62 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



In any event the mode of comparison is absurd. It can be used, it has 

 been used to prove that college training is without advantage, for down 

 to twenty years ago, the vast majority of prominent men had never 

 attended college. The remarkable increase in college students has come 

 within three decades: recent gi-aduates still labor under the burden of 

 contemporary criticism. 



But a more serious matter remains. The use of the term " small 

 college " is a mere play on words for the clamorous small colleges of 

 to-day are in no sense the successors of the small colleges of long ago. 

 Dartmouth, Amherst and Williams in New England, Union in New 

 York and Jefferson in Pennsylvania are often held before the admiring 

 listener as prototypes of the small college; yet each of them had grad- 

 uated classes of 40, 60 or even more in years prior to the civil war. 

 There were other, smaller colleges with 100 or less students which 

 equalled the larger in grade; but the 100 or less students included only 

 those studying the regular course, the list did not include children in 

 elementary work. All those older colleges had a narrow curriculum, but 

 it was definite ; the faculties were small, but they were competent to do 

 the required work. It is certain that the modest ante-bellum colleges 

 in some cases showed great results — but only where proper material was 

 provided. There were many little colleges whose faculties were as 

 earnest and as faithful as the best, yet one finds among their graduates 

 very few who became even modestly prominent in any calling or pro- 

 fession; the reason being that they had not a strong type of people as 

 constituency. Not the size of the college, but the type of students was 

 responsible for the result. Colleges situated amid sturdy communities 

 have long lists of men eminent in every kind of work. The men were 

 there before they went to college; the elements of success were innate; 

 no training, no education can impart them. Dartmouth and Jefferson, 

 large for those days. Center of Kentucky and Bowdoin of Maine, small 

 colleges of those days, are typical. The reader will think at once of 

 others, similar in type. 



As has been said, a very great proportion of the present-day schools, 

 glorying in the title of small colleges, have little resemblance to those of 

 earlier days. True, they are burdened with unremittent financial 

 stringency and the requirements are modest — ^but with these the like- 

 ness ends. The curriculum in the old colleges was narrow, but it was 

 compulsory, and its definite aim was to prepare men for undertaking 

 professional study. Too many of the newer colleges, while pretending 

 to be legitimate successors of the older, offer a curriculum of amazing 

 range, music, art, pedagogy, semi-professional studies and elective 

 courses in college work. In looking over the announcements, one is 

 apt at times to imagine that at last he has found the ideal institution 



