The Days of a Man D868 



Another factor, characteristic of British and Ameri- 

 can institutions generally, strengthened the bonds 

 which united professors and students at Cornell. 

 This may be defined as sympathetic cooperation. 

 Meaning It lies behind the endearing term "Alma Mater," 

 f which I never heard used for a German university. 

 ff mfl Goethe, indeed, spoke of Jena as "liebes, ndrriscbes 



Mater T . . , r 



Nest. But Jena in those days was a center ot 

 student debauchery, and the "dear, foolish nest" 

 abounded in costly folly. Some one once asked a 

 student from the University of Prague if he loved it. 

 " Love it ! No, I hate it ! " " And why ? ' : ' Because 

 it's a State affair." But with the American con- 

 ception of the State as a cooperative commonwealth, 

 educational relations are wholly different, and the 

 state university is thought of as "Alma Mater" by- 

 thousands of men and women. Having behind it 

 no element of the compulsory and its degrees not 

 essential to professional advancement, it stands in a 

 very different relation and is loved by its alumni 

 quite as warmly as Harvard or Yale. The Uni- 

 versity of Prague, a creation of soulless officialism, 

 has as a whole no personality. It could no more be 

 the object of love than a post office; it serves mainly 

 as the door to professional preferment. 

 Looking A second great advantage possessed by American 

 forward institutions is that they are never complete, but 

 always look forward to something better. This 

 gives a perennial impulse toward progress. The 

 German university, on the contrary, is from the 

 first a perfect representative of its type, with practi- 



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