42 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



for those who will take them seriously. They know little of the powers 

 of perverted wealth ; they know little of the vices and the artificial 

 standards of society. I venture to say that hundreds of them go through 

 M. A. C. without having these facts forced upon their attention. I be- 

 lieve the old college has turned out a larger percentage of self-respect- 

 ing, virtue loving men and women than any other school in the United 

 States. The dormitory life has brought the students into close touch. 

 They have learned to sympathize with others; they have learned to honor 

 and respect their superiors. The wealthy students have mingled with 

 the poor and both have grown stronger by reason of the competition. 

 They have gone away with broader sociological views and stronger char- 

 acters and have become better citizens by virtue of their mutual admira- 

 tion and respect. 



''The society life of M. A. C. was of the right sort, what there was of 

 it. There should have been quarters for about twice as many social or- 

 ganizations. What a pity it was that about half the students were un- 

 able to avail themselves of this privilege. AVhen you ask the people of 

 Michigan for an appropriation for more dormitories I suggest that you 

 promise them that their young peo])le will be furnished Avitli an abund- 

 ance of wholesome social opportunities. 



"A public institution mothered by a state is no place for a few favored 

 ones to set up a distinct society of their own in order to segregate them- 

 selves and to display their powers over others less fortunate. It is no 

 place for class distinctions to take root and grow. Let the farmer boys 

 and girls believe that the world is a paradise wherein virtue is honored 

 more than wealth until they graduate, when their vision, like the Santa 

 Claus fable, gradually dissolving still leaves them enriched with the 

 faith that some day the whole world may become as pure socially and as 

 free from class prejudice as was their Alma Mater." 



No. 10. Opposed. 



"Dear Sir: — Elbert Hubbard said in a recent number of the Philistine 

 'That too much Waldorf Astoria caused the downfall of Babylon 

 and Nineveh,' applying that college wise, too much artificial life in our 

 American colleges is developing a class of eft'ete young men and an in- 

 competent alumni. It is said that Harvard has 5,400 students, of which 

 5,000 are remittance men ; the other 400 are self supporting. The 5,000 

 are the ones that are heard of in noisy boastings and swagger clothes and 

 manners as devotees of fraternity halls during the college course, and the 

 400 are the fellows who are heard of thereafter. Whenever an agricul- 

 tural college that is supposed to be devoted largely to the education of 

 farmers' sons and exalting the dignity of honest labor takes on airs of 

 Eastern colleges filled with pampered rich men's sons with full purses 

 and. empty heads, it has rung the knell of its declining years. Nobody 

 believes more thoroughly in honest hilarious fun for students than I, or 

 ever had any more of it, but I believe it should all be conducted with an 

 eye single to the simple life and the things that go to make up for Spar- 

 tan, sturdy, high-minded, self-respecting manhood and those traits do not 

 flourish best on richly upholstered furniture, easy couches, with social 

 I)ipe or cigarette, surrounded by the air of swagger that fraternity houses 

 tend to foster. 



