of Governor Herbert R. O'Conor 67

nature are yet to be discovered, where new progress is yet to he attained as
a result of research and experimentation.

Fifty years ago the head of the Patent Office in Washington was reported
as being ready to resign his post because he felt that business in his department
was due for a sharp decline. ' In the light of what has since transpired, you
know that fifty years ago the surface of Science's amazing possibilities had
barely been scratched. We have only to refer to the revolutionary changes
within our own period in transportation, in radio, in medicine, electricity and
every field where human ingenuity and research will play a part. There are
still further possibilities awaiting those who are especially trained.

The whole world is before you. There are no limits to what any one of
you can do, except those limits which you place upon yourselves. When
twenty, thirty or forty years hence members of this graduating class are
gathered for reunion and to talk over the successes registered by certain ones
among you, it will be the old, old story repeated. How much better to bear
in mind now the thought while you can realize on it, as to how much con-
tribution you might make to the progress of your fellow man if you really
used to the full advantage the opportunities that are given to you henceforth.

Having granted that graduates do enjoy advantages not possessed by all
others, a corresponding duty devolves upon them and should cause us to reflect
upon the special advantage which is yours by reason of the education you
have received at this Institution.

You are now being graduated from an Institution which is indelibly stamped
with the name of a great State. There permeates this institution a tradition
and glory, the very characteristics of the State itself.

It is no reflection upon other institutions when we say that in a particular
manner the University bearing the name and possessing the soul of Maryland
must necessarily leave upon its students the imprint of the seal of the State,
itself. The Great Seal of Maryland, the prized seal of our State since the
time of the Calverts, has the legend inscribed upon it.

It will be permissible if we translate freely the Latin legend to express
the feeling which Marylanders have had for their State. I believe it would
be expressing the spirit of Maryland if we translate the legend in this manner:

"By the Example of Thy Good Will Thou Hast Ennobled Us"

To evaluate properly the spirit which is Maryland's we must go back not
only to the first days of the Colony but even beyond that. The motivating
spirit even before the first Colonists set foot upon these shores was to live
their lives free of unnecessary restrictions, where they could aid others to
make this land a better place in which to live than that from which they had
come.

So, too, has it been during the one hundred and sixty odd years of our
Country's existence. Maryland has been loyal, supremely so, but her loyalty
has not closed her eyes to the fact that her citizens were guaranteed certain
fundamental rights by the Constitution, and she has not hesitated to insist
on these rights, even in the face of the most hostile adverse sentiment.

All of this has come down to us as so much a part and parcel of the
tradition of Maryland, that subconsciously it seems to have had its leavening
influence upon the life of the State, down even to the present day.