Trudeau closed with a reflection on the decline of communal life. Citing Benjamin Franklin's bafflement that colonial settlers captured during the Indian Wars refused to return to their own society, preferring Stone Age village life, he argued that modern civilization had produced ever-increasing isolation where nobody depends on their neighbor. His final wish was that the graduates would never lose sight of their tribe — the friends made at Macaulay — and that they would nurture those relationships with old-school physical presence, not just digital connection.