To the editor:
Thanks for the very good piece about the professorial discussion about the current reality of Ezra Cornell’s egalitarian ideals as embodied in the university’s motto.
Alas, as you well know, Ezra never said “Any person…. any study”, which you claim in the first sentence. Lest some readers believe that, your writer should have included something to the effect that this is a recent (last 15 years) informal and casual substitute for the much more profound and dignified words of the university motto, which several years ago was voted the best among all US colleges. “I would found an institution where any person can find instruction in any study.”
Isaac Kramnick, Richard J. Schwartz Professor of Government, Emeritus