Could there be a work more in harmony with the aims of the great Catholic organization than that of higher education.  At the national convention of 1912, held at Colorado Springs, the committee on Catholic Higher Education ends its report by saying:  “In the newer impetus that will come to Catholic education as the result of better understanding (its necessity and value), the Knights of Columbus must make themselves an important factor.  We owe it to ourselves and to that special loyalty to both Church and State which we pride to claim as the special note of the order.  It is often asked what are the Knights of Columbus doing that they should be so proud of their organization, and the best possible answer would be for all of us to be able to point to benefits that were conferred by Knights individually and in bodies upon our Catholic education.  There can be no mistake about the benefit to be conferred on Church and State by progress in Catholic education.”

The active and persevering co-operation of the Knights in the forwarding of the great cause of a Catholic University for Western Canada, would be their contribution to the great period of reconstruction which the world is now facing.

* * * * * *

On one of those beautiful mellow autumn evenings, of which the Prairie alone has the secret, the traveller, as his train steams into one of our Western Cities, will behold a stately cupola tipped with a golden cross.—­“What is that new building, yonder on the outskirts of the city?” will he inquire.  The answer will be:  “That is the Catholic University of Western Canada.”

[1] This chapter appeared as a series of articles, in the North West Review of Winnipeg,—­under the signature of “Miles Christi.”

[2] “Less than one per cent. of American men are college graduates Yet this one per cent. of college graduates has furnished:  55% of our Presidents, 36% of our Members of Congress, 47% of the Speakers of the House, 54% of our Vice-Presidents, 62% of our Secretaries of State, 50% of the Secretaries of the Treasury, 67% of the Attorney Generals, 69% of the Justices of the Supreme Court.”—­Dr. Jones, of the University of Missouri.

[3] Lord Haldane addressing the Co-operative Educational Association (May, 1920) made this statement:  “The universities of England must be made able, as national institutions, with a larger range of activity than at present, to undertake extra-mural work on a scale so great that it will be of general application throughout the land, and they must be put in a position to be fitted to bring this about.”

[4] Speaking of Publicly and privately supported institutions of learning in the U.S., Dr. Cappen, assistant commissioner of the United States Bureau of Education stated that there are 93 of the former in the U.S. and 477 of the latter.  About 62 per cent. of the college students in the country attend voluntarily supported colleges, and the private schools have about 68 per cent. of the educational funds of the country at their disposal.  This includes of course such very wealthy endowed institutions as Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Cornell and Stanford.