5o 4 THE. POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



(Stewart Paton) there results the helpless " looking outward for (their) 

 succor " (W. C. Lawton) that makes for resignation not born of 

 strength, and docility not the issue of sacrificing loyalty. No one 

 knows better than the regular attendants at faculty meetings the hesi- 

 tant, dispirited, nibbling, myopic, lame and wearisome discussions that 

 are a trial to spirit and flesh; but the reasons therefor lie in the 

 "vicious circle" from which they can be released by converting the 

 prisoners into the guardians of a fortress. For any believer in that 

 oldest and perennial source of salvation, the liberation of spirit that 

 makes freemen of slaves, knows what marvels may be accomplished by 

 removing barriers of intellectual restraint, whether shackles, blinders or 

 ghettos. The redemption is through the enthusiasm born of self-as- 

 sertion, with responsibility as its poise. All bodies long deprived of 

 their constitutional rights tend to become incompetent or nihilistic or 

 restless according to temperament. If disposed to act under a sense of 

 personal injury, they become militant; if organized and with the pros- 

 pect of control, they become insurgent ; if academic, they apparently be- 

 come dormant. The academic situation suffers from restriction in 

 means and neglect of ends in a confusion of peremptory demands. Re- 

 form must be directed to the illumination of ends and means, and pri- 

 marily to a fitter sense of their kinship. " Administration plays a part 

 in most of our colleges and universities altogether disproportionate to 

 its value. Nor is the objection to this state of things merely negative. 

 There is positive harm of the most serious kind in that submergence 

 of self-assertive personality on the part of the professors which inevit- 

 ably goes with it" {New York Evening Post: editorial). Here lies 

 another vicious circle: we have so much governing to do because we 

 rely so much on governmental machinery and so little on self-govern- 

 ment. Yet externalism, however unsuitable and disturbing in itself, is 

 yet more disastrous by reason of its by-products, — the distortion of 

 purpose, the suppression of initiative, the false competitive standards 

 that insinuate themselves in underhand and unforeseen ways, and so 

 little of which is enough to contaminate the whole academic life. It is 

 the common disaster that ensues when those who should lead are sub- 

 servient to their following, either by force of circumstance or feebleness 

 of principle. In the university above all should the ideals of a sturdy 

 and righteous government be visibly expressed. Its spirit should be 

 progressive. " It appears that the general course of social evolution is 

 not towards competition. In the university it would probably be ad- 

 verse to the finer traits of scholarship and character, most of all when, 

 as under our present system, the competition would be for the favor of 

 presidents and trustees" (J. McK. Cattell). Faculty incompetence 

 and the restrictedness of academicism — much of which is superficial 

 rather than deep-seated — is not the excuse for but largely the result of 

 externalism and of living in the depressed atmosphere which it breeds. 



