The glories already achieved in the field of science, art and
literature have but aroused us to seek for still greater honors. The
ray of light that has fallen across our pathway, giving hope and
promise of better and brighter things further on, has but fired the
zeal within us, and there is no way of satisfying this burning zeal
save the feasting on the coveted goal--the riches and beauties of
wisdom. One writer says: "As long as one's mind is shrouded in
ignorance he is but the tool of others, and the victim of foolishness
and gross absurdities. He will never experience those pleasures which
come from a well-directed train of thought and which is akin to the
dignity of a high nature. On the other hand, the person whose mind is
illumined with the light of knowledge, and whose soul is lit up, is
introduced as it were into a new world. He can trace back the stream
of time to its commencement, and gliding along its downward course,
can survey the most memorable events and see the dawnings of Divine
Mercy and the manifestations of the Son of God in our nature." 'Tis
not enough to know that we have faculties. 'Tis not sufficient to say
that there lives in us the power to see, to hear, to feel, to reason,
to think and to act; we must develop these powers until we can feel
the benefit of the blessings that come from their use. We will never
be able to reason for ourselves unless we learn to think for
ourselves. The thinking mind is the active mind, and the active mind
is the growing mind; the growing mind moves the man, and the man that
moves helps to move the world. He moves step by step from the common
level of events to things of greater height. He rises from pinnacle to
pinnacle, never ceasing, never tiring, never stopping, ever growing,
ever moving, ever rising till he finds the fountain head of all truth
and all virtue. We are now face to face with a new order of things.
Under this new regime we witness the foreshadowing of a higher sense
of civilization, a higher standard of morals, a broader field of
culture and a purer realm of thought.

Indeed, we are only in the shadow of this great light. 'Tis not the
promise alone that brightens our sky. The dawn has appeared. The music
of the morn has already been heard, and nations are awaking and
rushing to crowd around the altar as worshippers at the shrine of
learning. What lover of letters would doubt for a moment that if
Thomas Carlyle could re-enter the world of lette