DANGERS AT CORNELL -1868 -1872 361 



thing could be more unjust ; I had. greatly enjoyed such 

 studies myself, had found pleasure in them since my 

 graduation, and had steadily urged them upon those who 

 had taste or capacity for them. But, as a student and as a 

 university instructor, I had noticed two things in point, 

 as many other observers had done: the first of these was 

 that very many youths who go through their Latin and 

 Greek Readers, and possibly one or two minor authors be- 

 sides, exhaust the disciplinary value of such studies, and 

 thenceforward pursue them listlessly and perfunctorily, 

 merely droning over them. On their account it seemed cer- 

 tainly far better to present some other courses of study in 

 which they could take an interest. As a matter of fact, I 

 constantly found that many young men who had been do- 

 ing half-way mental labor, which is perhaps worse than 

 none, were at once brightened and strengthened by devot- 

 ing themselves to other studies more in accordance with 

 their tastes and aims. 



But a second and very important point was that, in 

 the two colleges of which I had been an undergraduate, 

 classical studies were really hampered and discredited 

 by the fact that the minority of students who loved 

 them were constantly held back by a majority who dis- 

 liked them; and I came to the conclusion that the true 

 way to promote such studies in the United States was 

 to take off this drag as much as possible, by present- 

 ing other courses of studies which would attract those who 

 had no taste for Latin and Greek, thus leaving those who 

 had a taste for them free to carry them much farther than 

 had been customary in American universities up to that 

 time. My expectations in this respect were fully met. A 

 few years after the opening of the university, contests 

 were arranged between several of the leading colleges and 

 universities, the main subjects in the competition being 

 Latin, Greek, and mathematics; and to the confusion of 

 the gainsayers, Cornell took more first prizes in these 

 subjects than did all the older competing institutions to- 

 gether. Thenceforward the talk of our "degrading clas- 



