Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White — Volume 1

by Andrew Dickson White

Senator Morrill then told a story regarding Everett's great speech at the opening of the Dudley Observatory at Albany, which I had heard at the time of its delivery. In this speech Everett said: ``Last night, crossing the Connecticut River, I saw mirrored in its waters Arcturus, then fully at the zenith, and I thought,'' etc., etc.; ``but,'' said Morrill, ``some one looked into the matter and found that Everett, before leaving home, had evidently turned the globe in his study wrong side up, for at that time Arcturus was not at the zenith, but at the nadir.''

At the Cornell commencement of this year (1885) I resigned my presidency of the university. It had nominally lasted eighteen years, but really more than twenty, since I had taken the lead in the work of the university even before its charter was granted, twenty years previously, and from that day the main charge of its organization and of everything except providing funds had been intrusted to me. Regarding this part of my life I shall speak more fully in another chapter.

Shortly after this resignation two opportunities were offered me which caused me considerable thought.

As to the first, President Cleveland was kind enough to write me an autograph letter asking whether I would accept one of the positions on the new Interstate Railway Commission. I felt it a great honor to be asked to act as colleague with such men as Chief Justice Cooley, Mr. Morrison, and others already upon that board, but I recognized my own incompetence to discharge the duties of such a position properly. Though I had been, some years before, a director in two of the largest railway corporations in the United States, my heart was never in that duty, and I never prepared myself to discharge it. Thinking the matter over fully, I felt obliged to decline the place. My heart was set on finishing the book which I had so long wished to publish,—my ``History of the Warfare of Science with Theology,''—and in order to cut myself off from other work and get some needed rest I sailed for Europe on October 3, 1885, but while engaged most delightfully in visits to Oxford, Cambridge, and various places on the Continent, I received by cable an offer which had also a very tempting side. It was sent by my old friend Mr. Henry Sage of Ithaca, urged me to accept the nomination to Congress from that district, and assured me that the nomination was equivalent to an election. There were some reasons why such a position was attractive to me, but the more I thought of it the more it seemed to me that to discharge these duties properly would take me from other work to which I was pledged. Before deciding the question, however, I determined to consult two old friends who were then living in London hotels adjacent to my own. The first of these was my dear old instructor, with whom my relations had been of the kindest ever since my first year at Yale—President Porter.

On my laying the matter before him, he said, ``Accept by all means''; but as I showed him the reasons on both sides, he at last reluctantly agreed with me that probably it was best to send a declination.

The other person consulted was Mr. James Belden of Syracuse, afterward a member of Congress from the Onondaga district, a politician who had a most intimate knowledge of men and affairs in our State. We had been during a long period, political adversaries, but I had come to respect sundry qualities he had more lately exhibited, and therefore went to him as a practical man and laid the case before him. He expressed his great surprise that I should advise with him, my old political adversary, but he said, ``Since you do come, I will give you the very best advice I can.''

We then went over the case together, and I feel sure that he advised me as well as the oldest of my friends could have done, and with a shrewdness and foresight all his own.

One of his arguments ran somewhat as follows: ``To be successful in politics a man must really think of nothing else; it must be his first thought in the morning and his last at night; everything else must yield to it. Heretofore you have quietly gone on your way, sought nothing, and taken what has been freely tendered you in the interest of the party and of the public. I know the Elmira district, and you can have the nomination and the election without trouble; but the question is whether you could ever be happy in the sort of work which you must do in order to take a proper place in the House of Representatives. First of all, you must give up everything else and devote yourself to that alone; and even then, when you have succeeded, you have only to look about you and see the men who have achieved success in that way, and who, after all, have found in it nothing but disappointment.'' In saying this he expressed the conclusion at which I had already arrived.

I cabled my absolute declination of the nomination, and was reproved by my friends for not availing myself of this opportunity to take part in political affairs, but have nevertheless always felt that my decision was wise.

To tell the truth, I never had, and never desired to have, any capacity for the rough-and-tumble of politics. I greatly respect many of the men who have gifts of that sort, but have recognized the fact that my influence in and on politics must be of a different kind. I have indeed taken part in some stormy scenes in conventions, meetings, and legislatures, but always with regret. My true r<o^>le has been a more quiet one. My ambition, whether I have succeeded in it or not, has been to set young men in trains of fruitful thought, to bring mature men into the line of right reason, and to aid in devising and urging needed reforms, in developing and supporting wise policies, and in building up institutions which shall strengthen what is best in American life.