6o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



for the better. In the old faculty, there was always some one to whom 

 troubled students could go, knowing that he would give the best he had 

 of advice and sympathy ; and that man is present in every faculty to-day. 

 Eeasoning a priori, the number of such men should be greater now. 

 The college professor of a half century ago was apt to be a recluse, not 

 a man of affairs. Too often, especially in the smaller colleges, he had 

 become teacher late in life, having been more or less unsuccessful in 

 another profession, which, naturally, he regarded as of higher grade 

 than teaching. That type has not disappeared; but the college pro- 

 fessor of the last three decades has had, for the most part, special prepa- 

 ration for his work; teaching is, for him, the noblest of professions; 

 except in a few departments, he is a man of the world, not enclosed in 

 a world of his own creation. With wider opportunities, he understands 

 his fellows and can keep in touch with younger men. On the other 

 hand, the student's life is broader, he is no longer regarded as some- 

 thing apart from his kind and he is better able to appreciate his oppor- 

 tunities — even though not always inclined to avail himself of them. 



It is true that the output of our colleges in recent years does not 

 give promise of equalling in average quality that of fifty years ago. 

 The vast increase in number of students has not been in the best inter- 

 ests of true education; too many are seeking neither knowledge nor 

 training ; too many others are unfitted by native limitations or by early 

 surroundings ; they merely limp through the course and by dint of hard 

 labor gain little more than the minimum demanded. It would be well 

 for our colleges, well for the men themselves, if a great part of those 

 now on college rolls should drop out and have no successors of their 

 kind. The lowering of the standard in some quarters and the de- 

 creasing average of the output are due to their presence. 



But those uttering the current laments respecting inferiority of 

 output rarely consider matters of this sort; actual conditions have little 

 of interest for them and they look far afield. The lack of frankness is 

 nowhere more apparent than in the type of argument used to enforce 

 the assertion that large colleges do not show results equalling those of 

 the smaller ones. One would be justified in using a harsher term than 

 " lack of frankness." Many advocates of present-day " small colleges,'' 

 with 60 to 90 per cent, of their enrollment taking non-collegiate studies, 

 are not content to say that their work is very good ; they maintain that, 

 if one may judge the tree by its fruit, their work is far better than that 

 done by the larger colleges. In an address delivered several years ago 

 at the inauguration of a college president, the speaker said that of the 

 fifteen college graduates, chosen to the presidency of the United States, 

 two thirds came from small colleges; that of seventeen graduates from 

 fifteen colleges, who attained distinction in congress from 1870 to 1885, 



