350 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



"WTien I AXTote this last sentence I thoiiglit that it Avas all out 

 of my own head, and I was proud of it; but as I laid down my pen 

 in my satisfaction for a moment's rest, my eye fell upon this pas- 

 sage in the prospectus of a new university — one which is said, in 

 the prospectus, to be not only universal, but cosmopolitan : " When 

 a question arises which divides scholars, like the tariff, the causes 

 and course of the Reformation, money, etc., the student will be re- 

 ferred to the ablest exponents of the opposing sides." 



No professor can plead ignorance of the way to enter this new 

 career of usefulness. One can scarcely pick up a college catalogue 

 or a magazine or a newspaper without learning how to make the 

 university universal. One of the simplest plans, with which all 

 are familiar, is to send to men with a reputation for learning a ruled 

 form and a request that each will write, in the proper columns, 

 the price, publisher, and title of the best book on his own subject — 

 mathematics, astronomy, moral science, or whatever it may be — or, 

 if he knows of no such book, that he will write one. An accompany- 

 ing circular tells how these lists are to be scattered through the 

 innumerable homes of our land, and how diplomas are to be dis- 

 tributed as prizes to those who, after purchasing the books, prepare 

 and submit the most exhaustive permutations of their tables of con- 

 tents. 



Learned men who do not approve this plan are offered a choice 

 from many others: six-week courses in law, medicine, and theology; 

 summer schools for the promotion of science and the liberal arts; 

 questions and answers in the educational column of some journal 

 for the home; or a national university so universal that it shall sup- 

 ply lunches and learning for all out of the public chest, with no door- 

 keeper to examine passports. 



The way to extend the university in this direction is so well 

 understood that I will turn now to another part of our subject, for 

 some may be less familiar with our opportunity to construct a royal 

 road to learning for those who are entitled to use it. 



A recent writer on education, who says American universities 

 impose " upon young men in the nineteenth century a curriculum 

 devised by dead-and-gone priests for the young men of the twelfth," 

 calls upon the teachers of America to reconstruct their curriculum 

 on psychological principles. I myself am no psychologist, and while 

 I fail to see how this fact concerns the public, it has recently been 

 pointed out in print, although no one has ever charged me with 

 lack of reverence for the psychologist. In truth, he is to me what 

 the good old family doctor is to many, for I am convinced that it 

 would be hard to name one among all the educational ills that flesh 

 is heir to that he would not be able to throw on the spot, with a 



