Mr. Irving's Address.

Mr. Irving could have had no more happy introduction yesterday afternoon than the few appropriate words of Dean Briggs: "A friend who has given delight the world over has come again to our corner of the world to show a generous courtesy to Harvard University. We welcome Mr. Irving."

The address which followed was admirable. It is hard to think of any respect in which it could have been more thoroughly satisfactory. The enthusiastic applause with which it was received showed that this was the common feeling of the whole large audience, a large part of whom were college students. The faculty, however, were well represented on the platform, where were also Miss Terry and several other members of the company.

Mr. Irving said that his address, or rather his conversation, would consist of a few desultory reflections on an interview he had had with some young Harvard friends; something about individuality, which seemed to him to be a matter of much importance. That the individual may reach the highest expression of his power, he must develop that which is part of his own nature. Every man should learn to value and to use his own individuality. It is a priceless gift, next in sequence of value to honor and health. It is the one power which all possess and which may lead to permanent renown: and if in his youth a man tries to put it from him, he comes as near as may be to the intellectual standard of that "base Indian" who "threw away a pearl richer than all his tribe."

There are so many who aspire to be Daniel Websters, and Edwin Forests, and Phillips Brooks's, that it is almost to be feared the supply may ultimately come to exceed the demand. The examples of such men too often tend to mislead the rising generation, who aim at the result, but do not place a just value on the means by which such a result is obtained. Daniel Webster did not become great by merely imitating some one else. He had great gifts of a certain kind, and used them to the full; but the power to impress other men does not depend on girth, or stature, or avoirdupois. Napoleon and Nelson, Garrick and Kean, were little men, yet did not their individualities find suitable means of expression, each in its proper fashion? Just so may that of every other man if he only uses the means with which God has thought fit to endow him; but he can no more trim the natural power within him to a pattern than he can alter his stature. Each man is different from his fellows, as are the leaves of a tree; and at best a perfect simulation can be but an imperfect substitution.

The first endeavor of the actor is to assume identities not his own. He has to study from living models; for his craft is to present appearances other than his own, and to do things which all men may recognize as not impossible typically. In this study we can not help arriving at some high opinion of the worth and value of identity. The voice, face, manner, bearing, and accent of others are all easy of imitation; but it is when the higher qualities belonging to an individuality have to be reproduced that the imitator's difficulty begins and his weakness is exposed. With the true artist the internal force is the first requisite,- the external appearance being merely the medium through which this is made known to others.

There is hardly any individuality which is not worth the closest study. Every character has its own atmosphere, and as an actor divests himself of one personality and invests himself with the spirit of another, a sort of intellectual transmigration goes on. For Hamlet, Richard, Lear, or Iago, the true actor will not only change comparatively his voice and manner, but even his pronunciation. As Goethe says: "The really high and difficult part of art is the apprehension of what is individual, characteristic." The artist of experience, to whom is entrusted the proper means of expressing an emotion under given conditions and limitations, has so wide a choice of means that his task becomes almost an unconscious one, and his own instinct can perhaps best guide him in it.

All college students will have in their lives to deal with men. They are to essay the higher planes of life. To them the study of mankind must be an important one, for whether they have to make or keep fortunes, their individualities must be pitted against those of others; and in the struggle of individualities a knowledge of one's own, with its strength and weakness, is of the first importance. There were never wiser words spoken than those of old Polonius; "To thine own self be true, and it must follow as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man." But how can a man be true to himself, if he does not know himself; and how can he know himself if he mistrusts his own identity, and puts aside his special gifts in order to render himself an imperfect similitude of some one else?

Mr. Irving concluded: "I ask you to weigh well the advantages which may present themselves to you before you try to part with, to minimize, or to forego in any way your own individuality. Study it without being egotistic, and understanding the weak places, shun their temptations and try to protect yourself by added strength. Knowing yourself, you may learn to know others; and so in process of time you will both consciously and unconsciously learn those abiding principles of human nature and of human character which add to the knowledge and the progress of the world."