both the senses in which that word is employed, with perfect accuracy.
In the first place, it is liberal in breadth. It extends over the whole
ground of things to be known and of faculties to be trained, and it
gives equal importance to the two great sides of human activity--art
and science. In the second place, it is liberal in the sense of being
an education fitted for free men; for men to whom every career is open,
and from whom their country may demand that they should be fitted to
perform the duties of any career. I cannot too strongly impress upon
you the fact that, with such a primary education as this, and with no
more than is to be obtained by building strictly upon its lines, a man
of ability may become a great writer or speaker, a statesman, a lawyer,
a man of science, painter, sculptor, architect, or musician. That even
development of all a man's faculties, which is what properly
constitutes culture, may be effected by such an education, while it
opens the way for the indefinite strengthening of any special
capabilities with which he may be gifted.

In a country like this, where most men have to carve out their own
fortunes and devote themselves early to the practical affairs of life,
comparatively few can hope to pursue their studies up to, still less
beyond, the age of manhood. But it is of vital importance to the
welfare of the community that those who are relieved from the need of
making a livelihood, and still more, those who are stirred by the
divine impulses of intellectual thirst or artistic genius, should be
enabled to devote themselves to the higher service of their kind, as
centres of intelligence, interpreters of Nature, or creators of new
forms of beauty. And it is the function of a university to furnish such
men with the means of becoming that which it is their privilege and
duty to be. To this end the university need cover no ground foreign to
that occupied by the elementary school. Indeed it cannot; for the