1989 
 y l 
 
 ADDRESS 
 
 OF 
 
 Hon. N.J. Hammond, 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 ALUMNI SOCIETY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 JUNE 16th, 1891. 
 
 ATLANTA, GA.: 
 
 Constitution Publishing Company. 
 
 1891. 
 
\ 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 OF 
 
 Hon. N.J. Hammond, 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 ALUMNI SOCIETY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 
 
 JUNE; 16th, 1891. 
 
 ATLANTA, GA.: 
 
 Constitution Publishing Company. 
 
 1891. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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University of Georgia, 
 Athens, Ga., June 16, 
 
 i8qi. J 
 
 Hon. N. J. Hammond, 
 
 Athens, Ga. 
 Dear Sir : — The Alumni Society has instructed 
 me to thank you for your able, eloquent and instruc- 
 tive address delivered to-day, and to request that you 
 furnish us with a copy of the same for publication. 
 Will you kindly let me know when you can give me 
 your manuscript. 
 
 Yours very respectfully, 
 
 David. C. Barrow, Jr. 
 
 • ' *"' Secretary' of the) Alumni Society. 
 
 Atlanta,' Ga., June ; 24, 1891. 
 Prof. David C. Barrow, 1.. "' ':' .' 
 Secretary of the Alumni Society, 
 
 Athens, Ga. 
 Mr. Secretary : — Herewith please find a substan- 
 tial copy of my address as requested by the Society. 
 With thanks for the flattering words in which the 
 request for the same was made, 
 I am yours, etc., 
 
 N. J. Hammond. 
 
MR. HAMMOND'S ADDRESS. 
 
 Mr. Hammond was introduced by Hon. P. W. 
 Meldrim, President of the Alumni Society of the 
 University of Georgia, as follows : 
 
 Gentlemen of the Alumni Society, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 
 I have the pleasure of introducing, as the orator of the day, a 
 gentleman whose ripe scholarship, blameless private life, eminent 
 public service and unfaltering love for his Alma Mater, make him 
 the ideal Alumnus. 
 
 Mr. Hammond spoke as follows : 
 
 Mr. President and Brother Alumni — Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 
 Guizot wrote that it was impossible to fitly appreciate as a 
 cause of civilization, the appearance of great men. The potent 
 influence is that which makes and multiplies great men, viz: great 
 thoughts. 
 
 The Old World stood aghast when the Colonies, in this New 
 World, pronounced a divorce between Church and State. But no 
 less startling was the other new doctrine that "the distinguishing 
 happiness of free governments is that civil order should be the 
 result of choice and not necessity, and that the common wishes of 
 the people should become the laws of the land." 
 
 Had we not had a surfeit of Centennial discourse you might be 
 entertained by examining how radical were these departures from 
 the hoary-headed, but not venerable, dogmas that the State should 
 dictate what the people should believe as to religion, and that cer- 
 tain classes only and not the whole people should be consulted in 
 making laws. But that is foreign to our present purpose. 
 
6 
 
 Because the common wishes of the people were to become the 
 laws of this land, our ancestors declared that "the public prosperity 
 and even existence of free governments very much depends upon 
 suitably forming the minds and morals of their citizens;" that 
 such governments "can only be happy when the public principles 
 and opinions are properly directed and their manners regulated." 
 * * * and that " it should therefore be among the first objects of 
 those who wish well to the national prosperity to encourage and 
 support the principles of religion and morality, and early to place 
 the youth under the forming hand of society that by instruction 
 they may be moulded to the love of virtue and good order." These 
 quotations from our legislation of 1785 shows Georgia's reasons for 
 founding this University. 
 
 Such sentiments were not peculiar to this State. The Congress 
 of the Confederation declared in the celebrated Ordinance of 1787, 
 that "Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good 
 government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of 
 education shall forever be encouraged." And after the Union had 
 been perfected by the adoption of the Constitution of 1789, and 
 after this unique form of government had been successfully estab- 
 lished, these sentiments of 1785 were almost literally quoted and 
 applied to the whole country. 
 
 In Washington's farewell address he gave utterance to what 
 he called " some sentiments the result of much reflection, of no 
 inconsiderable observation and all important to the permanency of 
 our felicity as a people." No sentiment in that admirable address 
 is more important than where he begged his countrymen "to pro- 
 mote as an object of primary importance institutions for the gene- 
 ral diffusion of knowledge" because, "in proportion as the structure 
 of a government gives force to public opinion it is essential that 
 public opinion should be enlightened." 
 
 Therefore they do greatly err who complain because the State 
 furnishes facilities for education as though she were only making 
 a gift to the recipients. In that same preamble of 1785 to the 
 Charter of the University, the legislature declared that, because, in 
 the late "common danger and distress," the country had been so 
 aided by the principles and abilities which wise regulations had 
 
before established in the minds of our countrymen," they should 
 ''feel under the strongest obligation to form the youth, the rising 
 hope of our land, to render the like glorious and essential services 
 to our country." 
 
 Those grand ideas have lost nothing by the lapse of years. They 
 broke the clouds and let the sun rise upon this continent. 
 
 Every school-house and college which has been built here in 
 the past century, every law favoring education, made by the States 
 and the United States, has added evidence of our faith in their 
 soundness. The increased attention given to the subject in recent 
 years shows that we are fully awake to the situation, that we believe 
 that, if such forces in government were needed a century ago, when 
 we occupied only a narrow strip of land on the Atlantic, they are 
 far more needed now since our territory is so widely extended, our 
 population so multiplied, our trade and commerce so increased, our 
 values so great, and when all the complications of business and 
 government call for such study and investigation as to tax the 
 energies of the best minds of the country. Our Constitution of 
 1877 shows how Georgia meets the demand by her tripartite system 
 of common schools, intermediary institutions and University. She 
 affords to all who will devote themselves to the task, oppor- 
 tunity to become, to a certain extent, well rounded scholars. 
 
 We use "well rounded" advisedly. Ruskin said, "God tried 
 himself when he made a tree." He had not in mind some slender 
 pine which, growing with the multitude, stretched its attenuated 
 stem upward to get the sunshine, but a tree which, because of its 
 special excellence, had survived the destruction of the forest, and 
 with room for expansion had struck deep and wide its roots, stretched 
 outward and all about its strong arms around a sturdy trunk, and 
 made itself both a delight and a beauty to all under its shade. 
 
 If creative energy might be thought to have put forth special 
 effort on such an object, what powers were not called into play 
 when a human being was made, that splendid animal knitted to- 
 gether by that subtle influence which every joint supplieth, and 
 which the Romans, admiring his muscles and sinews, called vir ; 
 that higher order of being having aspirations above the herd, turn- 
 ing his eyes upward, and, therefore, called by the Greeks anthropos; 
 
8 
 
 that supreme excellence, born after all other things, the product of 
 the joint thoughts and purposes of the plural Elohim, who said, 
 "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." Such is the 
 creature made for dominion over everything on earth, in the deep 
 and in the air, which the State would educate for its own uses. 
 
 It would be interesting to discuss how that fullnesss is to be 
 best attained; for instance, to defend the study of the ancient clas- 
 sics (so instructive, so enlarging, so strengthening to the mind) 
 against the attacks of certain new lights at home and abroad ; to 
 suggest what books should be studied and what avoided. We can- 
 not enter that field. 
 
 But, since religion and education have been linked together 
 in the quotations above, it will not be inappropriate to advise 
 the constant study of the book of our faith. We will not invade 
 the office of the pulpit, but drop certain suggestions about the 
 Bible. Scholars will find it the best repository of pure English, 
 and be improved by its impassioned poetry and splendid imagery, by 
 its illustrations, so simple and so well adapted to the common 
 understanding. 
 
 The Old Testament contains the only early history of the 
 origin of all laws, arts and sciences, by later history traced from 
 Egypt to Greece, from Greece to Rome, from Rome to the World. 
 
 In it we find the foundation for all the laws of all the nations. 
 Through it we perceive the strength of a faith which brought a 
 nation out of slavery, kept it for centuries intact though opposed 
 by all others, and after almost another century of captivity enabled 
 it to rebuild its temple and re-proclaim its laws at Jerusalem. 
 
 We see mighty Babylon built, Nineveh grow, and Tyre 
 stretch forth its Briarean arms to grasp the commerce of the world. 
 We see " the beauty of the excellency of the Chaldeans" perish 
 and " that great city" and Tyre doomed to destruction ; and learn 
 the causes of their downfall. 
 
 We witness the gradual' rise of woman from a state of servi- 
 tude and degradation, the struggle between the true and false relig- 
 ions and hear even priests denounced by the holier prophets. We 
 see the budding thought of the immortality of the soul. 
 
 We wait four centuries from Malachi to Jesus for the gather- 
 
9 
 
 ing forces to usher in that glad day when the harem gave place to 
 the permanent home of one wife, when bleeding birds and beasts 
 were pushed aside by the one Sacrifice, and the idols of earth were 
 broken by one God — Jehovah. 
 
 The wall of hatred between Jew and Samaritan was torn away. 
 Paul preached the resurrection from the dead, and the inspired 
 vision of John, mentioning neither Jew nor Gentile, forgetting 
 that any lines divided the nations, held forth promise of blessedness 
 to all who will " come." 
 
 But the grandest lesson in both Testaments is that no longer is 
 religion a thing for nations to quarrel about, in which none but 
 States and kings and priests and prophets are concerned, but that 
 the widow with her two mites is worthier than Dives with his mill- 
 ions, because of the difference of their characters; and that his per- 
 sonal duty is the supreme concern of each individual in society. 
 
 Assume now for the sake of the argument, and for that only, 
 that the State and society have done all that is needful to perfect 
 men; that, here and elsewhere in Our Commonwealth, they are 
 being sufficiently trained both in learning and in morals; we 
 inquire what return shall such men make to the public, how they 
 will exercise that " influence beyond the stretch of laws and punish- 
 ments and * * * claimed only by religion and education." 
 
 Naturally as opportunity and inclination allow they will become 
 husbands and heads of households. A Persian fable tells of one 
 who in his bath was handed a piece of scented clay. He said to it, 
 * ' Art thou musk or ambergris ? For I am charmed by thy perfume. 
 The clay replied, "I was but clay until I spent some time with 
 the rose, and the sweet quality of my companion became part of 
 myself." 
 
 Love of wife and children will stimulate to exertion to furnish 
 them with comforts and luxuries. Wealth will be craved, and 
 there is danger that the means of its attainment may not be 
 always good. Some men have natural aptitude for accumulation, 
 as others have for music or other things. Such men, if they will 
 sink all else in the struggle for money, may become contemptibly 
 rich and will be richly contemptible. -Let no man desiring to be 
 useful so seek wealth. Let every one prefer to leave his children 
 
10 
 
 an example to follow rather than a fortune to spend. Let every 
 man fear least when he shall be pointed out as worth a million, his 
 neighbors will respond, "yes, but he is worth nothing but his mill 
 ion." Wealth is desirable, not to shine in clothing and equipage, 
 not to gratify our vanity or appetites, nor even our tastes, but for 
 the opportunities it brings for great enterprises, for the control and 
 management of large plans for the benefit of our country and 
 humanity. 
 
 But neither to wed nor to get rich do men need urging. Their 
 interests will control them. Selfishness is the safe-guard of society. 
 In other things, however, men do not so readily consent to duty. 
 
 Of course every man should have a purpose in life. His 
 avocation or profession may be and generally will be the creature 
 of circumstances. But he should ever keep before him some life 
 task worthy of his struggle and toil. How piteous and yet how 
 noble was the dying cry of Buckle, "My book, my book, I will 
 never live to finish my book." 
 
 To that task must be brought not learning only, but muscle 
 and nerve, industry, sobriety and energy of soul. These make un- 
 lettered men sometimes climb to enviable heights. How might 
 such men fly with the eagle had they also education. The State 
 demands more of those specially prepared for the work. 
 
 Three centuries ago Shakespeare put this thought into shape: 
 When the guard was harrowed "with fear and wonder" at the 
 ghost of Denmark's murdered King, and trembled in the presence 
 of the unknown and mysterious, he cried out to Hamlet's friend, 
 "Thou art a scholar. Speak to it, Horatio." 
 
 So in society, chaos to those who have not studied its laws; in 
 government, a puzzle to fools, to wise men a noble science; in 
 religion, a superstition to the multitude, a glorious vision to the 
 initiated; in the midnight of ignorance, folly and vice, there comes 
 a cry to each such exalted man : Thou art a scholar. Speak to 
 these demons and bid them depart. 
 
 How shall they speak? The utterances must come from honest 
 hearts. All ignoble fears must be banished. All mean desires 
 must be buried. Fear of punishment and hope of reward are use- 
 ful to a degree, but we seek now the influence bevond their stretch. 
 
11 
 
 He who adores only from the fear of hell is a coward; he who seeks 
 heaven only for its golden walks, its fruits of the tree of life and 
 its sweet music of angelic harps in a voluptuary. 
 
 Only he is pure who loves all things good because they are good, 
 and worships God because he is God. How glorious would be our 
 condition if those whose neighbors seek of them precept and example 
 were so honest and brave as to speak no word from fear, no sen- 
 tence from the hope of personal gain, no opinion except what was 
 thought to be best for society ! 
 
 What shall they speak ? What the subject and occasion need. 
 They should be despised who, when sought for information furnish 
 only guesses, who, when asked for opinions, furnish only notions. 
 Any penny-a-liner may so write ; any street babbler may so 
 chatter. 
 
 That one may speak truly, he should accustom himself to think 
 of things in their true relations, and call them by their right 
 names. These are never changed by the sizes of the transactions 
 nor the position of those who are employed in their doing. He who 
 cheats in the sale of a yard of ribbon is like him who cheats in the 
 transfer of a railroad. Both are swindlers. There is no difference 
 between ignorant bullies, who defy the police, and the "best citizens" 
 who take the law into their uwn hands. Both crowds are mobs. 
 Call not him who steals a dollar over the counter and him who, 
 behind the counter, by false figures and abused confidence, appro- 
 priates millions, by different names. They both are thieves. Let 
 me warn you young men not to think of, nor call that which is 
 denounced not only by the Church but by the Constitution of your 
 State, the Code of Honor. 
 
 This lesson is well understood in high* circles in politics and 
 in religion. AVashington, in that farewell address to which allusion 
 has been already made, speaking of the Union, said, "It is of in- 
 finite moment that you should cherish a cordial, habitual and im- 
 movable attachment to it, accustoming yourselves to think and 
 speak of it as the palladium of your political safety and prosperity.' 
 
 And the inspired son of Amoz, describing the wickedness of 
 Judah and Jerusalem, complained, at their climacteric, that "they 
 call evil good and good evil, put darkness for light and light for 
 
12 
 
 darkness;" and said, "so their root shall be rotteness and their blos- 
 som shall go up as the dust." 
 
 Speaking from honest purposes and after an acquired habit of 
 honest thought, the next thing in importance perhaps is that their 
 opinions shall be their own. This does not inrpty that others may 
 not be consulted. He is an unsafe adviser who fails to seek all 
 known sources of aid, when opinions depend on facts. But if the 
 question propounded be one of moral duty and the circumstances 
 are plain, it should then be immaterial what others would do with 
 like surroundings. 
 
 We hear much talk about Rehoboani taking advice of the 
 young men instead of the old men. Generally it is safe to consult 
 those of experience. But not all grey hairs are honorable ; that 
 depends on upon what heads they grow. The young princes who 
 advised him to make the burdens of the people heavier were bad 
 men doubtless ; and it may be that the old men who advised him 
 to be their servant that day that his subjects might be his servants 
 forever after, were not time-serving politicians. We know not. But 
 he knew that, to pamper his pride and vanity, to feed his corrupted 
 tates and sensual desires, Solomon had put grievous burdens on the 
 shoulders of his people ; and when called upon to lighten those 
 burdens, Rehoboam, a king, had a kingly opportunity to right a 
 wrong, and ought to have done it on the spot, without asking any 
 time or any advice. 
 
 Graduates of colleges and universities should not make the mis- 
 take that they form a class or that their powers and culture are 
 needed only in certain walks of life. On the farms and in merchan- 
 dise as much as in the learned professions, in every department of 
 human toil and effort, their abilities will tell for good to their 
 country. 
 
 Nor should they shun the drudgery of every day public duty. 
 For instance he who will not do his share in the administration of 
 justice because he regards jury service irksome or ignoble helps to 
 bring the laws into disrepute and possible contempt. 
 
 Nor should they shirk their proper share in political affairs. 
 That they will find there much that is low and degrading, much 
 that is even filthy and loathsome, only the more demands their 
 
13 
 
 presence, that by the river of their influence they may cleanse the 
 Augean Stables. Let them not shrink back for fear of taking con- 
 tamination to their homes. If themselves pure, they are in no 
 danger. " What though the waters of the sullen fen seem to pol- 
 lute the snow of the swan ? They fall off from her expanded 
 wings, and pure as a spirit, she soars away and descends into her 
 own silver lake, stainless as the water-lilies floating around her 
 breast." 
 
 Whether he wills it or not, every educated man will be in some 
 sort a leader of public opinion, in business affairs, in Church and 
 State. He will, perhaps insensibly to himself, either degrade or 
 elevate those about him. As the plane of intelligence is continually 
 rising, he who would lead upward must keep abreast of the times, 
 know something of history past and current, study men in their 
 relations to society and government, know something of the habits 
 of life and thoughts of not only his own countrymen, but of nations 
 afar off; in a word, have that broadness and clearness which comes 
 from extensive observation and correct information. 
 
 Let him prefer his own family, his own home, city, state or 
 government, but without contempt or hatred for any other. Jonah 
 was called to go a long distance to preach to a foreign nation, the 
 anemy of his country, because he was fitted for the work. The 
 effect of his labors in Nineveh, when he bent his energies to the task, 
 showed how great a man he was. No wonder that, at first it took 
 a whale to swallow him. But when he got into a pet and whined 
 because "that great city," which he thought was to be destroyed, 
 was saved, he became so contemptibly little that he would not have 
 made a mouthful for the worm which had gnawed down his vine. 
 
 It is a grand thing to have the courage of one's convictions. 
 Three examples stand out in sacred history to teach this noble 
 courage. Joshua proclaiming that whatever Isreal may decide 
 "as for me and my house we will serve the Lord;" Daniel worship- 
 ping after the proclamation of the King to the contrary, just as he 
 did before ; and Paul saying he would go to Jerusalem in spite of the 
 warning of Agabus and the fears and entreaties of his friends. No 
 less in business affairs and politics than in religion is such a quality 
 admirable. He inspires confidence who hesitates not when duty 
 calls, who would stake the Presidency upon a message. 
 
14 
 
 But gome will say that such conduct will bring defeat. That 
 depends upon what we mean by defeat. If mere ephemeral success 
 be all that is hoped for, if the best role is that of the trimmer, and 
 the missing of the temporary rewards of such conduct be want of 
 success, they are right. But 
 
 " Not in the clamor of the crowded street, 
 But in ourselves are triumph and defeat." 
 
 When Burke was taunted that the Whig party had been dis- 
 gracefully beaten, he replied, "O, illustrious disgrace! O, vic- 
 torious defeat! May your memorial be fresh and new to the latest 
 generation. * * * Let no man hear of us who shall not hear 
 that in a struggle against the intrigues of courts, and the perfidious 
 levity of the multitude, we fell in the cause of honor, in the cause 
 of our country, in the cause of humanity itself. But if fortune 
 should be as powerful over fame as she has been over virtue, at 
 least our conscience is beyond her jurisdiction." 
 
 Perhaps this talk had seemed more erudite had the examples 
 and names used for illustration been taken from Grecian and Roman 
 history. Perhaps it had been more entertaining to have drawn 
 from the rich list of our alumni names of those who have illustrated 
 high virtues in domestic life and in the marts of trade, in the forum 
 and on the field, in journalism, in medicine, in law and in the pulpit. 
 Here, in the hearing of their descendants, selection of some might 
 have been thought unjust to others equally worthy of praise. 
 
 Illustrations from the Scriptures have been preferred because 
 familiar to all. And having begun at the birth of our Govern- 
 ment, it seemed meet to close by reference to that great statesman 
 who pleaded in parliament against the oppression of our colonies 
 because it was wrong, as he denounced the cruelties of his country's 
 officials in India because they were wrong ; who without family or 
 wealth, by honesty and industry, won distinction above both ; who 
 in his old age declined a peerage ; and was not buried in West- 
 minster Abbey only because of his solemn order that his body 
 should rest in the little church in the village of Beaconsfield. 
 
 To-day's offering contains mere suggestions and few in num- 
 ber. But no matter. The Commandments are but ten, and vet 
 
15 
 
 • 
 
 on them stand all the laws of Christianity and civilization. But 
 seven colors mingle in the varied beauty of flowers and forest, of 
 landscape and sky. The combinations of but seven notes compass 
 the whole range of music, from the vibrations of the child's harp to 
 the swell of the grandest oratorios of Mendelssohn or Handel. 
 
 So if the educated youths of the country will heed these few 
 admonitions ; study the word of God ; be true to their domestic 
 duties ; seek wealth only for the good they may accomplish ; be 
 industrious, honest, sober and earnest ; love their country without 
 narrowness, and serve it when called in common and exalted posi- 
 tions with like devotion ; have high purposes and courageous main- 
 tenance of principles, they will compass the whole circle of life's 
 duties, they will "render the like glorious and essential services to 
 our country." They will make our government, as stable as the 
 decalogue, and as glorious to the vision as the rainbow ; and its 
 movements will be music as grand as when the "morning stars 
 sang together" at the birth of our world, and as sweet as when, at 
 the birth of our Savior, the multitude of the heavenly host sang, 
 "On earth peace, good-will to men." 
 
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