PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESSES. Oa 
education, of which even the philologist boasts—laboratory methods; which has 
established the great underlying principle of all progress —evolution —is this de- 
partment of knowledge, I say, of so little importance that it is practically ignored 
in the requirements of a modern liberal education? Twenty-five years ago the 
classical course was the almost invariable one in our colleges; but even in those 
times I was required to learn the rudiments at least of physics, chemistry, botany, 
zoology, and geology. Now modern education has liberalized the course by mak- 
ing the larger part of the language studies compulsory, and all, or nearly all, the 
natural sciences optional! 
But the writing on the walls is so legible that he who runs may read. Yale 
College, the great exponent of the classical course, has been almost the only 
prominent college in the United States that has not gained materially in attend- 
ance during the past two years. Harvard, more liberal, does not insist upon so 
extended a study of the ancient languages, and will permit a considerable 
amount of science to be offered in their stead. Columbia College, which, until 
recently, has had requirements almost like those of Yale, has so modified its 
course that Greek is no longer demanded. To quote from its recent catalogue: 
‘*No one can obtain the degree of bachelor of arts who does not know some- 
thing of at least one ancient language, and who has not therefore looked out 
through this window upon the world of antiquity. He must know also something 
of history, something of philosophy, something of political economy, a good deal 
of English, something of mathematics, and something of at least one natural 
science. He must also have a reading knowledge of French and German.’’ It 
is refreshing to learn of one college that does require the student to leave that 
window of antiquity long enough to learn something of one natural science, of 
the laws that control the world and its inbabitants. We may be profoundly 
thankful that all the universities do not insist that we shall look out through two 
windows upon the high morality and civilization of the old Romans and Greeks. 
In thus claiming some recognition for natural sciences in the course of liberal 
arts I shall doubtless be accused of narrowness. I trust, however, if I am, that 
it will not be imputed to ignorance of the classical course. I studied, when a 
youth, Latin and Greek for the prescribed time of six years each, and have since 
learned to speak or read three or four of the modern languages. 
But I do more than claim recognition for the sciences. I claim broadly and 
emphatically that the natural sciences, any or all of them, are as valuable and as 
necessary as pure cultural studies as are the languages; that intelligent and suc- 
cessful study of them will do as much, if not more, in making the student a broad 
man, a successful man, as will the study of Latin or Greek. And they will do 
more in making himan honest man. Nowhere in all the broad field of knowledge 
will he learn better to think exactly than in the natural sciences. Nowhere will 
he be more impressed with the importance of truth for truth’s sake. 
Among the graduates of the University of Kansas, with whom I am best ac- 
quainted, there are not more than one-half who have had any training whatever 
in the natural sciences, with the exception of about ten weeks in physics and as 
many in chemistry, and perhaps a smattering of physiology. The simplest facts 
in natural history are as utterly unknown to them as is the prosody of the He- 
brew language. A little, a very little, of biological science has been absorbed in 
the reading of fiction, of history, and the newspapers. 
The simplest functions of their own bodies remain for the most part sealed 
mysteries ; the commonest laws of nature inscrutable. In fact, the ignorance of 
nature as a whole among the majority of the graduates of the so-called liberal 
colleges is usually abysmal in its profundity; Stygian in its opacity. In the 
