THE "MERGER" CONTROVERSY 389 



them have been made not to trustees as bodies separate from the institution 

 as a whole, but with the tacit supposition that the faculties were integral 

 parts of the structure, able to make themselves felt in the important questions 

 of education. To assume that the one board, because it has the legal power, 

 may suppress or transfer or otherwise profoundly alter the constitution, is to 

 change the position of these schools in our societies. If these self-renewing 

 bodies of business men are to be the sole keepers and administrators of these 

 trusts, stolidly uninfluenced by the protests of the other and more vitally 

 important estates, the Faculty and the Alumni, it cannot be expected that 

 they will hereafter command the confidence of those who would send their 

 good purposes on from generation to generation. 



I have thus briefly, and most inadequately, suggested some of the consid- 

 erations which are to be discussed in the debate which is before us. You see 

 that they go far and concern questions of great pith and moment. ... I 

 beg of you and all the participants herein that the debate be kept to the high 

 level of its importance. We need always have in mind the fact that those 

 who are opposed to us are ardent, even as we, for the betterment of the 

 institutions which they love even as we love them. . . . We are brethren, 

 strong for the betterment of our common house: let us remember that we 

 have in the end to dwell together under its roof and abide in its memories. 

 This counsel of perfection need not lessen, however, the energy with which 

 we resist to the uttermost what we hold to be evil. 



The controversy which followed the "merger" proposition 

 was bitter and determined, for upon its result Mr. Shaler be- 

 lieved hung the life or death of the School which he had labored 

 so earnestly to advance. It called forth on his part a vast ex- 

 penditure of force and emotion ; for when he once espoused a 

 cause he threw himself into it with passionate devotion. There 

 is no doubt that this trying episode, this opposition to his most 

 cherished and disinterested schemes for the development of 

 the Lawrence Scientific School, told seriously upon his health. 

 While petty squabblings bored him, a good big fight aroused all 

 the powers of his mind ; bold and resourceful in debate, he fought 

 his battles with tremendous and unflagging verve. In these 

 intellectual encounters, mercilessly hard as he hit his opponents, 

 he hit fair, and for this reason, although in the course of his life 

 he had many antagonists, he had few enemies, his great-hearted 

 manliness bearing down the hostility disagreement usually 



