292 Darwinism and Other Essays. 



ameliorative projects with conscious reference to 

 such an end, the efficiency of our university will 

 be most successfully maintained, and its prosper 

 ity most thoroughly insured. 



Next, in order to impart to our notions of re 

 form the requisite symmetry and coherence, the 

 legitimate objects of university education must be 

 clearly conceived and steadfastly borne in mind. 

 The whole duty of a university toward those who 

 are sheltered within its walls may be concisely 

 summed up in two propositions. It consists, first, 

 in stimulating the mental faculties of each stu 

 dent to varied and harmonious activity, in sup 

 plying every available instrument for sharpening 

 the perceptive powers, strengthening the judg 

 ment, and adding precision and accuracy to the 

 imagination ; secondly, in providing for all those 

 students who desire it the means of acquiring a 

 thorough elementary knowledge of any given 

 branch of science, art, or literature. In a word, 

 to teach the student how to think for himself, 

 and then to give him the material to exercise his 

 thought upon, this is the whole duty of a uni 

 versity. Into that duty the inculcation of doc 

 trines as such does not enter. The professor is 

 not fulfilling his proper function when he incon 

 tinently engages in a polemic in behalf of this or 



