Headmaster Nathaniel E. Conard’s Convocation Speech
September 13, 2010
In recent years, the motto of the Pingry School,
Maxima reverentia pueris debetur, has perhaps been
most discussed when people better versed in Latin than
I have debated its translation. Lost in these discussions
have been the antecedents of our motto. Where did this
Latin phrase come from? How and why did it become
the school’s motto? And, of course, over and above what
it says, what does it really mean?
Now, I should issue a disclaimer here: although I possess a larger
than average vocabulary of Latin names of plants—which is
unbelievably useful, of course—and of cockroaches—which
is not—I am in no way a Latin scholar.
At the end of last year, not long after we held a reception
in Boston for alumni in that area, one of the alums at the
reception, Eric Anderson, class of 1955, sent me a copy
of the Pingry Review from the spring of 1984.
To set the stage a bit, as many of you will recall, Pingry had
moved from Hillside to this campus during Thanksgiving
of 1983, so the spring of 1984 was the first spring that
Pingry’s middle and upper schools had spent here in
Bernards Township. And this particular issue of the
Pingry Review was all about the dedication of this—the
NEW—campus at what was dubbed Pingry Day 1984.
The festivities included speakers—featured were
Governor Thomas Kean and Theodore Sizer, the former
Dean of the Graduate School of Education at Harvard and
Headmaster of Phillips Academy Andover—a golf outing,
a reunion reception, athletics events, and, in an interesting
coincidence, the spring musical, Guys and Dolls.
The issue of the Review also featured the 25-year
veteran faculty members whom we now refer to as
Magistri. There were nine of them, all men—a bit
different from today, when we have 35, over half of
whom are women. (And, of course, the vast majority of
today’s Magistri were present for Pingry Day in 1984.)
Of the Magistri of 1984, only one, Miller Bugliari, is
still on the faculty—and he is now the second longest
tenured faculty member in Pingry history behind only
the legendary Latin teacher Albie Booth who in 1984
had completed 55 of what would ultimately be 64 years
on the faculty. Which brings me back, for those of you
who are still with me, to the Pingry motto.
For in this issue of the Review, Mr. Booth wrote about
our motto. And, as was clear from what he wrote, there
is a bit more to that motto than what meets the eye.
With apologies to any Classicists on the stage or in the
audience, let me share with you some of what I have
found in Mr. Booth’s article and our motto.
First, a little historical context. From about 1865 to
1892, Pingry occupied a schoolhouse on Westminster
Avenue in Elizabeth. Quoting from The Beginning of
Wisdom, the history of the first 100 years of the school
by legendary English teacher Herb Hahn, “The interior
of the schoolhouse consisted chiefly of a single highceilinged, well-lighted school room. … Across the north
end of the main schoolroom extended a platform, in the
center of which Dr Pingry sat at his desk.” He goes on to
say, “Across the wall at the south end, where he and not
the boys constantly saw it, was painted a line adapted
from one of the Latin poets: Maxima Reverentia Pueris
Debetur, which has since become the motto of Pingry
School and appears on its official seal.”
Where, I suspect all of you are silently asking yourselves,
did Dr. Pingry get that line? I am glad you asked! It
turns out that he adapted the line from the Latin satirist
Juvenal’s fourteenth satire. I will offer you two translations
of the context in which the original line resides. The
first is the one that Mr. Booth himself quoted, and I do
not know who translated it (did I mention that I am
not a Latin scholar?)—perhaps it was Mr. Booth himself:
“The greatest reverence is owed to a boy. If you are
preparing anything shameful, do not despise your boy’s
years, but let your infant son stand in your way as you
are about to sin.” The second translation, from 1918, is
by George Gilbert Ramsay, a professor at the University
of Glasgow. “If you have any evil deed in mind, you owe
the greatest reverence to the young; disregard not your
boy’s tender years, and let your infant son stand in the
way of the sin that you propose.”
It begins to seem that “you owe the greatest reverence
to the young,” or, as we translate it, “greatest respect is
due students” is an admonition to adults. Indeed, if we
read Ramsay’s translation of the next few lines of the
poem, this becomes even more evident. He continues,
still speaking of the child in question, “For if some day
or other he shall do a deed deserving the censor’s wrath,
and shall show himself like to you, not in form and
face only, but also your child in vice, and following in
all your footsteps with sin deeper than your own, you
will doubtless rebuke him and chide him angrily and
thereafter prepare to change your will. [and now the
punch line] But how can you assume the grave brow and
the free tone of a father if you in your old age are doing
things worse than he did…?”
I imagine Dr. Pingry sitting at his desk, looking out over
his pupils, and being constantly reminded by the line
of Latin painted across the south end of the classroom,
that how he conducted himself would determine how
his pupils ultimately conducted themselves. It is not a
trivial responsibility, is it?
I suggest to you, however, that the responsibility implied
by this motto was not, and is not, one way. Yes, we as
adults have a responsibility to teach by example the
importance not only of scholarship, but of character.
However, the respect that our motto suggests is your due
comes itself with great responsibility—the responsibility
to constantly strive to earn that respect through your
words and your deeds. In fact, I believe that it was in
acknowledgment of that responsibility that in the fall of
1925, the members of the Pingry class of 1926 established
the Honor System, which, 85 years later, guides us as the
Honor Code.
We each had the opportunity this morning to read
and sign anew the Honor Code and to affirm that
commitment publicly just a few minutes ago, so it is
fresh in our minds that the essence of the Honor Code
is one of positive guidance—there are no “Thou shalt
nots” in the Honor Code. Let me read to you the second
half of the Honor Code. It says,
The members of the Pingry community should conduct
themselves in a trustworthy manner that will further the
best interest of the school, their class, and any teams
or clubs to which they belong. They should act as
responsible members of the community, working for the
common good rather than solely for personal advantage.
They should honor the rights of others, conducting
themselves at all times in a moral and decent manner
while at Pingry and throughout their lives as citizens of
and contributors to the larger community of the world.
At its core, the Honor Code is about who we are and
who we should strive to be. It is about how we live our
lives and how we should aspire to live them. And while
that certainly includes how we take our tests and write
our essays—and even what we do with our plates and
glasses at lunch—it is far, far more than that.
I opened my remarks to you this morning by posing a
series of questions. I know that as you approach this year
you almost certainly imagine that it is the responsibility
of your teachers to ask questions, and your responsibility
to answer them—preferably correctly. As I close my
remarks, I want to suggest to you that the true measure
of your learning this year might lie in your willingness
to risk being wrong as you grapple with questions that
have no clear, right answers—questions, in fact, that
you learn how to ask.
So in the spirit of the great respect with which I regard
you, let me leave you with two of many possible questions
derived, ultimately, from our motto, straightforward on
their surface, and ask you to contemplate them as you go
through this year. What does it mean in real, practical,
everyday terms to “act as responsible members of the
community, working for the common good rather than
solely for personal advantage”? And what does it really
mean to “honor the rights of others”?
These are not rhetorical questions, and I look forward
to hearing your thoughts. Maxima reverentia pueris
debetur.
Let’s have a great year!