34 ‘
i Ate) A. Wis 2 WBE BRY.
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interest in his subject, is forced to con-
tent himself with what is little more
than a lecture in teaching the larger
groups of ordinary men to whom the
subject has only a general interest. A
lecture system of this kind is beset with
perils. It is something of which we
have to make use, because there are not
enough first-rate men in the country to
teach all the subjects of study which this
generation demands, in classes of size
small enough to adapt themselves to the
recitation system. The choice in many
lines of study lies between having reci-
tations with fourth-rate men or lectures
from first-rate ones. I never met a
good teacher who really approved of the
lecture system, or who did not prefer
small classes to large ones. But these
really good teachers are just the men
that we wish to bring in contact with
as many students as_ possible. If we
refuse to let them lecture, we either
confine the benefit of their instructions
to a few, or increase their hours beyond
the possibility of human endurance.
COLLEGE SPIRIT MENACED.
Another evil connected with the elec-’
tive system is the loss of esprit de corps.
In a college like West Point or Annapo-
lis, where a homogeneous body of men is
pursuing a common scheme of studies,
with a common end in view, and with
rigorous requirements as to the work
which must be done by each individual,
this spirit is seen at its strongest. The
place sets its character stamp upon every
one; sometimes perhaps for evil, but
in the vast majority of cases for good.
An approximation to this state of things
was seen in our early American colleges.
In many of them it is still maintained
to a considerable degree. But the forces
which maintain it are far less potent
to-day than they were fifty years ago.
The community of interests is less, the
community of hard work is very much
less. If this college spirit once passes
away, the whole group of qualities which
we have known by the name of college
democracy is in danger of passing also.
For the increase of wealth in the outside
world is a perpetual menace to old-
fashioned democratic equality. If we
have within the college life not only
differences in things studied, but differ-
ences in enjoyment between rich and
poor, we are at once in danger of wit-
nessing a development of social distinc-
tions and class interests which shall
sweep away the thing which was most
characteristic. and most valuable in the
earlier. education of our colleges.. Not
the intellectual life only, nor the social
life only, but the whole religious and
moral atmosphere suffers deterioration
if a place becomes known either as a
rich man’s college; or, worse -yet, as a
college where rich and poor meet on
different footings. What shall it profit
us if we gain the whole world and lose
our own soul, if we develop the intel-
lectual and material side of our educa-
tion, and lose the traditional spirit of
democracy and loyalty and Christianity ?
That there will be an advance in
thoroughness of preparation for the
special lines of work which our students
are to undertake is a thing of which we
may safely rest assured. That there
shall be a similar advance in the general
training for citizenship in the United
States is an obligation for whose fulfil-
ment our universities are responsible.
The Yale of the future must count for
even more than the Yale of the past in
the work of city, state, and nation. It
must come into closer touch with our
political life, and be a larger part of
that life. To this end it is not enough
for her to train experts competent to
deal with the financial and legal prob-
lems which are before us. Side by side
with this training, she must evoke in the
whole body of her students and alumni
that wider sense of their obligation as
members of a free commonwealth which
the America of the twentieth century
requires.
The central problem, which we all
have to face, and about which all other
problems group themselves, is this:
How shall we make our educational
System meet the world’s demands for
progress on the intellectual side, without
endangering the growth of that which
has proved most valuable on_ the
moral SId@f ehnd :<it 1s: thé: lat-
ter part which demands the most
immediate attention from a college presi-
dent, not necessarily because it is more
important in itself{—for where two things
are both absolutely indispensable, a com-
parison of relative values is meaning-
less—but because the individual profes-
sors can, and under the keen competition
between universities must, attend in a
large measure to the excellence of in-
struction in their several departments,
while the action of the university as a
whole, and the intelligent thought of the
university administration, is requisite to
prevent the sacrifice of the moral inter-
est of the whole commonwealth.
MEETING THE DIFFICULTY.
There are four ways in which we may
strive to deal with this difficulty.
(1) By relegating the work of charac-
ter development more and more to the
preparatory schools. ur acceptance or
non-acceptance of this solution deter-
mines our attitude toward the problem
of entrance requirements.
(2) By striving to limit the occasion
for the use of money on the part of the
student. The necessity for such limita-
tion constitutes the problem of college
expenses.
(3) By endeavoring to create a body
of common interests and traditions out-
side of the college course which shall
make up for the diversity of interests
within it. The most widely discussed,
though possibly not the most important,
point under this head is furnished by the
problem of college athletics.
(4) By so arranging the work of the
different departments of study that the
variety inherent in the elective system
‘shall not be attended with intellectual
dissipation; providing the chance for
economy of effort on the part of the
instructor and the assurance of systema- .
tic codperation on the part of the
pupils. This is the problem of univer-
sity organization.
The plan of relegating the responsi-
bility for character development to the
preparatory schools has at first sight
much to commend it. It relieves the
college officers of the most disagreeable
part of their duty, that which pertains
to matters of discipline, and enables
them to concentrate their attention on
their function as teachers. It meets the
demands of many progressive men en-.
gaged in secondary education, some of
whom long for an extension of their pro-
fessional functions into new fields of ac-
tivity, while others, justly proud of their
success in the formation of character
under existing conditions, desire the ad-
ditional opportunity which is given them
if they can keep their oldest boys a year
or two longer under their influence.
The larger the university the greater
becomes the pressure in this direction.
But with conditions as they exist at
Yale, I cannot think it wise to yield to
this pressure. If we take a-year from
the beginning of the college course, that
year will be spent by most of the boys
either- n= a= high “school (or <a - daree
academy. In the former case we ap-
proach the German or French system of
education; in the latter the English. A
compromise between. the two, whereby
a boy. finishes his high school course
and then takes the additional year at an
academy, is hardly admissible on any
ground; the single year is somewhat
too short to give the intellectual .influ-
ences of the new place to which the boy
goes, and far too short to give its
character influences.
AGAINST THE FRENCH OR GERMAN SYSTEM.
I cannot believe that anv one who has
watched the workings of the French or
German system would desire to see it.
adopted in this country. The passage
at an advanced age from the discipline
of the lycée or gymnasium to the free-
dom of the university, however well it
may work in its intellectual results, does
not produce the kind of moral ones
which we need. The English system has
wider possibilities; and for England it
does extremely well. But it is essen-
tially a product of English conditions,—
that is, of aristocratic ones. It is an
education for a privileged class. In
America, on the other hand, we wish
our higher education to remain demo-
cratic. We should not be satisfied with
a system which excluded from its bene-
' fits the large number of boys who come
from institutions, public or private,
which are situated near their own
homes, and prepare only small groups
for college. And even for those who
are fortunate enough to come from the
best preparatory schools, the loss in
college life would often outweigh the
gain in school life. A system of influ-
ences whose operation terminates at
nineteen or twenty fixes a boy’s moral
and social place too soon. For the
young man who has grown to the full
measure of his moral stature at this age
it is good; -for the one who matures
later it is distinctly bad. In our every-
day experience at Yale, as we watch the
interaction between school estimates and
college estimates of character, we can
see that whatever postpones a man’s final
social rating to as late a day as possible
lengthens the period of strenuous moral
effort, increases the chance of continued
growth, and is of the largest value to
the boys and men of the best type.
The abandonment of the responsibility
for forming character would have its
disadvantages for the university no less
than for the students. A boy’s loyalty
will remain where his moral character
has formed itself. The devotion and
sentiment of: the Englishman play not
about Oxford or Cambridge, but about
Eton, Harrow, and Rugby. Universities
which derive their prestige and _ their
wealth from the past rather than from
the present may perhaps endure this
deprivation. Not so the American col-
lege or university, which looks for its
strongest support to the loyalty of its
alumni.
RELATION TO PREPARATORY SCHOOLS.
With the desire of secondary school
teachers to extend their work I have
the strongest sympathy. To the idea of
codperation between universities and
schools, whereby each shall arrange its
teaching with reference to the other’s
needs, I am fully and absolutely com-
mitted, and purpose to do all that I can
to further it. A university fulfills its
true function only when it thus seeks
and gives aid outside of itself. But I
believe that the chance for this exten-
sion, this cooperation, and this leader-
ship, is to come through the freer inter-
change of thought and interchange of
men between school teaching and uni-
versity teaching, rather than through a
transference of subjects from one to the
other. I believe that with the conditions
as they exist, the true policy for our
university with regard to’ entrance
requirements is to find out what
our secondary schools can do _ for
their pupils, intellectually and morally,
and adapt our requirements to these con-
ditions. Detailed questions as to what
specific subjects we shall require must
be subordinated to this genefal principle
erence CC CC ‘ >
of requiring those things, and only
those things, which the schools can do
well. To know whether we can substi-
tute French or German for Greek, we
must know whether any considerable
number of schools teach French or Ger-
man in such a way as to make it a real
equivalent for Greek in the way of
preparation for more advanced studies.
Unless we keep our minds on this
principle, we.shall be in perpetual danger
of receiving students who have been
crammed for their examinations rather
than trained for their work.
COLLEGE EXPENSES.
The second of our leading problems
is the question of college expenses.
Though the increase in this respect is
less than is popularly supposed, there is
no doubt that it is large enough to
constitute a serious danger. It is far
from easy to see how this danger is to
be avoided. It is all very well to talk
of returning to the Spartan simplicity of
ancient times, but we cannot do it, nor
ought we to if we could. We cannot,
for the sake of saving the cost of a
bathroom, return to the time when
people took no baths. Nor can we meet
the difficulty by furnishing the comforts
of modern civilization and charging no
price for them. If the university could
afford to do it for every one, it might
be well; but to do it for some and not
for others works against the spirit of
democracy. It may readily become a
form of pauperization: This same dan-
ger lurks in the whole system of benefi-
ciary aid, as at present given in Yale
and in most other colleges. To avoid
this danger, and at the same time give
the men the help which they fairly ought
to have, we need not so much an increase
of beneficiary funds as an increase of the
opportunities for students to earn their
living. Aid in education, if given with-
out exacting a corresponding return,
becomes demoralizing. If it is earned
by the student as he goes, it has just
the opposite effect. This holds good of
graduate scholarships and fellowships no
less than of undergraduate ones. There
is no doubt that in the somewhat indis-
criminate competition of different uni-
versities anxious to increase the size,
real- or apparent, of them graduate
departments, there has been an abuse of
these appliances which, unless promptly
Ex-President TIMOTHY DWIGHT, D2D.. LE.D.
