|
|
To Littleton Waller Tazewell Washington, Jan. 5, 1805
DEAR SIR, -- Your favor of December 24 never came to my hands
till last night. It's importance induces me to hasten the answer.
No one can be more rejoiced at the information that the legislature
of Virginia are likely at length to institute an University on a
liberal plan. Convinced that the people are the only safe
depositories of their own liberty, & that they are not safe unless
enlightened to a certain degree, I have looked on our present state
of liberty as a short-lived possession unless the mass of the people
could be informed to a certain degree. This requires two grades of
education. First some institution where science in all it's branches
is taught, and in the highest degree to which the human mind has
carried it. This would prepare a few subjects in every State, to
whom nature has given minds of the first order. Secondly such a
degree of learning given to every member of the society as will
enable him to read, to judge & to vote understandingly on what is
passing. This would be the object of the township schools. I
understand from your letter that the first of these only is under
present contemplation. Let us receive with contentment what the
legislature is now ready to give. The other branch will be
incorporated into the system at some more favorable moment.
The first step in this business will be for the legislature to
pass an act of establishment equivalent to a charter. This should
deal in generals only. It's provisions should go
- to the object of
the institution.
- it's location.
- it's endowment.
- it's
Direction.
On each of these heads I will hazard a first thought or
two.
- It's object should be defined only generally for teaching
the useful branches of science, leaving the particulars to the
direction of the day. Science is progressive. What was useful two
centuries ago is now become useless, e.g. one half the professorships
of Wm & Mary. What is now deemed useful will in some of it's parts
become useless in another century. The visitors will be the best
qualified to keep their institution up in even pace with the science
of the times. Every one knows that Oxford, Cambridge, the Sorbonne,
etc. are now a century or two behind the science of the age.
- The
location. The legislature is the proper judges of a general
position, within certain limits, as for instance the county in which
it shall be. To fix on the spot identically they would not be so
competent as persons particularly appointed to examine the grounds.
This small degree of liberty in location would place the landholders
in the power of the purchasers: to fix the spot would place the
purchaser in the power of the landholder.
- It's endowment. Bank
stock, or public stock of any kind should be immediately converted
into real estate. In the form of stock it is a dead fund, it's
depreciation being equal to it's interest. Every one must see that
money put into our funds when first established (in 1791) with all
its interest from that day would not buy more now than the principal
would then have done. Mr. Pitt states to parliament that the
expenses of living in England have, in the last 20 years, increased
50. percent: that is that money has depreciated that much. Even the
precious metals depreciate slowly so that in perpetual institutions,
as colleges, that ought to be guarded against. But in countries
admitting paper, the abusive emissions of that produces two, three or
four courses of depreciation & annihilation in a century. Lands will
keep advancing nominally so as to keep even really. Canal shares
are as good as lands, perhaps better: but the whole funds should not
be risked in any one form. They should be vested in the visitors,
without any power given them to lessen their capital, or even to
change what is real.
- The Direction. This would of course be in
the hands of Visitors. The legislature would name the first set, &
lay down the laws of their succession. On death or resignation the
legislature or the Chancellor might name three persons of whom the
visitors should chuse one. The visitors should be few. If many,
those half qualified would by their numbers bring every thing down to
the level of their own capacities, by out-voting the few of real
science. I doubt if they should exceed five. For this is an office
for which good sense alone does not qualify a man. To analyse
science into it's different branches, to distribute these into
professorships, to superintend the course practiced by each
professor, he must know what these sciences are and possess their
outlines at least. Can any state in the union furnish more than 5.
men so qualified as to the whole field of the sciences. The Visitors
should receive no pay. Such qualifications are properly rewarded by
honor, not by money.
The charter being granted & the Visitors named, these become
then the agents as to every thing else. Their first objects will be
- the special location.
- the institution of professorships.
-
the employment of their capital.
- the necessary buildings.
A word on each.
- Special location needs no explanation.
-
Professorships. They would have to select all the branches of
science deemed useful at this day, & in this country: to groupe as
many of these together as could be taught by one professor and thus
reduce the number of professors to the minimum consistent with the
essential object. Having for some years entertained the hope that
our country would some day establish an institution on a liberal
scale, I have been taking measures to have in readiness such
materials as would require time to collect. I have from Dr.
Priestley a designation of the branches of science grouped into
professorships which he furnished at my request. He was an excellent
judge of what may be called the old studies, of those useful and
those useless. I have the same thing from Mr. Dupont, a good judge
of the new branches. His letter to me is quite a treatise. I have
the plan of the institutions of Edinburgh, & those of the National
institute of France; and I expect from Mr. Pictet, one of the most
celebrated professors of Geneva, their plan, in answer to a letter
written some time ago. From these the Visitors could select the
branches useful for the country & how to groupe them. A hasty view
of the subject on a former occasion led me to believe 10.
professorships would be necessary, but not all immediately. Half a
dozen of the most urgent would make a good beginning. The salaries
of the first professors should be very liberal, that we might draw
the first names of Europe to our institution in order to give it a
celebrity in the outset, which will draw to it the youth of all the
states, and make Virginia their cherished & beloved Alma mater. I
have good reasons to believe we can command the services of some of
the first men of Europe.
- The emploiment of their capital. On
this subject others are so much better judges than myself that I
shall say nothing.
- Buildings. The greatest danger will be their
over-building themselves, by attempting a large house in the
beginning, sufficient to contain the whole institution. Large houses
are always ugly, inconvenient, exposed to the accident of fire, and
bad in cases of infection. A plain small house for the school &
lodging of each professor is best. These connected by covered ways
out of which the rooms of the students should open would be best.
These may then be built only as they shall be wanting. In fact an
University should not be an house but a village. This will much
lessen their first expenses.
Not having written any three lines of this without interruption
it has been impossible to keep my ideas rallied to the subject. I
must let these hasty outlines go therefore as they are. Some are
premature, some probably immature: but make what use you please of
them except letting them get into print. Should this establishment
take place on a plan worthy of approbation, I shall have a valuable
legacy to leave it, to wit, my library, which certainly has not cost
less than 15,000 Dollars. But it's value is more in the selection, a
part of which, that which respects America, is the result of my own
personal searches in Paris for 6. or 7. years, & of persons employed
by me in England, Holland, Germany and Spain to make similar
searches. Such a collection on that subject can never again be made.
With my sincere wishes for the success of this measure accept my
salutations & assurances of great esteem & respect.
|