity, and see how far it was in their power to operate on the public mind of the world as they knew it, or of the age in which they lived. Take the very prince of ancient orators, of all orators whom the world has known, the Homer of eloquence, as the modern Germans have well entitled him, who "wielded at will the fierce democratie " of Athens. Follow him to one of the great scenes of his triumphs. See him ascending the Bema. Behold him, as, looking around upon the Parthenon and the Propylæa, he inhales the inspiration of their massive grandeur and matchless symmetry, or as, darting a more distant glance towards the Piræus, he catches the image of his country's power and prowess reflected from the shining beaks of her slumbering galleys! Listen to him, as he pronounces one of those masterly and magnificent arguments, which must ever be the models of all true popular eloquence, and of which we may say, in his own words, "Time itself seems to be the noblest witness to their glory, -a series of so many years hath now passed away, and still no men have yet appeared who could surpass those patterns of perfection." The orator has concluded. The storm of applause has subsided. The vote has been taken, to succor the Olynthians, to resist Philip, or, it may be, to acquit Ctesiphon and banish Æschines. The Assembly is dispersed. But where are now the brilliant and burning words which have kindled them into such a blaze of enthusiasm? Have they been caught up, as they fell flaming from the lip, by a score of reporters, as with the fidelity of a daguerrotype? Have they been wafted upon a kindred current to a hundred cities? Have they, indeed, been "fulmined over Greece, To Macedon and Artaxerxes' throne?" Have they been served up in a thousand journals, to a hundred thousand readers, before another sunrise? Have they even been put into a decent pamphlet for more convenient and deliberate perusal and reference? No wonder that the great Athenian so emphatically pronounced the sum of all eloquence to be action. No wonder, that he exercised himself in speaking with pebbles in his mouth, and measured his voice against the roaring surges of the sea. The orators of antiquity spoke only to their immediate audience. They could address themselves to nobody else. It was upon the living multitude before them that an influence was to be produced, or not at all. Their power was limited by the number of persons assembled to hear them, or even more limited by the strength of their own lungs. The 6,000 men who were necessary to constitute a psephisma or decree, or, at the very most, the 20,000 men who enjoyed the right of suffrage, were all to whom Demosthenes could appeal, all upon whom his magic words and mighty thoughts could operate. He spoke to Athens; and Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts And eloquence, native to famous wits Or hospitable," was a city just about the size of Boston, with a population of only 140,000 in all, men, women, children, and slaves; and the whole *Oration on the Classes. |