196 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



ising to be the dispenser of these special mental traits during the latter 

 years of the educational curriculum is quite obvious to those who know 

 that mental habits are, to a large extent, definitely and permanently 

 formed much earlier than this period. If the qualities commonly 

 designated as balance, interest and sympathy, the dominant character- 

 istics of those who actually possess a liberal education have not budded 

 in the school period, they can not be successfully grafted during the 

 university years. The formation of mental habits belongs to the school 

 and not to the university period. To-day the university unfortunately 

 limits its sphere of usefulness in our intellectual life to frittering away 

 energies and resources in attempting to reeducate those who have failed 

 to develop intellectual interests during the school years. At the age 

 of seventeen or eighteen, when the average student enters the univer- 

 sity, his mental habits are already formed to such a degree that the 

 catalogued promises made to him of the efficacy of liberalizing studies 

 smacks more of the east wind of authority than of common sense. If 

 those who defend the present conditions of affairs as a necessary form 

 of compromise are correct, then we may well be pessimistic of our 

 future intellectual development, inasmuch as the university is revealed 

 to us as a nurse for the sick rather than as a counselor and aid to the 

 strong. The dominance of that kind of mediocrity which imperils the 

 life of democracy is very plainly indicated in the present organization 

 of our universities that make ample provision for the day-nursery treat- 

 ment of those who are devoid of intellectual interests and ambitions, 

 and take little cognizance of the great numbers of students possessed of 

 mental health, vigor and praiseworthy ambitions. 



Many parents and teachers have the unfortunate habit of assuming 

 a semi-apologetic attitude when referring to courses of studies, as if 

 they were tasks to be undertaken merely in order to satisfy the conven- 

 tional demands of society, while all manly virtues are commonly re- 

 ferred to as if they could only be exercised by training the biceps and 

 were quite independent of brain development. 



At school attention should be directed to the value of constant con- 

 tinuous effort, emphasizing the fact that a desire to work with one's 

 brain is just as much a sign of health as the wish to excel in physical 

 exercises. The importance of mental habits and the formation of 

 thought processes should be emphasized not only as a means of attain- 

 ing success in practical issues, but as the essential factors in the pres- 

 ervation of mental balance. 



The silly conventional values commonly attached to an education 

 should be replaced by substituting those intellectual interests in work 

 that add so materially to the pleasure of living. The success of an 

 education and the intelligent interest of an individual in his occupa- 

 tions may often be directly measured by estimating the degree of 

 pleasure taken in " talking shop." The devitalizing influences of our 



