Purpose
The purpose of Beta Theta Pi was laid out publicly in 1879, when Beta Theta Pi became the first college fraternity to publish its constitution. The Fraternity continues to guard certain secrets about membership which are reserved for its members; however, it offers wide knowledge of the objects and aspirations of Beta Theta Pi. The Code of Beta Theta Pi lays out the objects of the Fraternity as follows:
| “ | It shall be constituted as hereinafter provided and shall have for its objects, the promotion of the moral and social culture of its members, the establishment of confidence and friendly relations among the universities and colleges of the United States and Canada, in securing unity of action and sympathy in matters of common interest among them, and the building up of a fraternity that recognizes mutual assistance in the honorable labors and aspirations of life, devotion to the cultivation of the intellect, unsullied friendship, and unfaltering fidelity as objects worthy of the highest aim and purpose of associated effort. | ” |
-The Code of Beta Theta Pi, Article 1, Section 2
| “ | Again, the Beta is distinguishable and distinguished from all other kinds of fraternity men whatsoever by just a little warmer and stronger, just a little tenderer and more enduring fraternity feeling than any of them can attain to. For it was always so. I do not in the least know how it happened, nor why it persisted after it happened, but a long time ago there came into Beta Theta Pi a fraternity spirit that was, and is, and apparently will continue to be, unique. We know it, who are inside, and they see and record it who are outside the Beta pale. Whether young or old, in college or out, from the small school or the great university, we are conscious of a heritage of genuine fraternalism that has not been vouchsafed in like measure – I say it deliberately – to any other of the great college fraternities. And we cannot doubt that in this, as in other respects, our 'future will copy fair our past, and that in the world of fifty years from now, as in that of years ago, as in that that lies around us today — the first mark of a Beta will be his Beta Spirit. | ” |
-Willis O. Robb, Ohio Wesleyan 1879
Read more about this topic: Beta Theta Pi
Famous quotes containing the word purpose:
“Patience and tenacity of purpose are worth more than twice their weight of cleverness.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895)
“God sent children for another purpose than merely to keep up the race—to enlarge our hears; and to make us unselfish and full of kindly sympathies and affections; to give our souls higher aims; to call out all our faculties to extended enterprise and exertion; and to bring round our firesides bright faces, happy smiles, and loving, tender hearts.”
—Mary Botham Howitt (20th century)
“Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If it can be said to play the role of the watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker.”
—Richard Dawkins (b. 1941)