Convocation Addresses of the Universities of Bombay and Madras/Part 1/Rev. John Wilson, D.D., F.R.S.
NINTH CONVOCATION.
(By Rev. John Wilson, D.D., F.R.S.)
Gentlemen of the Senate,—I am sure we all deeply regret the absence on this occasion of our Governor, the Right Honourable Sir Seymour Fitzgerald, our Chancellor. The deep interest which His Excellency takes in the prosperity of the University; his ready, eloquent, and effective advocacy of its claims; and the encouragement which he gives to it in various ways, we most highly appreciate. We all deeply sympathise with the object of his absence, that of welcoming, along with our distinguished Welcome to the Duke of Cannaught. Viceroy, the Earl Mayo, and the other magnates of this great country, the second son of our most Gracious and Illustrious Queen Victoria to the shores of India. We ourselves (I venture to speak not only for this large assembly, but for the whole of the West of India) most cordially join in that welcome. We, the dwellers on "Cambay's strand," unite our most cordial felicitations with those of our fellow-subjects sojourning near "Ganges' golden wave" on the arrival, in this distant land, of our Sailor Prince, who is gracefully carrying the expression of the imperial and personal interest of her Majesty in all her subjects to the remotest places of the globe. We go further than this, and humbly beg His Royal Highness to spare as much time as he conveniently can for this most populous and rapidly growing
city, with its numerous and diversified tribes and tongues congregated together, with its capacious and beautiful harbour, with a commerce the most valuable of the "Greater Britain," needing the protection of the Royal Navy, with most curious and instructive antiquities within easy reach, some of which extend back beyond the Christian era, and with the most picturesque and sublime scenery in its neighbouring isles, hills, and mountains.
Before making a few general remarks on our University and its Results of Examinations. varied studies, and the prospects of education in India, especially in its higher departments, I shall briefly advert to the report which has now been read, by order of the Syndicate, by our valued Registrar, Mr. Taylor. That report, generally speaking, we must all feel to be satisfactory and even gratifying. The only qualification which some may be disposed to make of this remark may have reference to the results of one or two of the examinations held this season, which have not altogether come up to our expectations. It has certainly been a disappointment, for example, to the public as well as to ourselves that, of 803 candidates who presented themselves for Matriculation, only 142 have successfully passed the examination, while of 600 candidates last year, 250 passed; and that of 100 undergraduates who presented themselves at the First Examination in Arts, only 34 have passed this year, while of 77 candidates last year, 40 passed. I am not prepared to say or insinuate in this place, that any fault exists in any quarter in connection with these results. Possibly the great body of the candidates who appeared for trial were on no reasonable expectancy fit for entrance into the University. Possibly some incidental errors of system may have been made by some of the examiners (competent and conscientious though they assuredly are) either in constructing their questions or assigning their marks. The time allotted for answering each paper is only three hours, and demands should not be made in excess of this time. Candidates are entitled to the benefit of each of their answers in so far as they are correct, while deductions, of course, are to be made for errors and defects. Possibly the instructions given to the examiners by the Syndicate should be extended, or a conference of certain classes of examiners held, as of those both in the first and second languages, before the questions to be given are printed, and before the results of examination are declared. Translations made from English into the Oriental languages, and from the Oriental languages into English, are certainly a test of the knowledge of English, as well as are the questions put and answered only in English. Our most satisfactory examination in Arts this year was that for the degree of B.A., at which 20 of 46 candidates passed. The other examinations do not require any special remark. The public, I think, may have confidence, from the very strictness practised, in the proficiency of our graduates, to whatever faculty they belong. I distinctly see, both from the feeling which I observe among students and the improving appearances of the colleges, a great increase of graduates in Medicine, Law, and Civil Engineering, who doubtless will promptly obtain employment and remuneration for the services which they may render to Government or the community.
All our prizes and scholarships, we have reason to believe, Prizes and Scholarships. have been salutary stimulants of study and exertion during the past year, a circumstance which must be pleasing to their liberal founders. The essay which gained the Manockjee Limjee Gold Medal for 1868 is a very creditable production. Though it is not an object with our University to give instruction in the more mechanical of the fine arts, for which we have in Bombay a separate school, founded and endowed by the Jamsetjee family, we have given encouragement to the study of architecture, in connection with engineering, by prescribing the subject of this essay. We have done this, remembering the architectural achievements of India in past ages, and that still
"---ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes
Emollit mores, nee sinit esse feros."
The physical geography of India, viewed in connection with its history, the subject of the essay for 1869, belongs to our course of instruction. Our Sanskrit scholarships, endowed by Mr. Bhagawandas Purushottamdas, and by Mr. Vinayakrao Jagannath Shankarshet, and our Latin scholarship endowed by Cowasji Jehangier Readymoney, c.s.i., have proved to be very, useful. So, doubtless, will be the prize in books established through the liberality of one of our European Fellows, the Honourable Mr. Ellis, who will be long remembered in the Bombay Presidency as a wise, faithful, and efficient administrator, and as the first successful advocate of an educational cess for this country.
The Sassoon endowment for a Hebrew scholarship was noticed at last Convocation. The regulations formed for that scholarship will, we hope, encourage the study of a most ancient language, on the highest grounds of undying importance.
Most gratifying to all our feelings is the commemoration through this University of the late Mr. James J. Berkley, one of our first Fellows. Looking to the Sahyadri Mountains (literally, the "Range of Difiiculty") in our neighbourhood, with the courageous eye of true practical science, he determined to do his best to carry over them a pathway for our steam-carriages, acting perseveringly on the determined resolution,
"Inveniam viam aut faciam."
His efforts, through the aid of Providence, were crowned with the success which we all appreciate; and we now surmount, what at one time were the almost unpassable barrier-walls of the Dakhan, in about an hour and a quarter, luxuriously seated in fleet conveyances, with nothing to do by ourselves but to look out from the windows of our convenient apartments, and admire in our ascent the sublimities of height added to height, and depth added to depth, and clothed with all the diversified vegetable drapery of the tropics. It is pleasing to remember the delight which Mr. Berkley took in the work of himself and his able associates as it advanced; and how eloquently and forcibly he descanted upon it in this hall before the Mechanics' Institution, of which he was the president and ornament, and before the public of Bombay.
With respect for the judicious liberality of the Chiefs of Junagadh and Navanagar, and with tender interest in the loss of the young but promising and brave officers Hebbert and LaTouche, who fell at the Tobar Hill, we must contemplate the endowment which their Highnesses have offered and we have accepted.
I hope that the regulations, now due, for the Gold Medal in Law, commemorative of the late Honourable Mr. Justice Forbes, one of the most accomplished members of our Civil Service, and the ingenious, inquisitive, and successful historian of Gujarat, who has done for that interesting and important province what Colonel Todd has done for Rajputana, will soon be submitted to the Senate.
Since I came into this room there has been put into my hands a gold medal denominated the Chancellor's Medal, and presented to us by Sir Seymour Fitzgerald. It is a very beautiful and massive medal, and reflects much credit on the Bombay Mint, where it was executed. I am sure it will be highly appreciated by the youth of this University, and I hope that when we meet here next year, the Chancellor himself will have it in his power to put into the hands of some successful student this token of his high regard for this University.
To advert now to more general matters connected with our Fellows and their qualifications. University: I would say that the list of our Fellows represents every class of the community, European and Native, able to do it service, including, besides those appointed jure dignitatis, gentlemen of University culture and training; of intimate acquaintance with the Oriental languages, manners, and customs; of legal, scientific, medical and engineering skill and experience; of special influence in large sections of the native community; of generous liberality to the University as an institution; of qualification as examiners of our entrants and candidates for degrees; and of marked success in our own graduation, or of local academical distinction before this University was formed. Now, when we have obtained such an extended constituency as that which we possess, the annual appointments to the Senate need not perhaps be so large as they have been for some years past. It is a great mistake to appoint to our Fellowship gentlemen, whether Natives or Europeans, for the mere enhancement of their social position in the community.
Our bye-laws regulating our curriculum of study have been Curriculum of Studies. very carefully framed, and should not be interfered with without much deliberate consideration, and without being subjected to the test of experience. I think that for our Matriculation Examination the prescription of a course of reading in general history in one or other of our most approved authors (as Fraser-Tytler, Dr. Schmitz, Dr. Taylor, and Dr. White) would be better, because more comprehensive and generalized, than the prescription by the Syndicate of the four select histories of Greece, Rome, England, and India, now in use. To this general history I think we should add, under the heading of "General Knowledge," some elementary knowledge of the classification of animals, and of the geological formations revealed in the crust of the earth. Dr. Oldham, the able and enterprising head of the Geological Survey of India, has justly complained to the Government of India of the want of even the most rudimental knowledge of natural history on the part of many who might otherwise find employment connected with that survey, profitable both to themselves and the State. Independently of the improvement of their observational powers, our young men, by such a study of the works of God as I now venture to recommend, would confer great advantages on their native land. We may be assured that the mineral resources of India will not be fully discovered and brought to light till the sons of India themselves receive at least such an amount of elementary instruction as that at which I have just hinted. I may venture to say, from personal knowledge, that His Excellency the Viceroy feels much interest in this matter, as he does in everything likely to call forth the natural resources of this great and marvellous country.
After our next examinations no cognizance, according to Vernacular versus Classical languages. our present bye-laws, will be taken of the vernacular languages of India in connection with our higher examinations. In common with some of our best linguists and educationists, European and Native, I personally regret this circumstance, though I cordially rejoice in the signal success which has attended our introduction and extended use of the classical languages both of the West and of the East. Of these classical languages the best for style, and the simple, chaste, and appropriate expression of thought, are the Latin and Greek; the best for philological science and research is the Sanskrit; the best (as an ancient tongue) for elevation and sublimity, the Hebrew, with its cognates; and the best for richness, power and delicacy, and universality of application, the English, drawn from many sources. We deliberately include the English among the classical languages. Jacob Grimm has justly pronounced it one of the most noble ever used for human utterance. It contains wonderful and undying creations and compositions, such as those of our Shakespeare and Milton, which will be read and studied to the ends of the earth. The Persian language. I much regret that we have not yet included the Persian in the list of our prescribed classical languages. The proposal to put it in this position was lost in the Senate only by a single vote; and it may be yet renewed with the prospect of success, as some who voted against it are prepared to withdraw from it their opposition. Let all dubitants in this case listen to what Max Muller says of the Persian:—"As to Persian; this was long the language of the most civilized and most advanced nation in Asia. In the first centuries of the Islam, Persians were the teachers of Arabs, and among the early Arabic authors many names are found of Persian origin. Persian literature again was the only source whence, in the East, a taste for the more refined branches of poetry could be satisfied, whether through originals or by the medium of translations. In fact, Persian was for a long time the French of Asia, and it is still used there as the language of diplomatic correspondence. Hence many terms connected with literary subjects, or referring to other occupations of a society more advanced in civilization are of Persian, i,e., of Arian, origin." To this it has to be added, that the principal Muhammadan histories of India are in Persian; and that many Persian words are found in the Urdu, Kurdish, Turkish, and other Caucasian languages. It affords abundant scope for study, from the grand epic of Firdausi of the commencement of the eleventh century down to the latest authors of Ispahan and Teheran. It is through it that we have to arrive at the definite meaning of many Zend and Pehlvi words still but imperfectly understood.
Of our professional studies, legal, medical, and engineering, Professional Studies. modifications founded on experience will doubtless require from time to time to be made. A new degree in Law, that of Licentiate in Law, has been asked by some of our undergraduates. It will, I presume, be the duty of the Faculty of Law to advise us, in the first instance at least, as to the disposal of this application. I hope that the Faculty of Civil Engineering will receive important accessions by the introduction into it of the eminent professional gentlemen just nominated members of our Senate by His Excellency the Governor in Council.
I would now, in conclusion, say a word on the progress of Progress of Higher Education in Bombay. the higher education in Western India, during the forty-one years that I have been connected with this country, I may say that I witnessed its commencement, for when I arrived in this place there were only about eighty native boys learning the rudiments of English in the Native Education Society's school patronized by Government, and about the same number in private seminaries in the town and island. I remember hearing the gallant, generous, brave and learned soldier, and accomplished and successful political officer. Sir John Malcolm, encouraging the native gentlemen to persevere in the work thus feebly begun, that there might be a constituency for the Elphinstone Professors, selected from home, when they might arrive. I remember welcoming to Bombay the first Elphinstone professor. Dr. John Harkness, who was among my own fellow-students and friends at the University of Edinburgh, as were Mr. Eisdale, the first academical instructor in English and the Western sciences in Puna, and Dr. Morehead, the first Principal of our Grant Medical College. At his first lecture, which was an excellent one. Dr. Harkness had present, with others, only some half dozen of students, a couple of whom were lent to him for the occasion from the Mission Institution which I myself had before this been instrumental in founding. The original supply of students for the higher or Collegiate Department of the Elphinstone, or Government Institution, was principally the production of two most accomplished and devoted teachers from Scotland, Messrs. Bell and Henderson, afterwards constituted professors, and of whose success in teaching, united with that of Dr. Harkness and Mr. Orlebar, a Mathematical professor from Oxford, such men as Dr. Bhau Daji and Messrs. Dadoba Pandurang and Vinayak Vasudeva are the monuments, as Professor Keru Lakshuman Chhatre, one of the most accomplished and advanced Mathematicians in India, is of Mr. Eisdale's work at Puna, For what has followed all this, both in this presidency and the neighbouring States, by the multiplication of most able Collegiate instructors, I refer you, gentlemen of the Senate, to the Reports of the late Board of Education, and of the Director of Public Instruction, to the Reports of the various Missionary Institutions and Educational societies, and to our own Calendars. Due preparation was made for the University; and the University has given a» great impulse to the higher education in all our provinces. It has done more than this. It has introduced a great improvement in the quality of that education. The books prescribed embrace the literature and science of the West and East, without those eliminations in deference to prejudice and fear of change which were too often formerly made, especially in the Government seminaries. Results of Higher Education. The consequences are the extension of the knowledge of what is of most importance, a comparison of the different courses of thought and discussion and historical representation, the generation of a more catholic and tolerant spirit, the extension and improvement of the native press and native authorship; the advancement of popular education, embracing that of females, so long neglected, the awakening of salutary inquiry about the duty, the deliverance and the destiny of man, and the commencement and progress of important reforms in the Indian community, having respect both to the present life and that which is to come. With reference to these matters, I was struck with a remark made to me a few years ago by a most acute and observant native gentleman, one of the first Fellows of our University, the late Mr. Jagannath Shankarshet. "We must be prepared," he said, "to take the natural consequences of education as well as the gift itself." What is here witnessed is perhaps more conspicuously revealed in another of the sister presidencies, I mean that of Bengal. I do not specially allude to any new religious organizations which, have been there formed, on which I do not wish, to make any observations in this place, either approbatory or condemnatory. Let us remember that India is an empire with various tribes and tongues of mutual peculiarities and even uncongenialities, and not a single homogeneous and consolidated nation. It has several distinct and marked centres of diffusive illumination and civilization. Among these Calcutta, the capital of the North-West Provinces, Lahore, Bombay, and Madras are the chief. Let Calcutta and its acute, ingenious, and in intellectual life not inactive Babus (I have no sympathy with, the exaggerated and distorted caricature of them made by the great Macaulay) act vigorously on Bengal, Behar, Tirahut and Orissa and the interesting and but recently appreciated sub-Himalayan provinces lying to its north and north-east. Let Allahabad, aided by Delhi and Oude, act effectively on the great river valleys, which were once the seats of ancient Indian power and empire. Let Lahore, with its sturdy and determined races, deal with the whole country and its environs, of the Panchanada, now the Panjab, so often referred to in the most ancient Indian song. Let Bombay, with the irrepressible power of its people, occupy itself with the fair provinces of the Maharashtra, in the fullest sense of the word, whether under European or Native government, the fertile lands of Gujarat, the less productive Sindh, the country of the lower Indus; and let Madras have the whole of the Dravidian provinces to the south, so separated by language from the Northern provinces, and in which it has already accomplished no small measure of good. Let us every-where provoke one another to zeal and good works. Let us be Duty of Britons. friends of India to its farthest extent, asking the blessing of God on all our endeavours as an empire, as a people, and as supporters of educational, philanthropic, and divine enterprize, to promote its well-being. Let us who are Britons, particularly remember the providential obligations imposed upon us by our wonderful, and, to a great extent, unsought acquisition of power in this great and wondrous land. Let the diffusion and maintenance of light, life and love be our endeavour, and continuous and bliss-giving work.
Be these thy trophies, Queen of many isles,
On these high heaven shall shed indulgent smiles.
First by thy guardian voice to India led.
Shall truth divine her tearless victories spread;
Wide and more wide, the heaven-born light shall stream.
New realms from thee shall catch the blissful theme.