What Is Our Idea of a University? Ill
perimentalist, the economist or the engineer, though such too
it includes within its scope. But a University training is the
great ordinary means to a great but ordinary end; it aims at
raising the intellectual tone of society, at cultivating the pub-
lic mind, at purifying the national taste, at supplying true
principles to popular enthusiasm and fixed aims to popular
aspiration, at giving enlargement and sobriety to the ideas
of the age, at facilitating the exercise of political power,
and refining the intercourse of private life. It is the educa-
tion which gives a man a clear conscious view of his opinions
and judgments, a truth in developing them, an eloquence in
expressing them, and a force in urging them.” A volume
would scarcely suffice to comment on these lines so full of
substance.
But Cardinal Newman wrote his book a hundred years
ago and he had in mind an Irish University in Dublin. The
case of a French University, if not different from a religious
viewpoint, differs greatly in many other respects. Besides, I
am sure that our own conception of university training,
although you may judge it somewhat antiquated, will appeal
to you as an important and sound achievement.
The task of education is a beautiful one. It is a work of
art, it is a work of life. When a young man enrolls in a uni-
versity, his education has previously been brought to a cer-
tain degree of efficiency. But there still remains much to be
accomplished. Indeed, we have to put the finishing touch on
the work of our predecessors, who have labored at the intel-
lectual and moral formation of the student : we have to make
a man of him, a complete man. In my mind, a complete man
must be learned, philosophical, and religious. Even this is
not sufficient. When we have taught a young man “how to
think,” there is something more we must teach him : we must
teach him to be a leader. No Christian has the right to live