EVOLUTION OF THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM. 23 1 



Whatever may be our opinion as to the desira- 

 bihty of such a course for ourselves or for our sons 

 or daughters, it is impossible not to regard the 

 old-time classical course with a feeling of respect. 

 It was based on a theory of education, and its 

 promoters were loyal to this theory. If only the 

 boys for whom its pigeon-holes were arranged 

 could have been of uniform size and quality, the 

 system would have been perfect. That it was not 

 quite perfect was clearly the fault of human 

 nature, which furnished a very variable article of 

 boy for the educators to work upon, and caused 

 them to reach by uniform processes widely differ- 

 ent results. What these variations were, is well 

 known to us and needs no explanation. We know 

 that there are some boys whose natural food is the 

 Greek root. There are others whose dreams ex- 

 pand in conic sections, and whose longings for the 

 finite or the infinite always follow certain parabo- 

 loid or ellipsoid curves. There are some to whom 

 the turgid sentences of Cicero are the poetry of 

 utterance; and there are others who with none 

 of these tastes grow and blossom in the sunlight 

 of comradery, undisturbed by the harassing influ- 

 ences of books and bookish men. To all these 

 kinds of students this old-time classical course 

 brought satisfaction, and the days they spent in 

 Princeton or Harvard or Amherst were the brightest 

 of their lives. Such have rarely failed to try to 

 provide for their children the same training which 

 they found so satisfying to themselves. 



But there were other students, not less fond of 

 study, who were restless under tliese conditions. 



