Mat 2, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



657 



chant, architect, banker, scientist or play- 

 wright; a college president is sure to fail 

 in much that is expected of him unless he is 

 a public speaker of considerable power. 



One of the essential qualifications of the 

 college president I have left until the last ; 

 it is possibly the rarest and most important 

 of all. He must get on with men and 

 women, and somehow keep them working 

 harmoniously and enthusiastically for the 

 really important things in the life of the 

 institution. He must needs be a spiritual 

 force. 



This power of leadership is made up of 

 many elements. The first and last is pa- 

 tience. Another is a catholic interest and 

 sympathy that enables him quickly to get 

 the viewpoint of other men. Another is 

 primary devotion to things bigger than 

 himself, for a self-seeking man can not re- 

 tain leadership in a college community. 

 Another is a sense of his own limitations, 

 for conceit repels. Conceit, however, is not 

 likely to survive long after one attempts 

 all that is expected of him as a college 

 president. 



Consider this necessity for getting on 

 with men, retaining their confidence and 

 loyalty, yet yielding no principle. He must 

 command the support of trustees for poli- 

 cies they do not understand; he must deal 

 justly with both factions of a faculty to 

 the probable satisfaction of neither ; he 

 must keep the faculty happy without the 

 desired salaries, staff and appropriations; 

 he must deny the students what seem to 

 them the chief desires of their hearts; he 

 must send boys home and tell their parents 

 that they are not equal to other men's chil- 

 dren ; he must defer the ambitious projects 

 of citizens, in devotion to ideals the city 

 can not share; he must use the alumni in 

 making changes which the alumni naturally 

 oppose; he must bring benefactors close to 

 the college, while denying them the privi- 



lege of controlling it ; he must attack tradi- 

 tion among worshipers of tradition; he 

 must face opposition whether he performs 

 or fails to perform any particular act; he 

 must spend more time than he has, in ex- 

 plaining his conduct, or be condemned for 

 not explaining. All these, and many more, 

 are among the obligations of the presidency. 



The question what should be expected of 

 a college president I have not ventured to 

 discuss. I have confined myself to condi- 

 tions as I have found them in one hundred 

 of our better institutions. I now venture 

 to suggest that the trouble is not chiefly 

 with the men, but with the post. Trustees 

 do not, as a rule, select the least competent 

 persons available; but they offer to men 

 who have proved competent within a rea- 

 sonable scope an almost impossible array of 

 tasks. There are five hundred college presi- 

 dencies, and not enough men to go around, 

 as the office has evolved in the United 

 States. There is something in the remark 

 that a college president is "neither fish, nor 

 fiesh, nor good red herring." And there 

 is something more than humor in the charge 

 that a college president is, " ex-officio, a 

 liar and a coward." A person in public 

 office, attempting the impossible, is liable 

 to every kind of criticism. 



I venture the further suggestion that the 

 remedy is not to curb the power of the 

 president, while continuing to expect too 

 much ; it will not help matters to encumber 

 executive action with complications and 

 delays, while leaving upon the oifice more 

 duties than a man could meet even with the 

 power of a despot. The college president 

 is already regarded as a poor risk by life 

 insurance companies. 



It may be best to assign certain of the 

 functions enumerated above to other offi- 

 cers. The duty of spiritual leadership, his- 

 torically the most important of the func- 

 tions of the college president in America, 



