What, then, is the function of the academic class in the community? Simply to keep the flag of human intellect flying, a work which, in most cases, involves some self-sacrifice in those who devote themselves to it. A professor, for example, though a man of intellect, is not necessarily devoid of brains, and he might well turn those brains to advantage in some more lucrative profession. As it is, he is compelled to a large extent to sacrifice his individuality, to degrade his intellect with drudgery which is beneath it, to stand as a mere intermediary or conduit-pipe between the student and knowledge. At the same time, if, out of the hundreds of students who pass through his hands in one academic year, he succeeds in inspiring even a single individual with a true desire for culture, his existence for that year is fully justified, for has he not added one member to the band of intellectual pioneers who will finally, we hope, take possession, in the name of humanity, of the whole universe of thought?
Come, my friends,
Push off, and sitting well in order, smite
The sounding furrows, for our purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars until we die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
THE ETERNAL SILENCE
Around this rolling sphere of Man
There lies a vast Unknown,
Beyond the space that he can scan
With tracts of starlight sown.
Beneath the shadow of th' Unknown
From age to age he stands,
And to the Void in wavering hope
He stretches praying hands.
But in the Void no signs appear,
It stands unbroken still,
And from the void no word of cheer,
But silence deep and chill.
And when the upstart race of men
Has ceased from all this earth,
When past is their brave strife with Fate,
When past are Death and Birth;
When lifeless, sightless, blank and cold
The home of man's poor breath;
Still will this ball through space be rolled,
In Silence deep as death.