?o6 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



which should set at defiance what is perfect- 

 ly well defined as the science of cramming. 

 Could the graduates of my time have passed 

 such an examination in Latin and Greek ? If 

 they could have done that, I should now 

 see a reason in the course pursued with us. 

 When we were graduated, we should have 

 acquired a training, such as it was ; it would 

 have amounted to something ; and, having a 

 bearing on the future, it would have been of 

 use in it. But it never was for a moment as- 

 sumed that we could have passed any such 

 examination. In justice to all, I must admit 

 that no self-deception was indulged in on this 

 point. Not only was the knowledge of our 

 theoretical fundamentals to the last degree 

 superficial, but nothing better was expected. 

 The requirements spoke for themselves ; and 

 the subsequent examinations never could 

 have deceived any one who had a proper con- 

 ception of what real knowledge was. 



But in pursuing Greek and Latin we had 

 ignored our mother-tongue. We were no 

 more competent to pass a really searching ex- 

 amination in English literature and English 

 composition than in the languages and litera- 

 ture of Greece and Borne. We were college 

 graduates ; and yet how many of us could 

 follow out a line of sustained, close thought, 

 expressing ourselves in clear, concise terms ? 

 The faculty of doing this should result from 

 a mastery of well-selected fundamentals. The 

 difficulty was that the fundamentals were not 

 well selected, and that they had never been 

 mastered. They had become a tradition. 

 They were studied no longer as a means, but 

 as an end the end being to get into college. 

 Accordingly, thirty years ago there was no 

 real living basis of a Harvard education. 

 Honest, solid foundations were not laid. The 

 superstructure, such as it was, rested upon 

 an empty formula. 



The reason of all this I could not under- 

 stand then, though it is clear enough to me 

 now. I take it to be simply this : The classic 

 tongues were far more remote from our world 

 than they had been from the world our fathers 

 lived in. They are much more remote from 

 the world of to-day than they were from the 

 world of thirty years ago. The human mind, 

 outside of the cloisters, is occupied with other 

 and more pressing things. Especially is it 

 occupied with a class of thoughts scientific 

 thoughts which do not find their nutriment 

 in the remote past. They are not in sympa- 

 thy with it. Accordingly, the world turns 

 more and more from the classics to those 

 other and living sources in which alone it 

 finds what it seeks. Students come to college 

 from the hearthstones of the modern world. 



They have been brought up in the new at- 

 mosphere. They are consequently more and 

 more disposed to regard the dead languages 

 as a mere requirement to college admission. 

 This reacts upon the institution. The college 

 does not change there is no conservatism 1 

 have ever met, so hard, so unreasoning, so 

 impenetrable, as the conservatism of profes- 

 sional educators about their methods the 

 college does not change ; it only accepts the 

 situation. The routine goes on, but super- 

 ficiality is accepted as of course ; and so thirty 

 years ago, as now, a surface acquaintance 

 with two dead languages was the chief re- 

 quirement for admission to Harvard ; and, 

 to acquiring it, years of school life were de- 

 voted. 



Nor in my time did the mischief end here. 

 On the contrary, it begau here. As a slip- 

 shod method of training was accepted in 

 those studies to which the greatest promi- 

 nence was given, the same method was ac- 

 cepted in other studies. The whole standard 

 was lowered. Thirty years ago I say it 

 after a careful search through my memory 

 thoroughness of training in any real-life sense 

 of the term was unknown in those branches 

 of college education with which I came in 

 contact. Everything was taught as Latin and 

 Greek were taught. Even now, I do not see 

 how I could have got solid, exhaustive teach- 

 ing in the class-room, even if I had known 

 enough to want it. A limp superficiality was 

 all-pervasive. To the best of my recollec- 

 tion the idea of hard thoroughness was not 

 there. ... rt 



Many of you are scientific men ; others are 

 literary men ; some are professional men. I 

 believe, from your own personal experience, 

 you will bear me out when I say that, with a 

 single exception, there is no modern scien- 

 tific study which can be thoroughly pursued 

 in any one living language, even with the as- 

 sistance of all the dead languages that ever 

 were spoken. The modern languages are 

 thus the avenues to modern life and living 

 thought. Under these circumstances, what 

 was the position of the college toward them 

 thirty years ago ? What is its position to-day ? 

 It intervened, and practically said then that 

 its graduates should not acquire those lan- 

 guages at that period when only they could 

 be acquired perfectly and with ease. It occu- 

 pies the same position still. It did and does 

 this none the less effectually because indi- 

 rectly. The thing came about, as it still 

 comes about, in this way : The college fixes 

 the requirements for admission to its course. 

 The schools and the academies adapt them- 

 selves to those requirements. The business 



