PLANS AND PROJECTS-1838-1905 487 



they devoted themselves to pure literature, would have 

 gained lasting fame ; but their interest in the questions of 

 the day was controlling, and literature, in its ordinary. 

 sense, was secondary. 



Harvard undoubtedly had the greater influence on lead 

 ing American thinkers throughout the nation, but much 

 less direct influence on the people at large outside of 

 Massachusetts. The direct influence of Yale on affairs 

 throughout the United States was far greater; it was 

 felt in all parts of the country and in every sort of enter 

 prise. Many years after my graduation I attended a 

 meeting of the Yale alumni at Washington, where a 

 Western senator, on taking the chair, gave an offhand 

 statement of the difference between the two universities. 

 i i Gentlemen, said the senator, we all know what Har 

 vard does. She fits men admirably for life in Boston 

 and its immediate neighborhood; they see little outside 

 of eastern Massachusetts and nothing outside of New 

 England; in Boston clubs they are delightful; elsewhere 

 they are intolerable. And we also know what Yale does : 

 she sends her graduates out into all parts of the land, 

 for every sort of good work, in town and country, even 

 to the remotest borders of the nation. Wherever you find 

 a Yale man you find a man who is in touch with his fellow- 

 citizens; who appreciates them and is appreciated by 

 them; who is doing a man s work and is honored for 

 doing it.&quot; 



This humorous overstatement indicates to some extent 

 the real difference between the spirit of the two uni 

 versities : the influence of Harvard being greater through 

 the men it trained to lead American thought from Boston 

 as a center; the influence of Yale being greater through 

 its graduates who were joining in the world s work in all 

 its varied forms. Yet, curiously enough, it was the utter 

 ance of a Harvard man which perhaps did most in my 

 young manhood to make me unduly depreciate literary 

 work. I was in deep sympathy with Theodore Parker, 

 both in politics and religion, and when he poured contempt 



