Washington and Lee University - Calyx Yearbook (Lexington, VA)

Page 12 text:

THE GREATER UNIVERSITY— WHEREUPON IT HAS ITS FOUNDATION AND WHEREIN ITS FUTURE LIES. BY DR. GEORGE HUTCHESON DENNY, PRESIDENT OF WASHING- l TON AND LEE UNIVERSITY. 1AM asked to give a brief statement concerning the future of Washington and Lee University. It would, of course, require prophetic vision to forecast, with any degree of accuracy, the future of an institution of higher learning. Yet, I am frank to confess that I have a very definite conception of the needs of the institution in which we are most vitally interested, and a very definite opinion as to the line of development that promises the largest measure of prosperity and usefulness in the life that lies before it. The past of Washington and Lee is secure. It is in many respects unique. We shall continue to reverence and cherish this past. To do this is our duty. But we shall also reverence our future. We shall undertake to lay large plans for that future. To do this is our responsibility. An institution of learning is a living, growing organism. It is never quite finished, unless it is dead. It is perennially young, and perennially in need. It is the privilege and the duty of the men upon whose shoulders rest the care and the government of an insti- tution, to study patiently the laws of its growth and to devise wisely the poli- cies that fashion its destiny. The future of Washington and Lee, in my judgment, lies in the direction of a great college, like Princeton, rather than in the direction of a great uni- versity, like Harvard. Of course, this does not mean that we should fail to maintain and to develop our excellent schools of law and of engineering and of commerce in connection with the college. It does mean, however, that post- 4 — — mi W W