9° 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



instincts to lead and take interest in 

 his schoolmates, for these latter at- 

 tributes will likely in after life guide 

 him to esteem the performance of 

 public duties as his highest aim. 



Marks for these four qualifications 

 should be awarded somewhat in the 

 following proportions: Four-tenths for 

 the first, one-tenth for the second, 

 three-tenths for the third and two- 

 tenths for the fourth. 



Marks for the several qualifications 

 should be awarded independently — that 

 is to say, marks for the first qualifica- 

 tion by examination; for the second 

 and third qualifications, respectively, 

 by the ballot of fellow-students of the 

 candidates, and for the fourth qualifi- 

 cation by the headmasters of the 

 schools, and the result of the awards, 

 that is to say the marks obtained by 

 each candidate for each qualification, 

 should be added together and the suc- 

 cessful student be the one who re- 

 ceived the greatest number of marks, 

 giving him the highest all-round quali- 

 fication. 



THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY. 



The great educational endowments 

 created by Mr. Rhodes, Mr. Carnegie 

 and others naturally direct attention 

 to our universities, and the question as 

 to what they are accomplishing is 

 asked on many sides. An optimistic 

 answer is given in the last number of 

 the North American Review by Presi- 

 dent Harper, of the University of 

 Chicago, and a pessimistic answer in 

 the last and preceding number of the 

 Forum by Professor Ladd, of Yale 

 University. Dr. Harper points out 

 that the library and the laboratory 

 occupy the places of honor in the 

 university. He tells us that the 

 laboratory for a single science should 

 'cost more than the entire college 

 plant of the last generation.' The 

 largeness of the cost of a modern 

 university is rather attractive than 

 otherwise to him: he has spoken of 

 the need of a university with an en- 

 dowment of fifty million dollars; and 

 this does not, as a matter of fact, ap- 

 pear to be extravagant at a time when 

 a manufacturing corporation may have 

 a capital of a thousand million dollars. 



The making of men and the advance- 

 ment of knowledge is after all a more 

 important industry than the manufac- 

 ture of steel. Dr. Harper is certainly 

 right in maintaining that professional 

 schools should be part of the univer- 

 sity, and is probably right in urging 

 the affiliation of colleges with one 

 another and with the university. But 

 he seems to be unduly optimistic and 

 perhaps locally influenced in profess- 

 ing faith in the future of the denomi- 

 national university. He says: "What- 

 ever the state may do, the obligation 

 which rests upon the churches is as 

 strong and as serious as it has ever 

 been in the past." But the church can 

 never permanently compete with the 

 state; the future belongs to the 

 state university. Baptists may endow 

 a university, but no one should endow 

 a Baptist university. 



The cheerful if somewhat material 

 optimism of President Harper is pref- 

 erable to the complaining tone adopted 

 by Professor Ladd. He gives correctly 

 the functions of a university : " ( 1 ) The 

 highest mental and moral culture of 

 its own students; (2) the advance- 

 ment, by research and discovery, of 

 science, scholarship and philosophy; 

 (3) the diffusion, as from a center of 

 light and influence, of the benefits of 

 a liberal, genial and elevating cul- 

 ture"; but he thinks that "the insti- 

 tutions of the higher education in this 

 country are worth all that they are 

 costing . . . only if they are to be pre- 

 pared to exercise all these three func- 

 tions in a much more intelligent and 

 effective fashion than at present." 

 Now every one hopes that the Ameri- 

 can University will continually im- 

 prove its methods of teaching, will in- 

 creasingly contribute to the advance- 

 ment of knowledge, and will more and 

 more become the intellectual and moral 

 center of the community; but it seems 

 odd that a university professor should 

 doubt whether a university is at pres- 

 ent worth what it costs. All our uni- 

 versities together do not cost one tenth 



