MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY. 261 



in the case of many similar schools, is the fact that a not inconsiderable 

 amount of general training has from the beginning been required of 

 every candidate for the degree. In some technical or scientific schools 

 there are no liberalizing studies, aside from those of a professional 

 character. The faculty of the institute have insisted that such studies 

 should be incorporated to a considerable extent in the curriculum of 

 every course, recognizing the fact that few students in technical schools 

 are graduates of colleges, and that the aim of the Institute should be 

 first of all to graduate broadly trained men. Aside from the courses 

 in liberal studies, a broad spirit is shown in the technical courses them- 

 selves. The study of general principles is always the chief end in 

 view, and to it are strictly subordinated the acquirement of all knacks, 

 tricks of the trade or merely practical rules. 



These characteristics of the Institute were impressed upon it from 

 the beginning by the master hand of its founder and first president, 

 William B. Sogers. President Rogers aimed to establish 'a compre- 

 hensive, polytechnic college' which should provide a 'complete system 

 of industrial education.' It is now generally recognized that a com- 

 plete system of industrial education would consist of three parts: First, 

 manual training schools, for developing the eye and hand, not with 

 the object of producing artisans, but for training alone. Second, 

 trade schools for special training in the technique of the different 

 trades. Third, higher technical schools for training in the fundamental 

 principles of the sciences, and fitting men in the broadest way to be- 

 come leaders in the application of the sciences to the arts. Manual 

 training is now generally recognized as a desirable addition to every 

 scheme of public instruction and a powerful adjunct to every technical 

 school. It was not indicated in the original scheme of the Institute, 

 but was added in 1877 through the wisdom of President Runkle, as 

 a result of the exhibition in Philadelphia of the results obtained 

 in Russia by instruction of this kind. Trade schools, for the training 

 of artisans, were never included in the scheme of President Rogers, 

 and are not now, either in America or Europe, considered suitable 

 adjuncts to so-called technical schools, although they are very desirable 

 as special and independent institutions. The original plan for the 

 Institute contemplated simply a school of the last-named kind, together 

 with provision for evening lectures, to which outsiders should be ad- 

 mitted, and which it was expected would be of benefit to artisans; and 

 also the establishment of a museum of arts, and of a society of arts 

 which should hold regular meetings and which should be the medium 

 for the communication to the public of scientific discoveries and in- 

 ventions. It may be as well to state here that the museum of arts 

 was never established except in so far as the separate departments of 

 the Institute have accumulated collections; but that the society of arts, 



