A NEW ZEALAND UNIVERSITY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 703, 24 August 1870, Page 3

A NEW ZEALAND UNIVERSITY.

♦ — (From ihe Wellington Independent, Aug. 18.) a A petition haß been presented from the Warden and Fellows of Ghris- . qhurch College, praying that the House proceed no further in the matter of the New Zealand University Bill, until a Commission has reported to the House on the whole question. Thia petition, although signed by gentlemen affixing to their names high academical degrees, is singularly vague and inconclusive. From it we gather that their objections to the University Bill are tbat the establishment of a university

is premature, and that the proposed university would not (whatever that may mean) be a university "in the highest sense." It asserts, also, parenthetically, that Otago is in some respects an "undesirable" seat, but advances nothing in proof ot the assertion. The first objection that it is premature to establish a colonial university, has been already disposed of by the House, and lands in both islands have been set apart for its endowment. Such an objection, indeed, is utterly untenable. The histories of the great universities in England and Scotland alike contradict it. Had such ideas prevailed where would have been the universities of Oxford or St Andrews ? With regard to the establishment of the latter, there is no doubt it was founded when the population- of the country was neither so. numerous nor so wealthy as the population* of New Zealand, and when its mearts of communication, its resources, its trade and commerce could not bear the most distant comparison. Such objectors seem to forget that the universities now " so famous, so excellent in art, and still so rising," were established in sparsely populated countries, without any means of communication to be compared with ours, in the very midst of desolating wars, and when no provision for elementary education had yet been made by the church or the nation. The second objection, thafc tbe university would nob be a university "in the highest sense," is simply ludicrous. The Fellows of Christ College, Christchurch, must be facetious fellows indeed. Tbey must have recently been relieving the grave duties and responsibilities of their Fellowship by reading Hierocles. Their objection is a simple reproduction of his story of the simpleton, who tried to cross a river and was nearly drowned. What did he then do ? Why, he made a vow never to touch water till he had learned to swim. So these learned dignitaries would have us not establish a university at all until we can establish one "in tbe highest sense." Yet, some of them, we believe, are graduates of Oxford University, which began with tbe " triviuin " and " quadrivium " of the dark ages, and some of Cambridge, which did noble service to the Church and to the world long before it had a Professor of Greek ! The University of Paris was a university "in the highest sense," but that was considered no reason why the establishment of a university Bhould be delayed at Aberdeen, which though at first not entitled to be so designated would closely resemble it, so far as necessity required, and altered circumstances would permit. That university began on a very humble Bcale, and though still retaining in many of its ancient forms a close resemblance to the University of Paris has, as every university must do, grown with the nations growth and strengthened with her strength. We may fix upon any university as the model on which ours is to be built up, but we shall find ourselves compelled to curtail, to add, or to alter according to our necessities and resources. The university must be racy of the soil. It must grow, it cannot be forced. This growth must have a beginning, and why not now ? When did these older universities we have referred to take their beginning ? Did they wait till the country was interlaced with roads, and other means of transport ? Had not the student to make a long and dangerous pilgrimage to the seat of learning ? Did they wait until they were fully equipped ? If the University of Glasgow — not yet perhaps in the estimation of these learned petitioners a " university in the highest sense," — had delayed the teaching of natural philosophy until it had better appliances, the world would have lost the -genius of a Watt, whose attempt as a poor Btudent at a poor university to mend the broken apparatus of his Professor, resulted in the wonders of steam. No, these universities all began in the same way and from the same starting point as we now recommend for the establishment of a colonial university. They began, aa we hope to begin, whenever they had a sufficient endowment to establish two or three chairs. They began, as we must begin, with small means at their command, with faith in themselves and in their country. The University of Paris gathered hun-

dreds of students from all countries long before it had a building of its own. The Council of the University of Dunedin offers us the most magnificent building in the colony, and an endowment already amounting to £1700 per annum, and are wo to lose this chance by delaying its acceptance a single day ? Nay, more, Otago offers what endowments cannot at once secure, students eagerly impatient and qualified to matriculate. The pupils of every school in the province compete for scholarships at the High Schools, tenable for five years, and university scholarships only wait the establishment of a university to be permanently endowed. Grammar schools are established at tho centres of population throughout the province, and the smallest township has its public library. No other province in the 1 colony can show such educational appliances, constituting, (as Mr Fitzherbert happily expressed it) an " educational momentum " which ought to ; sweep away beforo it all local or proi vincial jealousies. As the universities i at home were founded simply when- , ever and wherever sufficient endowments accrued, so we think a university should be first planted in that i part of the colony which contributes i most to its endowment, and which most urgently requires its services. Th-s was the principle of the bill, and • it is a thousand pities that the provin- ■ cial jealousy of the Canterbury members succeeded last night in preventing its being passed into law, and in de- ' priving the colony of a munificent offer that may' never be renewed.