universities Quotes

“In America and beyond, I will continue to fight for my vision of campus life -- one of constant intellectual and political simulation, where dangerous ideas are welcomed rather than shunned. Where violating some great taboo will lead to spirited debate, not a trip to the office of an Orwellian ‘Bias Task Force’.”

″[A liberal education] brings the mind into form,—for the mind is like the body.”

″[University] teaches [man] to see things as they are, to go right to the point, to disentangle a skein of thought to detect what is sophistical and to discard what is irrelevant.”

“A university training is the great ordinary means to a great but ordinary end.”

“This is the way to make progress; this is the way to arrive at results; not to swallow knowledge, but (according to the figure sometimes used) to masticate and digest it.”

“It is the place where the professor becomes eloquent, and is a missionary and a preacher, displaying his science in its most complete and most winning form, pouring it forth with the zeal of enthusiasm, and lighting up his own love of it in the breasts of his hearers.”

“The nature of the case and the history of philosophy combine to recommend to us this division of intellectual labour between Academies and Universities.”

“If then a practical end must be assigned to a University course, I say it is that of training good members of society... It is the education which gives a man a clear, conscious view of their own opinions and judgements, a truth in developing them, an eloquence in expressing them, and a force in urging them.”

“It is a seat of wisdom, a light of the world, a minister of the faith, an Alma Mater of the rising generation. It is this and a great deal more, and demands a somewhat better head and hand than mine to describe it well.”

“Certainly a liberal education does manifest itself in a courtesy, propriety, and polish of word and action, which is beautiful in itself, and acceptable to others; but it does much more.”

“The university gave me a new, elegant classroom to teach in. Only one thing, they said. You can’t bring your dog. It’s in my contract, I said. (I had made sure of that.)”

“Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.”