Convocation Addresses of the Universities of Bombay and Madras/Part 2/Surgeon-General The Hon'ble W. R. Cornish, C.I.E.
TWENTY-SEVENTH CONVOCATION.
(By The Honorable W. R. Cornish, F.R.C.S., C.I.E.)
Gentlemen, — By the statutes of this University in regard to the form of procedure in conferring Degrees, it is enjoined that the Chancellor shall appoint a member of the Senate to deliver an address to the graduates, "exhorting them to conduct them- selves suitably unto the position to which, by the Degree conferred upon them, they have attained." The duty of addressing you on the present occasion has fallen to myself. In some respects I could have wished that the task had been assigned to some one more closely connected than I am with the great educational work which this University tests, and confirms with the seal of its approval. But I do not forget that the Senate of this University comprises representatives of all professions and callings, and that the Chancellor, in his discretion, may see fit to name any member thereof to offer you counsel, and in the name of the Senate, wish you "God speed" in your various paths of life. The presence here of an unusually large number of graduates in Arts, on whom Degrees have this day been conferred, testifies to the fact that the regulations of this University are no hindrance to higher education. Year by year, the tests become more efficient and practical, and a Degree in Arts, Law, Medicine, or Engineering is not granted until the candidate has shown a competent knowledge of the subjects in which he is examined. On looking over the history of the Madras University, since its formation in 1857, I find that, including the graduates of the present year, 1,345 have passed the examination for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts, 32 have graduated as Master of Arts, 213 have obtained Degrees in Law, 34 in Medicine, and 29 in Engineering. These results are, on the whole, satisfactory, though I should have been better pleased with them, if they had shown a larger proportion of the educated youths of the country devoting their energies to Medicine and Civil Engineering. In regard to Medical Degrees, I have no doubt whatever, that the local authorities who now largely employ Medical men for the charge of Hospitals and Dispensaries, will ere long insist on the possession of a University Degree by those whom they employ, and that the proportion of Medical graduates, from this and other causes, will steadily increase. I am not without hope also that the recent activity in railway extension and other public works of magnitude in many parts of India, may cause a demand for the services of more local graduates in Engineering.
The Madras University, in common with other Indian Universities, is now empowered by an Act passed by the Legislative Council of the Government of India, to confer the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Laws on any person of eminence or distinction, who may be recommended by the Syndicate, and approved by the Senate. In this respect the Indian Universities are now in the enjoyment of powers similar to those possessed by the older Universities of Europe, and I have no doubt that when these powers are used by the governing bodies they will be employed wisely, and in the true interest of the Indian Universities.
Referring once more to the statistics of the Madras University, I find that the higher education is still mainly restricted to that class of the community which for ages past, has been noted for its intellectual endowment. Of the 1,349 Bachelors in Arts, 899 come from the Brahman community, which community represents only one twenty-sixth part of the Hindu population, The remaining twenty-five parts of the Hindu people have furnished only 252 Bachelors in Arts, —a fact which shows that the higher education has permeated but slightly the lives of the greater numbers of the people. Native Christians have obtained Degrees to the number of 117, and these results speak highly for the educational advantages of the class. The number of East Indian graduates is 55, of Europeans 17, and of Mahomedans 7. These facts in regard to the classes of the population furnishing graduates of the University, are full of significance. They show us that certain sections of the population have a desire for, and appreciation of learning, while other classes have not yet felt the need of it. In this connection it is important to note that the large Mahomedan population of this Presidency (numbering nearly two millions of persons,) is represented by only seven graduates, four of whom obtained Degrees in 1883. Amongst the graduates of the present year there are no Mahomedans, and I mention the fact with regret, that so important a section of the community should allow themselves to be left so far behind, in the higher education encouraged by the University.
To the graduates whose student life ends with the ceremonial of this day, I would offer a few remarks of general application. Your college work and set tasks are ended. You stand upon the threshold of your respective careers, whether your labors are devoted to State service, to the special professions of Law, Medicine, or Engineering, or to any of the numerous callings whereby the material resources of the country are increased, to your own profit, and the benefit of the country at large. In what spirit do you contemplate this new departure in your lives? Has the mental training and discipline of your student life developed in you a love of knowledge for its own sake, irrespective of its utility in fitting you to pass examinations and thereby to enter upon the occupations you have chosen? Has the insight you have obtained into the several branches of knowledge, created in your hearts a reverence for learning, and a desire to add to your knowledge, day by day and year by year, and to expend your best energies in the pursuit of truth? If you can answer "yes" to these questions, I can assure you that your labors, thus far, have not been wasted, and that you begin the working years of your lives under circumstances most favorable to success and future distinction. A quaint poet[1] of the seventeenth century has embodied his estimate of men's motives in seeking education in these lines:—
And idle ouriositie that is!
Some but to sell, not freely to bestow;
These gaine, and spend both time and wealth amisse,
Some to build others, which is Charity,
But these to build themselves, who wise men be."
If the education you have received has been acquired in a spirit of love and humility, you will profit by all opportunities of imparting your knowledge to others, and, in the words of the poet, you will be amongst the number of the "wise men" who seek to "build themselves".
In Literature, Art, and Science, "the old order changeth, yielding place to new" with such rapid strides, that unless a man remains a zealous student throughout his life, he must be left behind in the branches of knowledge which are needful to his professional usefulness. Let me then advise you to maintain, both in the near and distant future, those habits of mental discipline which have enabled you to obtain Degrees in this University. In every life, no matter how it may be engrossed by professional duty, and care for the things of the moment, some leisure must fall, which you may pass in absolute idleness, and mental vacuity, or in storing your minds with the wisdom of the past, or in following the ramifications of modern thought. The careful and critical study of classical works relating to history, poetry, philosophy, and any branch of science of which you have mastered the principles, will prove the most effectual remedy against that mental hebetude, which is apt to overtake us, when we have attained, as we think, the summit of our ambition. And while urging yon to a familiar acquaintance with the thoughts of eminent men of all ages and climes, I would not have you neglectful of modern ways of thought, as represented by current literature, and the periodical and newspaper press. A man to be of use in his generation must not be a mere bookworm, fattening his memory with obsolete and forgotten lore, but he must live in the present, and whet the edge of his intellect by friction against modern minds, and the more he studies modern literature, and especially the literature devoted to a record of scientific thought and progress, the more capable will he be of forming a true estimate of the extent of his own knowledge and deficiencies for the work appointed him to do.
Most of you, graduates in Arts, have after due consideration, probably formed some schemes in respect to your future means of livelihood. Some will doubtless devote their lives to the education and training of the young, and surely, no noble career can present itself to those having inclination and aptitude for such work, than the influencing for good the character of the infant generation, which shall in due order be the manhood of the next. "The child" being "father to the man," see to it that your teaching and personal example shall always be employed to encourage and develop the finer instincts of humanity, and to keep down all that is ignoble and base, in the tender minds subjected to your leading. Others of you will no doubt aspire to serve the State in various capacities. This is a reasonable object of ambition, and although the State cannot undertake to find work for all those who are qualified to do it, there must always be a field in State service for the highest intelligence the country can produce. One caution I may give in regard to this sphere of labor. I advise you to be content with modest beginnings, and for this reason, that the higher offices in State service are only to be approached by those who have gained departmental experience. Remember that in the varied service of the State each department has its own special work, and that mere general culture and intelligence, as implied by your University Degree, will not enable you to dispense with the special training required for your special departmental duties. You may be inclined to consider it a grievance that men of greater departmental experience, but of less culture than yourselves, are preferred before you; but you should seek to prove to your official superiors that your scholastic training has enabled you to discharge your special duties with greater aptitude and ability; and having so done you may safely leave your claims to advancement in the hands of those who have the best means of judging of your actual and relative merit.
I am old enough to remember the time when no educational test was imposed on candidates for the Uncovenanted Service, and I have watched the develop of the system, system, introduced into this Presidency by Sir Charles Trevelyan in 1859 and increased in stringency from time to time, with great interest, and am satisfied that the wider employment of graduates and undergraduates in the public departments of the State has resulted in better work, and in a distinctly higher tone of the public service. These results might have been anticipated, but the fact that the character of the service has been manifestly improved by the enforcement of general and special tests of competency, will undoubtedly encourage the State to maintain, and increase, rather than relax, the stringency of the tests now accepted.
I have advised you to be modest in the estimation of your own value, and to be content with beginning life on the lower rungs of the official ladder. If you possess ability, zeal, and integrity, advancement and promotion must follow, as surely as the night follows the day, because every department of the State has an interest in being well served, and efficiency in lower grades is the best passport to the higher. But let it be borne in mind that the State cannot create offices because graduates abound, and that when the State service, and the learned professions have drawn their supplies of educated labor, there will still remain a number of graduates, who, of choice or necessity, will have to seek elsewhere for occupations suited to their circumstances. Whether you betake yourselves to trade, commerce, agriculture, or industrial handicrafts, there are vast and unexplored fields before you, which, so long as you enter upon them discreetly, prudently, and honorably, will afford you the means of living and enjoyment, and opportunities of demonstrating to your countrymen, that a sound, mental and moral training is the best of all preparations, for any and every pursuit in life.
Education in India, as you know, is a very one-sided affair, insomuch that until very recently, it was confined to the male sex alone, and at the present moment, the education of the female sex is pursued under grave disadvantages. The truest friends of the people of India cannot but entertain serious misgivings as to the outcome of a system which practically excludes one sex from the advantages of mental training and discipline; and having the opportunity granted me of speaking, I cannot pass over this grave fault in your educational system in silence. The influence of a mother on her offspring is most powerful and farreaching. Her physical and mental characteristics pass to the fruit of her womb, and her children learn of her instinctively, before they are capable of speech or intelligent thought. It is the opinion of eminent men who have studied the subject that the transmission of certain mental and physical attributes of a race is more commonly influenced by the mother than the father; and the simple fact that nearly all the men of high eminence in Science, Art, and other pursuits, now living, have descended from mothers of more than average mental vigor and capacity, should be enough to cause us to ponder whether the Indian system is a wise one, or suited to the development of the highest Educated man intellectual power of the people. The gulf between the educated man and uncultured woman is very wide, and, if the views of scientists are true, there is some danger that the descendants of unions in which there is great disparity of mental development may favor the mother rather than the father, and that the intellectual powers of the males of succeeding generations may be of the feminine or childlike type, never ripening into the fulness of the higher order of manhood. The late Charles Darwin thought that a similar arrest of mental development followed, when there was great disparity in the ages of father and mother ; the offspring, according to his observations, generally showing the child-type of intellect throughout the period of mature life.
So strongly have the disadvantages of the lop-sided system of culture prevailing in India appeared to me, that I have often thought, and said, that given the position of a Dictator, and with full command of the State purse-strings, I would spend no public money on education, other than the primary teaching of both sexes, and the higher training of the future wives and mothers of India, until the existing disparity between the culture of the two sexes had in a great degree ceased. But, gentlemen, so heroic a treatment of the subject is unnecessary. I am delighted to acknowledge that you have already recognised the evil, and that every graduate of this University is doing his best, consciously or unconsciously, to cure it. Kindly give me your attention to the following figures. Twenty years ago the number of girls "under instruction" in this Presidency was 3,763. In 1873-74 the numbers were 17,113. Nine years later, in 1882-83, the female pupils had increased to 43,671. Thus, in the space of nineteen years, the female pupils in school had increased by about 40,000, and last year, they exceeded, by more than ten times, the numbers at school in the official year 1863-64. These results appear to me to prove, that an important revolution in native thought, as to the position of women, is actually in progress in our very midst, and, seeing that the extension of female education has proceeded step by step, with the dispersion of the graduates and under-graduates of this University throughout the land, I cannot dispossess myself of the belief that there is a close connectiona necessary consequence of man's culture. between the two phenomena. I believe that the training and education of the women of India is a necessary consequence of your own culture. You will not rest satisfied until the female members of your families are able to meet you on a common intellectual level. Man's imperfect nature craves for sympathy in his toils, aspirations, doubts, and anguish, and where shall he find the sympathy and loving help for which his soul earns, if not amongst the women of his family, who know his strength and his weakness, and love him none the less for his imperfections? The need of intellectual companionship in the home is a powerful motor, impelling you to set the educational system of women on a satisfactory basis. But this is not the only force at work. A stronger one, probably, is the natural desire of women not to be left on a confessedly lower level than yourselves, to say nothing of your own honest convictions that educated woman is best fitted by her counsel, sympathy, and encouragement, to strengthen your own efforts in mental and moral advancement. These forces are silently, but most surely, and irresistibly, influencing thought and conduct. Every graduate who leaves these walls, if he is himself imbued with the true spirit of learning, of necessity becomes an advocate of female education.
The difficulties before you in putting your desires into practice are neither few nor unimportant, but I doubt not that the women upon whom the spirit of knowledge and wisdom has already descended, will be your strongest supporters in those domestic reforms which may favor the sound teaching of useful knowledge to the females of India. Tour most ancient lawgiver, though his ideas of woman's fitness for learning were not in accord with modern thought, forcibly impresses upon you the obligation of doing honor to woman. He says, "Where females are honored, there the Deities are pleased, but where they are dishonored, there all religious acts become fruitless,"[2] and again "where female relations are made miserable, the family of him who makes them so, very soon wholly perishes, but where they are not unhappy, the family always increases." How can you honor and add to the happiness of your womankind better than by making them partakers of your intellectual pursuits, as well as the sharers in your domestic joys and sorrows ?
It is expected that wherever your duties may call you, you will take an intelligent interest in the management of local affairs. The extension of the principal of Local Government, in accordance with the views of the Viceroy, will give to all graduates of the University, either as electors, or representatives of their fellow-citizens in local assemblies, the necessary opportunities of showing their capacity in leading public opinion or in administration. You will forgive me, if I remind you thatStudy of the social conditions a careful study of the community amongst whom your lot may be cast is absolutely essential, if you would play a useful part in local administration. In the Census Report of this Presidency, published in 1883, you will find a vast number of hard facts and stubborn figures, over which you may ponder with the greatest advantage. These facts relate not only to the country as a whole, but to every inhabited village and town. They bring before yon the numbers, sexes and ages of the people, their civil and conjugal condition, their degree of education, language, religion, caste, or nationality, and occupations. Your first duty should be to make yourselves thoroughly acquainted with the actual condition of the people in these respects, as without such knowledge your personal influence and activity may be employed in wrong directions, and become positively mischievous, instead of beneficial. It is one of the unavoidableA blemish of the caste system blemishes of the caste system peculiar to this country, that men's interests should tend to gravitate almost wholly towards the family, the clan, or caste; but, to be useful and impartial in the administration of local affairs, you must widen your sympathies, and look mainly to the common good of those who make you their mouth-piece. It may be well to caution you that the gift of fluent speech is, in itself, but a poor provision for one engaged in local government. What you want is accurate knowledge, and a fixed determination to do justice to all classes of your local community. In every town or village, you will find work to be done, which shall benefit your fellow-men. The insanitary conditions abounding everywhere, and which are directly, or indirectly, the cause of much preventible suffering and mortality, call for your thoughtful attention as to the most practicable means of dealing with them. It is fitting that men on whom this ^^^■iTrmB Ij'^iiiversity has conferred Degrees should at all times take a leading part in reforms that may tend to make a community more healthy, happy, and prosperous. The care of the public health should be your first consideration, for a sickly community, or one in which the bread-winners are cut off in the prime of their days, must always be miserable and impoverished. And when the people shall have been shown the importance of cleanly habits as affecting their health, you may well direct their attention to some other customs which have an important bearing on their happiness and prosperity. Look forProfuse expenditure on marriage. instance at the custom, so universal, of profuse expenditure on the occasion of marriages and family ceremonial. The wealthy may indulge in such a custom without hurt to their estate, but see how pernicious is the example to the lower classes, when a poor man, apeing his rich brother, does not hesitate to sell himself, and all belonging to him, into life-long slavery, for the price of a wedding feast! The lightheartedness with which people, otherwise thrifty and self-denying, will incur overwhelming debts, sanctioned by custom and usage, is a matter that strikes strangers to your countrymen with astonishment, and you may well use your personal influence in discouraging habits which lie at the root of three-fourths of the chronic poverty of the Indian people. In these and other matters, in which you would be an example to your fellow-men, remember the advice of the poet : —
Both want, and wish thy pleasing presence still.
Kindness, good parts, great places are the way
To compass this. Find ont men's wants and will
And meet them there. All worldly joys go less.
To the one joy of doing kindnesses."
And in battling against customs injurious to health, material prosperity and morals, I may remind you in the words of John Milton that
No less renowned than "War."
Indian philosophers of old were remarkable for the two excellent qualities of "plain living" and "high thinking." We live now in the days of a higher civilization, and in an age when men spend much of their substance in luxury, or on the non-essentials of existence. I would not have you depart from the simple habits, inherited from a long line of ancestors, and which the experience of countless generations has proved to be best suited to the inhabitants of tropical lands. Food and clothing must Alcohol and meat not essential to health vary in different countries, as climate and other conditions vary, but in adhering to the simplicity of life practised by your forefathers, you will have the sanction and approval of some of the most eminent of modern scientists, who have come to the conclusion, hat alcoholic drinks and strong meats are not essential to health, life, or mental and physical vigor, while the abuse of strong drinks, at any rate, has proved a curse- to the Northern peoples. I would have you, in the words of the poet,
All foreign of that name; but scorn their ill."
The simplicity of your habits in eating and drinking, which climatic considerations have imposed* upon you, has had the advantage of enabling you to solve a problem which still troubles and perplexes more advanced nations. I allude to the maintenance The maintentenance of the poor of the poor. India, to its credit be it said, has needed no poor law. The obligation to feed the poor, and more unfortunate members of a family has always been regarded as a sacred duty by its principal members. The simplicity of your domestic life has enabled even the poorest members of society to fulfil these obligations, and I can vouch for the fact that they are fulfilled except when great natural calamity causes a failure of the food supplies, and there is no bread to give to him that asketh. During the great famine of 1876-77 there were not wanting critics, (chiefly of the carping order) who protested that the wise and humane policy of the Madras Government in State relief would result in the chronic pauperisation of the industrial classes. The prophecy was a cruel libel on the toilers and workers of your countrymen, and women, and has been completely falsified, for the broad truth remains, that immediately on the cessation of the food scarcity, the people everywhere resumed their normal habits of providing for the necessities of their dependants, and for years past the State has incurred no expenditure in the relief of Indian paupers. Having seen theSelf-respect of the Indian people of the land in times of prosperity, and also bowed down in adversity, under the influence of a terrible national calamity, let me add that I entertain a profound and lasting respect for their many virtues, and a high admiration of their keen sense of self-respect.
And now, gentlemen, before concluding, I must add yet a few last words. Time will not suffice me to touch upon a variety of subjects of deep and vital import, but I should like you to understand that your educational training, ending with the ceremonial of to-day, has been conducted with the view of making you better and stronger men, physically, morally, and Self-denial the law of being intellectually. If that training has been successful, your future lives will prove. As you have living examples of graduates of former years, many of whom I am pleased to see around me, leading noble, pure, and honorable lives, filling the highest stations in State service, and in the learned professions, with the unqualified approbation and respect of all who know them, so we hope you will serve as examples worthy of imitation to those who come after you, and become men of light and leading in your generation. If you bear in mind that no man can live wholly for himself, that in your daily lives duty should take the place of inclination, that self-sacrifice should be the law of your being, and that selfish objects and motives should find no response in your hearts, you will have risen to a high conception of your responsibilities, in connection with the days that may be in store for you. In George Herbert's words, once more,
So shalt thou humble and magnanimous be;
Sink not in spirit: who aimeth at the sky
Shoots higher much, than he that means a tree."
But it will happen to you, as to all of us, that intellectual cultureSeek Divine help or scientific research alone will not satisfy your spiritual cravings for deeper knowledge of the mysteries for life. This University, very properly, does not deal with theological questions, but leaves every man free to worship his Creator, and to seek His help and guidance in the manner that seems best in accord with his hereditary training or honest convictions, but this much I may say, that your education will have been but of small benefit to you, if it has not strengthened and expanded your views of the Divine Government of the Universe. H. E. the Viceroy, in opening a Science Hall in Calcutta, a few days ago, concluded his address in words which express my meaning so fully that I cannot do better than repeat them. Lord Ripon is reported to have said:—"When the widest generalizations of science are reached, and its loftiest discoveries are mastered, there will still remain, above and beyond them, all those mysteries of life which prove to us that the utmost knowledge of the outward universe will never solve the greatest problem of life, and that we must look elsewhere for that help which is to enable us to fulfil our work on earth, for the glory of Him who is the Ruler, not only of the world around us, but of the hearts and spirits of men."
I have nothing to add to these noble and touching words of one of the truest friends of the people of India, except that it remains for all of us to seek the Divine help we need, in earnest prayer, and spiritual communion with the Most High.
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves, and those who call them friend."