1964
Nathan Marsh Pusey Speaks at Commencement
Nathan Marsh Pusey, president of Harvard University, speaks at Wheaton’s 129th commencement and is awarded an honorary degree. In addition to his extensive involvement in higher education and literature, Pusey was also a staunch opposer of McCarthyism and a supporter of the Civil Rights Movement. His address to the Class of 1964 details a world in political transition that is longing for the involvement of young people. Towards the end of Pusey’s speech, he states: “Our deepest self-deception is to believe, as a great part of contemporary literature and contemporary philosophy seems to believe, that it takes more courage to write life off as a brutal absurdity than to love it in spite of itself.”