166 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION. 
The more any one of us carries away from college or university, the more 
ae is constantly bestowing on all those who are about us. 
And to come a little more particularly to our present condition, I think 
we may emphasize this statement with something more than ordinary 
force. One might well say there have been eras in the history of our 
country when everything went on as it were by routine, when a few 
leaders led the people upon great public questions. When we had the 
old-fashioned Whig and Democratic party, nobody ever thought of having 
any ideas, except those who had inherited them, upon political questions, 
and he was pretty safe in sticking to them. And so it was in respect to 
many ethical questions. So it was in respect to economic questions. But 
.00k out on the world to-day, and see what a caldron it is in respect to 
all these questions; how all political questions are stirred to the very 
oottom ; how even ethical positions that have been standing by prescrip- 
tion and tradition almost from the foundation of the world, are to- 
Jay challenged and made to stand up and answer for themselves, and 
testify for themselves; how the economic conditions which have come 
down to us from the past are to-day, we may say, in a state of unstable 
aquilibrium. The air is full of these questions concerning every sort of 
problem, and if ever there was a time when we needed to have dissemi- 
nated in all parts of our communities men and women with disciplined 
minds, who can take up these questions, and study them for themselves, 
and guide their children in the study of them, this is the time. The 
nation is full of the wildest agitators, preaching every sort of heresy on 
avery sort of theme. Where shall be found the sane, rational, and disci- 
plined men and women to guide the multitude who have not been accus- 
tomed to consider such questions ? Why, the very theory of our republi- 
san form of government is that every man shall know how to meet these 
questions that are thrown upon him. And therefore I say to you to-day, 
as never before, is it true that not only in these great centres of popula- 
Sion, but also in the smaller villages and in the hamlets, in the farming 
districts, which perhaps in some respects are particularly afflicted just 
aow with troubles of this sort, everywhere, if this nation is to stand, 
prosper, and go forward with sanity and reason, we must have all the 
rained and disciplined. men and women we can possibly muster into the 
ranks to go among them and teach. Now, that is what higher education 
is trying to do. 
One more thought, and then I will relieve your patience. If there is 
any danger to this country, greater at this time than any other, if there 
could be a position more dangerous than any other, it would be one 
in which we should have a small class of rich and educated men and a 
great class of poor and uneducated men and women. The gap is wide 
anough between these people to-day. In that gap there are perils to-day 
rreater than anv of us can measure. There is not one of us here who lies 
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