Conceived in prayer, born of the faith and convictions as embodied in its original seal which reads, "Equal rights and knowledge for all," an offspring of Plymouth Rock, Howard University is set before you—a cross between religious fervor and prophetic educational enthusiasm. She is, then, the essence filtrating from the declaration of Paul at Athens, that "of one blood hath God created all men to dwell upon earth."
For forty-five years, Howard has been living her life. She has been more or less doing her work as circumstances allowed and dictated, but now we ask of you "Watchman, what of the night?" How far has this work been progressing along the line of basal principles that we find embodied in all these authoritative extracts? Unfortunate I think it is that the discussions in the early meetings of the Board of Trustees were not preserved in stenographic report, for the time will come when the spiritual history of Howard University must be written as well as its material history, and then the historian will be at a loss to find the true afflatus that gave birth to our alma mater, unless we keep it in evidence.
The imagination has oft painted Howard University as a temple—a temple of knowledge,—a temple for the teaching of justice; a temple for the upbuild of mankind. Let us then hold its form to our imagination, pearly white as the palaces of the South, straight in its construction as rectitude, and let us present it to an admiring world, not only for æsthetic culture but ethical grandeur, religious progress, and political righteousness; and let us say to all, be he high or low, "who touches a stone in yon God-given edifice" is guilty of vandalism, is an iconoclast not at any time to be tolerated. He is tampering with the rights and privileges of a worthy people and deserves to have visited upon him the excoriation of a fiery indignation. Howard was created to meet the dire needs of a meritorious class, and insensible indeed must the man be who for sentimental or personal reasons or for profit, swerves one degree from the line of the highest form of education in administration or instruction. There should be launched upon him the anathema of an outraged people.
Sound the alarm that no man must hinder the true mission of Howard University. It were better for him that a millstone were hung about his neck and that he be cast into the deep. For him there is punishment even after death in the sure infamy that will attach to his name.
The old motto, "Equal rights and knowledge for all," is a necessary constituent of the Howard University life and purpose. There can be no Howard University without equal rights and highest culture for all, based upon merit and capacity. To be plain, we know of no Negro education. Political rights and civic privileges are accompaniments of citizenship and are therefore part of the warp and woof of Howard University's curricula; the salt and savor without which wherewith will it be salted? Mathematics has no color; ethics and philosophy are of no creed or class; culture was not fashioned for race monopoly; knowledge is in no plan or department an exclusive goal; justice is universal. Freedom in striving for the acquisition of God's bounty as revealed by nature is the birthright of all and an inalienable right of all. These are God-given privileges, and any contravention of them is born of evil and belongs to the evil powers.
Our privileges have imposed a trust and we are the trustees. Let no man deceive himself. Whatever the opportunity of approval now for betrayal of trust bequeathed to us, the time will come for the court of public opinion to find whom to blame and whom to thank. What the founders demanded for Howard, we must still demand. What William Clark and Martha Spaulding by their gifts meant, must still be meant by Howard's activities. Being justified in the past, it must be maintained in the future. Then to-night let us re-baptize in Howard spirit and issue the mandate of loyalty and endeavor.
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Let no Howard man ever expatriate himself. Necessity driving him from Howard, let him consider himself domiciled elsewhere, but his scholastic citizenship intact in Howard.
We will sing the old song of Howard, though there be other songs greater. Yale, Cambridge, Oxford, and Leipsic may sing their songs, but, for me and my house, we will sing "Howard, I love old Howard."
Let us imitate the psalmist: "We will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings." We will exalt Howard and delight in her good work. Where she is weak we will endeavor to strengthen, and where she is strong we will direct to the uplift of the race. She may be lacking in equipment; that can be tolerated; but as to principle, she must not be weak at any point. From stem to stern she must carry the marks of her purpose, and at mast-head must float the pennant of her seals.