ndicate our aim more fitly than those by which John
Henry Newman expresses his "Idea of the University," in a page glowing
with enthusiasm, to which I delight to revert.

What will be our agencies?

A large staff of teachers; abundance of instruments, apparatus,
diagrams, books, and other means of research and instruction; good
laboratories, with all the requisite facilities; accessory influences,
coming both from Baltimore and Washington; funds so unrestricted,
charter so free, schemes so elastic, that as the world goes forward, our
plans will be adjusted to its new requirements.

What will be our methods?

Liberal advanced instruction for those who want it; distinctive honors
for those who win them; appointed courses for those who need them;
special courses for those who can take no other; a combination of
lectures, recitations, laboratory practice, field work and private
instruction; the largest discretion allowed to the Faculty consistent
with the purposes in view; and, finally, an appeal to the community to
increase our means, to strengthen our hands, to supplement our
deficiencies, and especially to surround our scholars with those social,
domestic and religious influences which a corporation can at best
imperfectly provide, but which may be abundantly enjoyed in the homes,
the churches and the private associations of an enlightened Christian
city.

_Citizens of Baltimore and Maryland_.--This great undertaking does not
rest upon the Trustees alone; the whole community has a share in it.
However strong our purposes, they will be modified, inevitably, by the
opinions of enlightened men; so let parents and teachers incite the
youth of this commonwealth to high aspirations; let wise and judicious
counsellors continue their helpful suggestions, sure of being heard with
grateful consideration; let skilful writers, avoiding captionsness on
the one hand and compliment on the other, uphold or refute or amend the
tenets here announced; let the guardians of the press diffuse widely a
knowledge of the benefits which are here provided; let men of means
largely increase the usefulness of this work by their timely gifts.

At the moment there is nothing which seems to me so important, in this
region, and indeed in the entire land, as the promotion of good
secondary schools, preparatory to the universities. There are old
foundations in Maryland which require to be made strong, and there is
room for newer enterprises, of var