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July, 1930 437

next spoke. “It is a privilege,” said he, “to express to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and to President Compton for myself personally as well as officially for Princeton University, our very hearty felicitations upon this occasion. I find myself in two moods today, on a feeling of genuine rejoicing with you, the Corporation, Faculty, Students, and Alumni, that you have secured as your President a man of such notable attainment and of still richer promise. There is the mood, also, of poignant regret that Princeton must lose in order that you may gain.” He continued with a review of Dr. Compton’s career and paid him as well as his parents a great tribute. “My own personal wish and expectation for him,” concluded Dr. Hibben, “I would put in the words addressed many years ago to another facing an adventurous and difficult task: ‘He shall have so much courage that he shall never be weary and he shall think not on joy or sorrow that he hath had but only on the thing that lieth before him.’”
President Lowell of Harvard brought the greetings of that institution: “We have met to welcome you to the title and duties of President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Much have we heard of, greatly do we esteem your contributions to physical science pure and applied; and now we look forward to your administration of a body founded for these aims. In your manifold labors you will be helped by the experience, the wisdom, and the vast knowledge of Dr. Stratton, to me a near neighbor and a cherished friend. . . .
“One who has seen a sapling grow to a mighty oak may almost doubt his recollections. For its fame and power, Technology is not old among institutions of higher learning and in its early years obstacles of no common menace barred its path. . . . Did I compare it to an oak? Excuse the inappropriate simile, for a tree has a limit to its size. . . . What demands the public may hereafter make we do not know, but we are sure they will be great, and in meeting them may your administration be memorable.”
Dr. Stratton next introduced Sir William Bragg who spoke extemporaneously and brought the felicitations of the Royal Institution of Great Britain. After he had concluded, Chief Marshal Macomber declared that Dr. Compton was inaugurated President down the center of the Great Court. 

DR. COMPTON’S inaugural address follows: “Permit me to take this opportunity briefly to discuss certain features of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology which have induced me, with real enthusiasm, it cast my lot with you as a part of this new organization. I venture to hope that this is appropriate because the significance of these considerations is not primarily to me personally, but to every one who is interested in science, and in the 

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[[inauguration ceremony]]
INAUGURATION CEREMONY AS IT APPEARED FROM ATOP BUILDING THREE