The splendid sacrifice of these and others set high the standard of the University and invested it with a poetic beauty and a sacredness that dwells there still. "Nowhere in the South," said Charles Dudley Warner, in 1889, "and I might say, nowhere in the Republic, have I found anything so hopeful as The University of the South." "Of the wisdom of founding this University," said a visitor who spent the summer of 1878 at Sewanee, "no one would question after a single visit here. Its highest development is yet to be obtained. Its present standard is equal to the best, but its aims are to reach the highest and best culture obtainable. It is slowly and surely reaching forward and satisfactorily filling the measure of its allotted work.... It is difficult to explain to one who has had no opportunity for a personal observation, how many excellent formative influences are here combined.... Everything here promotes a feeling of reverence and respect for sacred things. The presence and influence of men of high standard in Church and state, whose example is potent for good.... The book of nature is always open here to the investigations of the geologist, the botanist, and the student of natural history.... The physical education goes on with that of the intellect; an invigorating atmosphere strengthens the capacity.... The various gymnastic and military exercises give a clear complexion, an elastic step and a noble carriage; and then mind and body, acting in healthy unison, fill out the measure of a well rounded man."
Bishop Quintard's ideals regarding the University to the upbuilding of which he was giving the most valuable years of his life, were shadowed forth in his words to the Convention of his Diocese in 1874, in referring to the meeting of the Board of Trustees which he had attended the previous year. "It is the aim and purpose of any true system of education to draw out, to strengthen and to exhibit in active working, certain powers which exist in man,--planted, indeed, by God, but latent in man until they shall have been so drawn out. Education is not the filling of a mind with so much knowledge, though, of course, it includes the imparting of knowledge. As education is the drawing out of the dormant powers of the whole man, it must in its highest sense be commensurate with the whole man. The body must be trained by healthful exercise, the mind or thinking power, must be drawn out and strengthened, and finally a heart must be sanctified and a will subdued. It is the aim and object of The University of the South to give to its students every advantage,--physical, mental and moral; to develop a harmonious and symmetrical character; to fit and prepare men for every vocation in the life that now is, where we are strangers and sojourners; and to teach all those things which a Christian ought to know and believe to his soul's health. The momentous and concerning truth that intellectual power unrestrained and unregulated by sound moral and religious principle tends only to mischief and misery in our race, has been in the educational systems of the age, almost overlooked."