^0 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN. 



tiflc, is the crowning glory of university life. * * * Unless colleges 

 have sucli ambition, they may be turned into mere mills to grind out 

 material for examinations and competitions. Higher colleges should 

 always hold before their students that knowledge, for its own sake, is 

 the only object worthy of reverence. Beyond college life, there is a land 

 flowing with milk and honey for those who know how to cultivate it. 



Without fear of more than temporarily displeasing the 

 patriotic American, whose pride of country is second to that 

 of none, it may be said that Germany, with its usual zest in 

 educational matters, leads the world in the quantity and 

 quality of original work done by properly prepared students 

 in her universities. I fear that it may be many years before 

 we can hope for, much less claim, equality on this side 

 the Atlantic, though the phenomenal progress which the 

 Johns Hopkins University has made in the establishment 

 of popular and productive post-graduate departments war- 

 rants the greatest caution in making such a prediction. 

 The avenues to successful business or professional pursuits 

 are open earlier to the American than to the citizen of an 

 old-world country ; and there is far less of the leisure for 

 further study and improvement that attends the patient 

 waiting for an opening in life that is required of the Ger- 

 man youth. Positions of trust, even the judge' s bench and 

 the professor's chair, often come unsolicited with us, when 

 the incumbent should, and, were it not for the temptation 

 before him, would occupy the position of a learner. 



It has be6n said by one of America's most accomplished 

 specialists, that the great need of American science is edu- 

 cated specialists, — men who, on the foundation of a liberal 

 education, have reared that superstructure of training in 

 the technique and literature of the specialty they espouse 

 which shall equip them for the performance of rigidly accur- 

 ate investigation; and that mental discipline and knowledge 

 that shall enable them to comprehend and apply with a large 

 understanding, the result of their labor. To be instrument- 

 al in training such specialists, and to assist them in doing 

 original work, should be the highest aspiration of a teacher ; 

 to do it well, is the greatest service that ho can render. 



