POPULAK SCIENTIFIC LECTU11ES. 



tremcs. Too poor in tKeir own possessions 

 not to bo compelled, with increasing de- 

 mands for the means of instruction, eagerly 

 to accept tlio help of tho state, and too weak 

 to resist encroachments upon their ancient 

 rights in times in which modern states at- 

 tempt to consolidate themselves, the German 

 universities have had to submit themselves 

 to tho controlling influence of tho state. 

 Owing to thin latter circumstance the decision 

 in all important university matters has in 

 principle been transferred to the state, and 

 in times of religions or political excitement 

 this supreme power has occasionally been 

 unscrupulously exerted. But in most cases 

 the states which were working out their own 

 independence were favorably disposed tow- 

 ard the universities ; they required intel- 

 ligent officials, and the fame of their coun- 

 try's university conferred a certain lustre 

 upon the government. The ruling officials 

 were, moreover, for the most part students 

 of the university ; they remained attached to 

 it. It is very remarkable how among wars 

 and political changes in the states fighting 

 with the decaying empire for the consolida- 

 tion of their young sovereignties, while 

 almost all other privileged orders were de- 

 stroyed, the universities of Germany saved a 

 far greater nucleus of their internal freedom 

 and of the most valuable side of this free- 

 dom, than in conscientious, conservative 

 England, and than in France with its wild 

 chase after freedom. 



We have retained the old conception of 

 students, as that of young men responsible 

 to themselves, striving after science of their 

 own free will, a,nd to whom it is left to 

 arrange their own plan of studies as they 

 think best. If attendance on particular lec- 

 tures was enjoined for certain callings what 

 are called " compulsory lectures" these 

 regulations were net made by the university, 

 but by the state, which was afterward to ad- 

 mit candidates to these callings. At the 

 $jur.o time the students had, and still have, 

 perfect freedom to migrate from one German 

 viniversity to another, from Dorpat to Zurich, 

 from "Vienna lo Gratz ; and in each university 

 they had freo choice among the teachers of 

 the same Bubject, without reference to their 

 position as ordinary or extraordinary pro- 

 fessors or as private docents. The students 

 are, in fact, free to acquire any part of their 

 instruction from books ; it is highly desir- 

 able that the works of great men of past 

 times should form an essential part of study. 



Outside the university there is no control 

 over tho proceedings of the students, so long 

 as they do not come in collision with the 

 guardians of public order. Beyond these 

 cases the only control to which they are sub- 

 ject is that of their colleagues, which pre- 

 vents them from doing anything which is 

 repugnant to tho feeling of honor of their 

 own body. The universities of the Middle 

 Ages formed definite close corporations, with 

 their own jurisdiction, which extended to the 

 right over life and death of their own mem- 

 bers. AB they lived lor the most part on 



foreign soil, it was necessary to have their 

 own jurisdiction, partly to protect the mem- 

 bers from tho caprices of foreign judges, 

 partly to keep up that degree of respect and 

 order, within tho society, which wns neces- 

 sary to secure tho continuation of the rights 

 of hospitality on a foreign soil ; and partly, 

 again, to settle disputes among the members. 

 In modern times the remains of this aca- 

 demic jurisdiction have bj r degrees been 

 completely transferred to the ordinary courts, 

 or will be so transferred ; but it is still nec- 

 essary to maintain certain restrictions on a 

 union of strong and spirited young men, 

 which guarantee the peace of their fellow- 

 ctudents and that of the citizens. In cases 

 of collision this is the object of the disciplin- 

 ary power of the university authorities. This 

 object, however, must be mainly attained by 

 the sense of honor of the students ; and it 

 must be considered fortunate that German 

 students have retained a vivid sense of cor- 

 porate union, and of what is intimately con- 

 nected therewith, a requirement of honorable 

 behavior in the individual. I am by no 

 means prepared to defend every individual 

 regulation in the Codex of Students' Honor ; 

 there are many Middle Age remains a7cong 

 them which were better swept away ; but 

 that can only be done by the students thorn- 

 selves. 



For most foreigners the uncontrolled free- 

 dom of Gentian students is a subject of PS- 

 tonishment ; the more so as it is usually 

 Borne obvious excrescences of this freedom 

 which first meet their ej'es ; they are minblo 

 to understand how young men can be so left 

 to themselves without the greatest detriment. 

 The German looks back to his student life na 

 to his golden age ; our literature and our 

 pootry are fall of expressions of this feeling. 

 Nothing of this kind is but even faintly sug- 

 gested in the literature of other European 

 peoples. The German student alone has 

 this perfect joy in the time, in which, in the 

 first delight in. youthful responsibility, and 

 freed more immediately from having to work 

 for extraneous interests, he can devote him- 

 self to the task of striving after the best i:nd 

 noblest which the human race has hitherto 

 been able to attain in knowledge and in spec- 

 .ulation, closely joined in friendly rivalry 

 with a large body of associates of similar 

 aspirations, and in daily mental iiitcrcoursa 

 with teachers from whom he learns some- 

 thing of the workings of tho thoughts of -in- 

 dependent minds. 



When I think of my own student, life, and 

 of the impression which a man like Johannes 

 Muller, tho physiologist, made upon us, I 

 Ttrmit place a very high value upon this lat- 

 ter point. Any one who has onco como in 

 contact with one or more men of the first 

 rank must have had his whole mental stand- 

 ard altered for tho rest of his life. Such in- 

 tercourse is, moreover, the most interesting 

 that life can offer. 



You, my younger friends, have received in 

 this freedom of the German students a costly 

 and valuable inheritance of preceding gn- 



