Mabch 11, 1910] 



SCIENCE' 



371 



to let others speak. Professor Lovejoy^ 

 draws attention to the ethical obligations 

 involved toward those men who very nat- 

 urally were looking forward in the imme- 

 diate future to a retirement under the pro- 

 vision so unexpectedly withdrawn. It must 

 be evident that the expectations thus 

 aroused carry with them every essential 

 factor of an implied contract. The with- 

 drawal of this right affects at once a group 

 of men who were looking forward to taking 

 advantage of its arrangements within the 

 next five or ten years, and affects them in 

 a manner so particularly unfortunate that 

 they need not hesitate to refer to this per- 

 sonal aspect of the situation. But the yet 

 more serious side of this sudden withdrawal 

 is that it reflects so unfavorably upon the 

 foundation itself. One of the prominent 

 arguments used by the foundation in estab- 

 lishing its provisions was that the professor 

 could look far ahead and with absolute 

 security to the benefit thus to be conferred. 

 An institution that radically changes the 

 essential scope of its purpose within four 

 years is not suggestive of security. It will 

 be extremely difficult, even if the present 

 problem is reconsidered and more satisfac- 

 torily solved, to assure professors that other 

 provisions will not be withdrawn and with 

 no more convincing reasons. Nor can any 

 refuge be taken in the fact that the founda- 

 tion reserved to itself the power to change 

 its rules. Every reasonable understanding 

 of that proviso would interpret it to refer 

 to minor changes in administration, not to 

 a radical and far-reaching abandonment of 

 a distinct and explicit provision. On this 

 point the Evening Post, of February 28, 

 .leaves nothing to be said, unless it be to 

 indicate that Professor Lovejoj'- does not 

 stand alone in his fear that "a body which 

 at a moment's notice abandons one of the 

 two purposes constituting its proclaimed 

 raison d'etre is equally likely to modify 

 ^Nation, February 3. 



the other to any assignable degree." The 

 editorial concludes thus: 



Dr. Pritehett says that "the expectation that 

 this rule would be taken advantage of almost 

 wholly on the ground of disabilities has proved 

 to be ill-founded"; but if this is meant as a 

 defence against the charge of want of good faith, 

 it betrays a misty notion of the nature of moral 

 obligations. If disability was meant to be the 

 basis from the beginning, nothing would have been 

 easier tnan to say so; if it was not, then it was 

 absolutely honorable, right and proper for any 

 man to avail himself of the retiring allowance 

 offered him without reference to any question of 

 disability. If an error was made in the first 

 place, rectify it by all means; but first stand by 

 the consequences of your error, to the extent 

 demanded by the ordinary standards of honorable 

 conduct between man and man. An absolutely 

 essential requirement of a properly constituted 

 university pension system is that it shall not 

 place upon the professor any sense of obligation 

 other than what is inevitable and inherent in 

 such a system; he must feel that he has earned 

 his pension, just as he has earned his salary, by 

 his past services. If to retire under a pension 

 is to mean to retire under a censorship, the 

 Carnegie Foundation may conduce to the material 

 comfort, but will certainly not conduce to the 

 dignity or the self-respect of the profession of 

 university teaching. And, to come back to the 

 main point, the homely obligation of fulfilling in 

 a reasonable measure substantial expectations 

 that have been raised by one's own declared 

 intentions is a duty antecedent even to the high 

 purposes to which the Carnegie Foundation is 

 dedicated. 



The immediate ob.ject of endeavor may 

 well be to bring to the attention of the 

 trustees, in as convincing a manner as pos- 

 sible, the categorical imperative of the obli- 

 gation which they have assiuned. There is 

 much to be said for the view that this obli- 

 gation extends to aU institutions that have 

 already become accredited to the founda- 

 tion. But moral obligations are not incom- 

 patible with a reasonable regard for the 

 practical situation. If the foundation 

 could be prevailed upon to adopt in place 

 of the measure now upon its records, an 



