DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE. 



653 



cultural purpose predominates in the 

 earlier courses, and the investigative 

 and professional in the later; but both 

 have a place in all and find their realiza- 

 tion in a common method of treatment. 

 While it is not expected that more than 

 a small percentage of those who take 

 the earlier courses will have professional 

 or investigative work in view, it is be- 

 lieved that they will derive the largest 

 and most distinctive returns from such 

 shaping of the work. That special men- 

 tal and moral discipline which is appro- 

 priate to the science can be secured 

 only by wrestling with its problems as 

 they actually present themselves to the 

 investigator. A radically different dis- 

 cipline is secured from handling the sub- 

 ject in the simple didactic method. It 

 is believed that those who enter upon 

 any of the courses with an intelligent 

 appreciation of the science as a growing 

 body of truth and a progressive field of 

 intellectual endeavor will desire to come 

 into touch with its working methods 

 and controlling spirit." 



In his address before the Baptist 

 Social Union of Chicago, Nov. 5, 1891, 

 Dr. W. R. Harper set forth what might 

 be expected of the new University of 

 Chicago. Much has been accomplished 

 along the lines indicated. Two or three 

 passages in this notable utterance are 

 worth repeating: 



"In these days of specialists, the man 

 who has passed through college has, 

 after all, but a smattering of things. 

 Possibly before his course is completed, 

 and certainly at the close of it, he 

 should have a chance to take some spe- 

 cial subject and give it the continuous 

 attention of months. Concentration on 

 a given line, before graduation, should 

 be encouraged. . . . The college- 

 system, as we all understand it, is not 

 intended primarily to stock the pupil's 

 mind with knowledge, but rather to de- 

 velop it, to make it able to receive and 

 apply truth from every source; in brief, 

 to open the mind. . . . But it is not 

 sufficient simply to be open to accept 

 truth when it presents itself; to adopt 

 new or modified methods, when they 

 have been suggested by others. A uni- 

 versity may not stop with this. Shall 

 you not expect contributions, and these 

 not small ones, to the sum of human 

 knowledge? Shall you not expect a 

 spirit pervading every department of the 

 university life which will lead men from 

 the lowest to the highest department to 

 investigate and to experiment ? A deal 

 of truth, known for ages, if it is to ex- 



ert any influence to-day, must be re- 

 stated. Such restatement makes it 

 practically new truth, and the contribu- 

 tion of the man who has done this is 

 only less than that of him who first 

 formulated it. Old forms of statement 

 in every line of work have lost their 

 force; they have been worn smooth, till 

 now they are really valueless." 



Hence the need, not only of specialists 

 and laboratories, but of an endowed 

 University Press for the publication of 

 books and periodicals. This want has 

 been supplied by the admirably edited 

 journals of the University, which con- 

 tain articles summing up the results of 

 studies and experiments pursued in nu- 

 merous lines of intellectual activity. 

 Usually the head professor of the de- 

 partment is the editor, aided by his as- 

 sociates and by eminent scholars in 

 other universities of America and 

 Europe. It is not necessary to dwell on 

 the merits of the 'Botanical Gazette,' 

 the 'Journal of Geology,' the 'Journal of 

 Political Economy' and the other month- 

 lies and quarterlies issued from the Uni- 

 versity of Chicago Press. The value of 

 this series is appreciated, and their suc- 

 cess is a credit to American scholarship. 



The keynote of the university spirit 

 is devotion to the cause of truth for its 

 own sake. This mental attitude was 

 well described in Professor Chamberlin's 

 convocation address (April 1, 1893) on 

 'The Mission of the Scientific Spirit': 



"Simple observation is incapable of 

 disentangling intricate phenomena and 

 of discriminating with precision the sev- 

 eral agencies and their varying results. 

 Even when it discerns the agencies, the 

 complexity of the combination baffles 

 all efforts to evaluate the measure and 

 degree of participation. In the varying 

 degrees of participation of causes lies 

 the greatest peril to safe conclusions. 



"But by the devices of experimenta- 

 tion, each factor may be disentangled 

 from its complex associations and made 

 to reveal itself in its simple and naked 

 reality. Experimentation, by its crea- 

 tive processes, opens a new world of ob- 

 servation; a world devised and con- 

 trolled solely for the disentanglement of 

 truth. The new potency thus added to 

 observation and induction gave birth to 

 modern science. By its aid the mass of 

 crude facts previously gathered were 



