JuLy 18, 1912] 
NATURE 
519 
The whole system is, in fact, capable of much de- 
velopment; for younger lecturers and for older and 
proved students, a field of useful labour is here 
opened. 
The absence of all unifying personal guidance of 
the student’s course of study is not infrequently felt 
to be a weakness in German university life, yet few 
people wish for definite or printed curricula, even if 
these should be only for the sake of suggestion. Full 
“academic freedom"’ proves, as a matter of fact, a 
benefit only to students of much intelligence and firm 
character. It is, in fact, only the more distinguished 
who rise; the ordinary individuals fall back. Some 
now declare that the lecture system has lived its day 
and that a method in which dialogue should pre- 
dominate ought to take its place; others—and such a 
conspicuous thinker as the late Friedrich Paulsen was 
among their number—regard the lecture system as 
the most effective, to be surpassed and replaced by 
no other. 
On the whole it is not strange that the demand 
should at intervals have arisen for a special ** academic 
pedagogy”’ as a new science. In an age when all 
questions of pre-university education are carefully con- 
sidered and measures taken in accordance, indifference 
ought not to prevail toward the succeeding years and 
their educational claims. The academic chair also 
claims its principles and regulations. There should 
be no shrinking from a discussion of the problem, for 
the psychology of the student period deserves an ex- 
haustive observation which it has not yet received. 
If it was already hard enough for the freshman to 
gain a footing in the new mental atmosphere, to 
understand the abstract language, and to follow the 
closer line of thought; and if it was at the same time 
not exactly easy for the professor to find the right 
way of fascinating the cleverer spirits without repell- 
ing the weaker, the difficulty has become still greater 
for both parties, because pupils have been admitted 
to the university, not only from the classical schools 
(humanistischen Gymnasien), but also indiscriminately 
from the various schools which have a nine years’ 
curriculum. 
Now, it had never been intended that the modern 
and mixed schools should regard themselves thence- 
forward chiefly as preliminary stages to the univer- 
sity. It was expected that only those few pupils from 
them who felt a special call to higher scientific studies 
would take advantage of the new privilege, while the 
majority would devote themselves as before to more 
everyday ends. It is, however, undeniable that a much 
greater percentage of the students in these more prac- 
tical institutions is streaming into the university than 
is desirable; and, what is worse, they enter, not for 
the sake of working in those subjects for which they 
had been chiefly trained (which were already free to 
them in the university), but in almost all other sub- 
jects as well, with the exception perhaps of theology. 
The allurement of the new liberty has clearly taken 
effect here, but just as clearly also the idea of social 
distinction which accompanies the academic calling. 
For in Germany, particular industrial districts ex- 
cepted, university men are still regarded socially as an 
upper class, to which, in the eyes of the public, only 
the nobility, the official class, and perhaps the most 
distinguished artists are superior. 
Convincing statistics of the result of the university 
work of students from modern schools in comparison 
with that of students from classical schools are at 
present not attainable. Great importance is not laid 
on figures and average results; the examinations, 
which must, after all, be the chief means of informa- 
tion, are affected by many different factors which 
cannot be weighed and measured, the addiction of the 
examiners to the method in which they themselves 
NO. 2229, vor. 89] 
were schooled being possibly one of them. On the 
whole, however, judging from a number of personal 
opinions, the results certainly do not seem to denote 
a triumph for the modern schools. From the classical 
schools, also, it is true, the number of those is not 
small whose mental capacity does not mark them for 
scientific study; and on the other side there are 
always to be found among the students from the 
modern schools individuals of conspicuous talent and 
the highest aspirations who do creditable work in each 
subject. 
The increase in the number of foreigners at the 
German universities steadily continues, but has re- 
cently had to be checked. Too many individuals of 
doubtful education, and frequently also leading very 
questionable lives, forced themselves in, particularly 
from the eastern European countries, and took up the 
space and the best seats at the practical exercises, 
crowding aside the German students. Visitors from 
America or England will scarcely be likely to find the 
recent measures of restriction an obstacle; their pre- 
vious education is often excellent. It is, of course, 
the natural and desirable thing that only those 
students of a nation should be sent abroad who have 
distinguished themselves above the average. The 
dark sides of the German university system above 
mentioned apply but little to such; the lectures of the 
most distinguished vrofessors are precisely what they 
have come for, and the arrangement of their studies 
can be confidently left to themselves. 
As is only natural, the various branches of learning 
differentiate themselves more and more from one 
another, and thus, through the splitting up of depart- 
ments already existing and through the extension of 
study over quite new fields, new chairs become needed. 
Of greater interest for foreign readers are perhaps 
the movements which are going on in the German 
student world. To put it briefly, the students’ clubs 
(Corps, Landsmannschaften, &c.) of the older form 
are losing ground to those which are founded on 
newer principles. The essential basis of the older 
corporations was, and is, the firm formation of a 
powerful community for the cultivation of boldness 
and courage, steadfast friendship, social and light- 
hearted enjoyment of youth; in practice, however, this 
is combined with considerable love of fighting and 
drinking, preservation of outworn ceremonies, and 
thoughtless pursuit of pleasure. Many of these bodies 
have at present but few members. At the same time 
the spirit which inspired them is by no means dead, 
and in certain universities, chiefly smaller ones, their 
characteristic way of life remains to this day. More 
prosperous, however, are the scientific societies, the 
athletic organisations, and those based on national, 
ethical, or Christian principles. And it is in keeping 
with the spirit of the time as well as with the 
academic tradition that the societies of similar aims 
at the various universities bind themselves together 
into united bodies. i a 
[An addendum to the article shows the distribution 
of students among the German universities, and from 
it are taken the numbers given below for the year 
IgIo-1I :— 
Universities IQIO-It Universities 1g10-11 
Berlin 0686 Kiel 1439 
Ronn 3846 Konigsberg 1387 
Breslau 2454 Leipzig 49c¢0 
Erlangen ... ie} 8 Marburg 1981 
Freiburg. ... 2246 Munich 6905 
Giessen 1243 Miinster 2047 
Gottingen ... 2233 Rostock... os 816 
Greifswald 048 Strassburg .. ... 2067 
Halle 2661 Tiibingen ... 1883 
Heidelberg 2008 Wiirzburg ... 1425 
Jena 1637 
54,823 
