The Days of a Man 



1:1868 



Autocracy 

 in the 

 German 

 universitv 



Sectarian 

 colleges 



chosen by his fellows and has practically no authority, 

 whatever slight control he does exercise being dele- 

 gated by his colleagues. These remarks of mine 

 came somehow to the notice of Dr. Rudolf Virchow, 

 the distinguished physiologist. Later, to one of 

 my audience. Dr. H. Rushton Fairclough, then at 

 work at the University of Berlin, Virchow said: 



You tell Dr. Jordan that I think he is mistaken. No greater 

 autocracy exists in education anywhere than in the Prussian 

 universities. But arbitrary power is vested in the Minister 

 of Public Instruction, not in the Rector, who is mainly an 

 honorary figure. Each professor is regarded as an agent of 

 the government. 



Through most of the last century, American 

 colleges had served as agents for the spread of 

 denominational religion. Indeed, it was not an 

 uncommon thing for college presidents to plead that 

 if you let your college die, your church would die, 

 too. But as many of the collegiate institutions were 

 quite imperfectly endowed, they were not able to 

 maintain adequate standards; and while they 

 boasted that their small numbers permitted close 

 contact between students and professors and so 

 brought the young people directly under moral and 

 religious influence, the very opposite was often the 

 case. When teachers are few, ill trained, ill paid, 

 and worn out, their personal hold over youth may 

 be very slight. Dependence on fees, moreover, 

 tended to laxity in regard to both scholarship and 

 behavior, for to dismiss even a single student meant 

 the loss of needed money. And for the purpose of 

 advertising, many weak institutions boasted of their 

 attendance, as though relative worth could be 

 measured by enrollment merely. Occasionally, also, 

 n 86 3 



