BRAIN-POWER AND HISTORY. 79 



ment we find state neglect; we are in a region where it is nobody's 

 business to see that anything is done. 



We in Great Britain have thirteen universities competing with 134 

 state and privately endowed in the United States and 22 state en- 

 dowed in Germany. I leave other countries out of consideration for lack 

 of time, and I omit all reference to higher institutions for technical 

 training, of which Germany alone possesses nine of university rank, 

 because they are less important ; they instruct rather than educate, and 

 our want is education. The German State gives to one university more 

 than the British Government allows to all the universities and university 

 colleges in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales put together. These 

 are the conditions which regulate the production of brain-power in the 

 United States, Germany and Britain respectively, and the excuse of the 

 government is that this is a matter for private effort. Do not our 

 Ministers of State know that other civilized countries grant efficient 

 state aid, and further, that private effort has provided in Great 

 Britain less than 10 per cent, of the sum thus furnished in the United 

 States in addition to state aid? Are they content that we should go 

 under in the great struggle of the modern world because the ministers 

 of other states are wiser, and because the individual citizens of an- 

 other country are more generous, than our own ? 



If we grant that there was some excuse for the state's neglect so 

 long as the higher teaching dealt only with words, and books alone had 

 to be provided (for the streets of London and Paris have been used 

 as class rooms at a pinch), it must not be forgotten that during the 

 last hundred years not only has knowledge been enormously increased, 

 but things have replaced words, and fully equipped laboratories must 

 take the place of books and class rooms if university training worthy 

 of the name is to be provided. There is much more difference in size 

 and kind between an old and a new university than there is between the 

 old caravel and a modern battleship, and the endowments must follow 

 suit. 



What are the facts relating to private endowment in this country? 

 In spite of the munificence displayed by a small number of individuals 

 in some localities, the truth must be spoken. In depending in our 

 country upon this form of endowment, we are trusting to a broken reed. 

 If we take the twelve English university colleges, the forerunners of 

 universities unless we are to perish from lack of knowledge, we find that 

 private effort during sixty years has found less than 4,000,000/., that is, 

 2,000,000Z. for buildings and 40,000L a year income. This gives us 

 an average of 166,000/. for buildings and 3,300/. for yearly income. 



Wliat is the scale of private effort we have to compete with in 

 regard to the American universities ? 



In the United States, during the last few years, universities and 



