Colleges and universities afford the opportunity for the attainment of a measure of self-knowledge, self-reliance and self-development, which in the home is often apt to come too slowly, and, learned at first hand with the world, is bought frequently at the price of an experience which dwarfs, if it does not altogether destroy, some of the finer fruits of those essential qualities of manhood. It is not what is gained in knowledge of books, but in knowledge of self, of limitations and powers and capacities; in what is acquired of habits of self-discipline and application, of methods of thought and research, that a college or university renders its truest service to its students; as it is by the love of truth and learning which it instils, rather than by the honours and degrees which it confers, that a university puts its stamp upon the graduates it sends out into the world.

It may be that for many men four years of undergraduate life are not sufficient to make a college impress deep, or, to appearances, lasting; but if in any measure it is real, that influence must tell, not only on the years immediately succeeding, but through the whole of life. The first fruits of a college education are more likely to be revealed in the attitude of mind towards the problems of life, as these present themselves when academic halls are vacated, than in any immediate accomplishment. A consciousness of capacity without opportunity may be, and is too often, the first inheritance of many a man, whose intellect has been stimulated and whose zeal has been intensified by association with his fellows in the numerous relationships which undergraduate life affords, but who finds in the world a less ordered and less congenial arrangement. Probably for most men, the years immediately following the attainment of their academic or professional degrees are the most critical, if not also the most painful, years of their lives.

To this phase of post-graduate experience Harper’s life was no exception, though undergraduate days were enjoyed by him to the full. In the summer of 1891, at the age of seventeen, he matriculated at the University of Toronto, from the Barrie Collegiate Institute, and he graduated from the university in June, 1895. He was, during the last three years of his undergraduate course, an honour student in the department of Political Science, and the class lists show that in the work of this department, especially in the subjects of political economy and political philosophy, he held a high place. His contemporaries at the university will always remember him as a man who entered in a whole-hearted way into what may be spoken of as the larger life of the university. He was a prominent member of the Literary and Scientific Society, and of his class society, and was always certain to be found an active participant in those events or movements of general interest with which undergraduate life at a large university abounds. While he was fond of books and might have been termed, at least during the latter half of each year, a conscientious student, it is doubtful if he did not get quite as much as, or more, out of association with his fellows, and from sharing in the spontaneous life of the college, than he did from the lecture room. A characteristic which distinguished him was a readiness to carry on with enthusiasm whatever he undertook, and this, combined with a nature intensely loyal to cause or friend, made him a strong man among men, and one whose support was sought because it could be counted upon. On the whole his disposition was social rather than individual, and his interests were diversified rather than particular. He was saved from the possible inimical effects of such a nature by an earnestness of purpose which kept him true to his responsibilities, while there can be little doubt that from it, in the broadening of his sympathies and in the understanding of men and their ways, he gained much which was of infinite service to him in after years.

Measured by the standard of growth already hinted at, Harper may be said to have left the university with a consciousness that he was fitted by talent and inclination for work in some branch of the so-called higher professions, that it was in connection with the general, rather than the more exclusive, interests of society that his energies would find their freest play, and that not by theories, but by men, he could hope to be permanently attracted. He had already learned that he was capable of serious and sustained effort, and likely to find in work a satisfaction of his best desires; and he must have known that in his nature were possibilities of the noblest expressions of disinterested action. It was natural, therefore, that having made no definite choice of a future profession at the time of graduation, and having engaged temporarily in agency work which was not to his liking, and towards which from the start he had not entertained any serious intentions, he should have found much that tried his patience severely, and at times caused him to experience periods of the most genuine depression. Fruitless attempts to obtain a start in journalism added for a while to his discouragements, so that the year and a half which followed graduation, though characterized by anything other than neglect or indifference, and, as a matter of fact, made the occasion of an opportunity for increased reading and the preparation of a thesis which secured him a Master’s degree from the university, was nevertheless, so far as he could see at the time, to be remembered as of adversity rather than as of advance. In reality it was a testing time, and it served to prove the man.

In the pages of the journal which Harper commenced shortly after graduation, it is possible to discern the attitude of mind which he had towards the problem of life, as he thus encountered it upon the threshold. Revealing as they do the qualities of inherent worth in him who wrote them, these pages are deserving of more than passing reference. Two characteristics they clearly disclose, a fearless integrity of heart and mind, and a disposition to philosophize, underlying each of which is a constant purpose of self-improvement, and a more than accepted belief in a definite moral order, and the ultimate triumph of right. Unconsciously he summed up the whole in the first paragraph he wrote:

And again,

And on the first of January, 1897,

Though it has been left to others to trace through the pages of his diary the rule of development and of life therein disclosed, it will hardly be said that the first hope expressed was denied, and that Harper did not realize, even in the brief day he was allowed, “the first essential and object of his existence.”