YALE ALUMNI WEEKLY
5
The President passes on to the lecture
system. The lectiire system is a neces-
sary part of the University instruction,,
but it must not be the only part. The
instructors must see to it that they are
able to come into direct relations with
their scholars, as individuals having
mental characteristics of their own, and
needing, each, his special treatment and
encouragement. The President does
not like the evil of hasty preparation
for examinations, incident to the lecture
system, by which the notes of the whole
term are covered in a single day or
night... He wants more frequent investi-
gation by the instructors of the work
which each man is doing, and less de-
pendence on semi-annual or annual
examination.
MATERIAL YALE,
Next to these thoughtful comments
on very interesting educational topics,
interest in the President’s report is
centered in his answer to his critics,
who have questioned the wisdom of the
way in which material Yale has been
built in the last twelve or thirteen years.
The President here is so much in earn-
est that it is well to repeat his com-
ments in full.
“Whenever additional buildings have
been provided, as they have been at
longer or shorter intervals -of- time,
they have been built, as far as possible,
in accordance with the ideas and re-
quirements of the particular era which
has called for them. This was the
course of action adopted and followed
by the fathers-of the last century, and
the earlier half of the present century.
No other course would have been wise
or reasonable. The same thing is true
to-day. It would be little short of
absurd for us, in the last years of the
nineteenth century, to erect new build-
ings of the. character, architecturally
and otherwise, of South Middle College
or North College—even as it would
have shown a want of intelligence in
the men of 1752, or 1824, to have made
these buildings no better, or more dur-
able, than the first wooden building of
1718. Moreover, it would be not only
utterly unwise and unsuitable to erect
such dormitories now as these older
ones were, but it would be in disregard
of the real necessities of the present and
the coming age. Lhe idea that the
improvement in architectural beauty,
and in comfort, in the houses which we
now build for our family homes, is
injurious in its tendency to the highest
interior life of the members of our
household, is an idea in contradiction
of the advance of civilization. It is
equally so in the case of dormitory
buildings. Moreover, the educating
influence of a building like Vanderbilt
Hall, which comes from its architectural
character, as compared with that which
pettains to one like the old North
Middle College, or the Lyceum, is no
insignificant force in making the stu-
dents of a university what educated men
ought to be.”
The apprehensions which some per-
sons seem to have felt, that the changes
in this matter of buildings, etc., wit-
nessed in the recent years, and likely to
be witnessed hereafter, may endanger or
diminish the democratic spirit that has
characterized the University, are as un-
founded as are the ideas which have
been already indicated. The democratic
spirit of this institution has never had
its vitality dependent on the fact that
every individual in the university
brotherhood was spending, or could
spend, only the same amount of money
in supplying his wants or meeting his
desires, as was or could be expended
by every other; or that each student
must have the same accommodations,
or the same number of books, or the
possibility of the same personal privi-
leges in every respect, which were open
to the college life of all his fellow stu-
dents. The democracy of the institu-
tion would never have existed; it would
never have been possible, if such.a con-
dition of things had been essential to
its existence. It would have been un-
worthv of educated and intelligent men,
if it had been possible. The Yale demo-
cratic spirit is no such weak, sickly,
worthless, impracticable thing as this.
If it is in these closing years of the
nineteenth century taking to itself such
a character, the sooner it dies abso-
lutely, and. gives way to something
nobler and more worthy of the name
of an intelligent, scholarly, Christian
democracy, the better for the University
and for the cause of the highest educa-
tion. The true and genuine democratic
spirit—that which our University has
xxx
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Mann, Mer.
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Tilton, 4.
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3. Blake, sub. XN
Perkins, sub. Bancroft, 6.
Sheafe, °. Higginson, Capt., 8.
Wadleigh, Cox. varsity.
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HARVARD CREW AND SUBSTITUTES. Ame
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Lawrence, 5. Endicott, sub.
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always claimed for itseli—is the spirit
which estimates a man according to
what he is, and not according to what
he has. It answers to the word of the
Christian teaching: ‘“‘A man’s life does
not consist in the abundance of his
possessions.” But surely it does not
ask—above all things, it does not make
its own continuing existence depend on
the fulfillment of the demand—that the
man who has possessiuns should make
no use of them for his own comfort,
and culture, and refinement, beyond
that which is possible for the man who
has them not.
“The fears which some men of our
University brotherhood seem to have,
and to entertain, as to the danger that
what is good in the Yale spirit may
- pass away, or be lost, because there are
more comforts, or better buildings, or
richer men in the institution than there
were in former times, are certainly
astonishing to one who, like the Presi-
dent, has been near the center of the
University life, and has watched its
development in all that. is good, for
more than fifty years.”
The President again turns to the mat-
ter of discipline and urges more
strongly than ever before, that this par-
ticular part of the University govern-
ment be taken out of the hands of the
Faculty and placed in charge of a few
men specially chosen for their ability
in that line of government. In con-
nection with discipline, the President
takes the opportunity to pay further
compliment to the Dean of the Aca-
demic Department and to the former
Director of the Scientific School “for
their wise and intelligent, their rea-
sonable and patient management of this
whole matter, which is appreciated by
both professors and students and can-
not be over-estimated.”
DEBATE.
This is the first of the reports of
President Dwight which mentions the
general subject of debate and comments
on the revival of interest in it. The
conclusion of the President is that,
some good rooms should be provided
for this purpose. No names are men-
tioned in commenting on the history of
debate at Yale. Warning is given that
the intercollegiate contests may be car-
tied too far in the way of rivalry, and
the question is asked whether the
thought now is not more one of getting
a prize or of victory than of being dis-
ciplined in the way of public speaking.
These extracts and points are all
taken from the report for the year end-
ing December 31. The report is, as
usual, an extended history of events in
the college world.
the President takes further opportunity
to express his high regard for the value
of the work done by Professor Brush
of the Scientific School. He further
urges the consideration of many needs
to which he has called attention be-
fore. The religious life of the College
is given considerable notice and the
work of Mr. Henry B. Wright as Secre-
tary is highly endorsed. |
THE DIVINITY SCHOOL.
Among the departments a great deal
of space is given to the Divinity School.
The comment on the school is entirely
favorable. The only thing which the
President points out as_ especially
needed, are further funds for instruc-
tion, in order that the salaries of the
professors may be increased and other
provisions made for increased facilities
for satisfactory teaching. The Prési-
dent argues for maintaining the high
standard of the department, and says:
“Tt is an interesting fact in the his-
tory of our Divinity School, that it has
never turned aside from its appropriate
work, under the influence of the de-
mands of a passing era, to provide short
courses of study for men of inferior
preparation; or courses in which the
English Bible was substituted for the
Greek and Hebrew; or courses for
Sunday-school teachers. It is also an
interesting fact, that the larger part of
such courses, which have been intro-
duced into some other institutions,
have been abandoned and set aside be-
cause the demand for them proved to
be only a temporary one, and also be-
cause the plan which involved these
courses proved itself, after a season, to
be a failure. If the professions of the
Law and Medicine are becoming more
and more, as the years move on, learned
professions;—and if the efforts of those
who are engaged in the work of educa-
tion for these professions is, with uni-
versal approval, directed to the accom-
plishment of this end, the present era
is certainly not one in which it is be-
In the course of it.
strict examinations.
fitting that the profession of the Minis-
try should weaken or diminish its
character as a learned profession. Let
our University schools, at least, do for
the Ministry what they are earnestly
striving to do for their legal and medi-
cal students. It is to be hoped that it
may always be so here in our Univer-
sity, and that our three professional
schools may in this respect ever con-
tinue, in their forward movement, alike
in their character and purpose.”
MR. HENDRIE AND THE LAW . SCHOOL.
Attention is called to the fact that Mr.
Hendrie has increased, during the vear,
by another ten thousand dollars, his
gift to the Law School, making the
total of his benefactions in this direc-
tion $65,000. In connection with the
Law School, regret is expressed at the
withdrawal of Professor Buckland, and
the good wishes of the Faculty are
given him in his new position.
The President gives unqualified en-
dorsement to the conduct of the Medi-
cal School and the results which have
been obtained from the work that has
been done there; of which he says:
“The value of the education given by
the School is making itself manifest, in
every way, in these now passing years,
and it is very gratifying to notice the
success of the students graduating from
the School in the securing of positions
which are open only as the result of
Nothing is now
needed for the development of the
School to such a degree. and after so
admirable a. manner, as to satisfy, and
more than satisfy, every true-hearted
friend of the University, except the en-
largement of the funds at its command
to an extent sufficient for the erection
of its building already mentioned and
for the realization of its present plans.
We may hope that the true-hearted
friends of the University will prove
themselves large-hearted in their senti-
ment and generous feeling towards the
Medical School.”
As to the Art School, the President
calls strongly for more funds and em-
phasizes the good work that has been
done by the school and the significance
of its early foundation and develop-
ment. President Dwight says that the
higher education of the future will have
more of the art element in it.
