Mabch 5, 1909] 



SCIENCE 



369 



the social and philosophical significance of 

 the activity to which his college studies 

 lead and upon which he wiU presently em- 

 bark. Such a treatment the group system, 

 dealing with subjects as subjects, does not 

 essay. 



It is, in other words, quite clear that 

 under modern conditions whatever breadth 

 of intelligence the boy attains — and this is, 

 I take it, mainly what is meant by culture 

 — has to be got ihrougli his activities — 

 social and individual — and not as against 

 them or in their despite. This is the fact 

 on which the elective system is based, 

 whether in the unorganized form now in 

 common use or in the organized form 

 which I am urging. So far, a common 

 argument protects both; the diversity of 

 college opportunity corresponds to the 

 diversity of social need. It can not be 

 arbitrarily abridged or reduced. Selec- 

 tion is inevitable; let it be made as eco- 

 nomically and effectively as possible. At 

 this point the cultivated man becomes ap- 

 prehensive. He fears that election dic- 

 tated by personal bent or professional need 

 may dwarf the student, mind and soul. 

 To some extent this danger will have been 

 frustrated by the common organic basis 

 which, as has been pointed out, should lie 

 below all individual selection whatsoever. 

 Beyond this, the elected studies must be so 

 handled as to avoid the reproach of nar- 

 rowness. It is in any event inevitable 

 that a rightly elected college course will 

 presage the student's practical destiny. 

 The same factors determine both— capacity 

 or bent, if he has it— otherwise, opportunity, 

 environment. In the common run of 

 cases, unless the student is a Dr. Jekyll in 

 college and a Mr. Hyde out of it, the two 

 phases will be harmonious. The business 

 and glory of the college are then, not 

 stupidly to ignore or vainly to resist the 

 vocational factor, but deliberately to de- 

 velop in advance its cultural meaning and 



possibilities. The disappointment with 

 which we now survey results is to be 

 ascribed to our failure to do this very 

 thing. 



The main difficulty in putting into 

 operation the policy I have suggested re- 

 lates to finding proper teachers. I must 

 touch this vital consideration very briefly. 

 The colleges are apt to attribute their ped- 

 agogic shortcomings to lack of teachers; I 

 attribute the lack of teachers to the peda- 

 gogic shortcomings of the colleges. Our 

 colleges have done little or nothing to de- 

 velop teachers; they have emphasized, re- 

 warded and competed for specialists. The 

 college function has been lost in the eager- 

 ness to encourage research. Now it has at 

 length been found that the two functions 

 are not identical; that men trained to do 

 the one can not equally well do the other. 

 That certain individuals may profitably 

 do both, that the college and the graduate 

 school are closely related, that they may 

 often best flourish in one institution; ali 

 this may be admitted, while still maintain- 

 ing that the crying need of our academic 

 life is for the creation on the part of col- 

 lege authorities of conditions and ideals 

 that will permit a race of college teachers 

 to grow up and to survive. 



A coUege organized along the lines above 

 laid down could, as it seems to me, claim a 

 certain degi'ee of adjustment to modem 

 life, taken as a whole and equally in refer- 

 ence to its constituent activities. I am not 

 unmindful of the fact that such college 

 organization presupposes a different type 

 of secondary school from what we now pos- 

 sess. This opens up a subject I can not 

 now discuss; but I will say this, that an 

 intelligent secondary school pedagogy, 

 such as is already struggling against col- 

 lege pressure to assert itself, may quite 

 conceivably, among other things, succeed 

 in disclosing the youth's essential affinities, 

 dealing with him, as it would, freely dur- 



