EDITOR'S TABLE. 



623 



of the street may pitch pennies for the 

 sake of winning them, why should not 

 the students secure a little pelf by a 

 trial of skill with their tongues? all 

 we ask is that the policy shall be for- 

 mulated and recognized. We hope that 

 in future the advocates of the perfection 

 of our college system of culture will 

 consent to regard it as a composite sys- 

 tem working in various ways, and ap- 

 pealing to divers motives for the attain- 

 ment of its ends. Hitherto we have been 

 assured witli great emphasis that this 

 system the perfected and purified re- 

 sult of centuries of experience has risen 

 above all low and sordid inducements, 

 and rests its superior claims on the dig- 

 nity of scholarship, the value of knowl- 

 edge for its own sake, and the intrinsic 

 excellence of culture. When it has been 

 urged that college studies are susceptible 

 of wise amendment, and should be ar- 

 ranged with some reference to the future 

 needs of the student's life, the suggestion 

 has been repelled with indignation, as 

 born of a base, utilitarian, bread-and- 

 butter motive that would degrade the 

 lofty and disinterested ideal that should 

 ever be held before the student the cul- 

 tivation and discipline of his intellectual 

 powers, as an end in itself, to be debased 

 by none of the vulgar incentives which 

 animate the beastly crowd in the prac- 

 tical scrambles of life. To be sure, we 

 have known that, notwithstanding all 

 this sounding talk, the higher institu- 

 tions have not hesitated to use the vulgar 

 spurs of action by which human nature 

 is everywhere moved. They are very 

 far from having disdained the appeal to 

 mercenary motives. The great univer- 

 sities of England are notoriously worked 

 by cash bribes, in the shape of fellow- 

 ships honorary positions with incomes 

 attached, which are securable by profi- 

 ciency in certain prescribed studies. 

 The universities have immense incomes 

 and are enabled to cling to their mediae- 

 val courses of study in defiance of pub- 

 lic opinion and the demand for reform, 

 mainly through the pecuniary prizes 



which in this way they hold out to stu- 

 dents. And this policy, in modified 

 forms, is extending to other collegiate 

 institutions as fast as they can get the 

 money for the purpose. Rich people 

 are inspired witli the ambition of en- 

 couraging learning ; that is, they get 

 some crotchet or hobby of education, 

 which they are willing to back with 

 money, and then prizes are founded, and 

 the students set into a fever of emula- 

 tion to gain them. In this way sordid 

 inducements become a part of the sys- 

 tem, and, as most of the donors have been 

 educated in the old way, their money 

 goes to perpetuate it. But no sooner 

 do the friends of science demand that 

 modern studies shall have an equal 

 chance with the ancient studies, and 

 that the knowledge which is necessary 

 for guidance in life shall be put upon an 

 equality with dead languages, than the 

 champions of the colleges are at once 

 upon their dignity, and beg to know 

 if the grand old liberal and ennobling 

 culture consecrated by centuries is to go 

 down before the narrow and selfish ex- 

 actions of a materialistic and money- 

 getting age. But these gentlemen are 

 not, after all, unmindful of the educa- 

 tional potency of filthy lucre, nor that 

 students may be plied with the motives 

 of the gamester the passion to win. 

 The intercollegiate speaking-match had 

 about it more of the ethics and incite- 

 ments of the cockpit than is quite con- 

 sistent with the lofty claims that are 

 put forth in regard to the inspirations 

 of the higher culture. We doubt if the 

 multiplication of intercollegiate con- 

 tests and ostentatious rivalries, whether 

 for the winning of purses, or the beat- 

 ing of antagonists, or the exhibition of 

 accomplishments, is either healthy in its 

 influence upon the internal life of the 

 institutions themselves, or favorable to 

 that quiet, concentrated, uninterrupted 

 mental exercise which is the indispen- 

 sable condition of solid attainments and 

 sterling scholarly character. 



