Maech 10, 1011] 



SCIENCE 



Zll 



there has been an absence of keen competition 

 either for the lower or for the higher positions. 

 This is a necessary result of expansion, and, 

 at any rate, it is a fact. The conditions, as 

 regards competition, are very different in some 

 European countries. A young man there must 

 often serve a long apprenticeship in a very 

 poorly paid position, and can only rise out of 

 this difficult situation by overcoming keen 

 competition. Our rather tame discussions of 

 the work of our colleagues lack the keen note 

 of economic competition which is often heard 

 in European controversy. Here, we feel, there 

 is room enough for all, and on an approximate 

 equality. Here it makes comparatively little 

 diiference to a man, economically, whether his 

 scientific work is mediocre or of eminent suc- 

 cess. For while the ratio of demand to supply 

 assures him of at least a moderately good 

 position, there is nothing in the way of a very 

 fine position to spur him forward. While 

 mediocre men are better oil here than in sev- 

 eral other countries, very good men, in purely 

 academic positions, are by no means so well 

 off as elsewhere. In Great Britain, at least, 

 there is a considerable number of professor- 

 ships the financial value of which, when al- 

 lowance is made for the different purchasing 

 power of money, is fully the equivalent of 

 eight to twelve thousand dollars. The finan- 

 cial value of these posts is well known 

 throughout the kingdom, and, as they are 

 permanent establishments, and are filled, 

 when they fall vacant, in the open market, 

 they act as a very effective stimulus to pro- 

 ductivity. They act as a stimulus to a class of 

 men whom it is most of all important to 

 stimulate, and who, in our country, are sub- 

 ject to no such incentive — namely, to the men 

 of greatest ability, who have already proved 

 their power and have already achieved posi- 

 tions as good as any we have here to offer. 

 Not only a high money value, but also great 

 prestige, attaches to some of these chairs, be- 

 cause of the eminent men who have occupied 

 them in the past. We have practically noth- 

 ing to correspond to them; and this is, I be- 

 lieve, one of the great deficiencies of our 

 system. Nowhere, it would seem, is the 



punishment for idleness so light as in our 

 academic life; and nowhere is the reward of 

 productive industry so meager. I am far 

 from contending that the mere financial re- 

 ward is the sole stimulus to scientific produc- 

 tion; but these prizes not only bring great 

 financial relief; they are also the seal of suc- 

 cess. I might paraphrase what I said a few 

 sentences back by asserting that nowhere is 

 there such a lack, as in our American acad- 

 emic life, of the tangible symbols of success 

 and failure in scholarly work. 



To punish mediocrity is scarcely within our 

 power during a period of rapid expansion ; but 

 to reward proved merit is in our power. Why 

 should not a university, numbering among its 

 professors some one of the acknowledged lead- 

 ers in American productive scholarship, simply 

 double or triple his salary, at the same time 

 doing all it can to strengthen his department, 

 and thus secure to itself preeminence in that 

 particular subject among all our universities; 

 insuring, further, a continued preeminence by 

 permanently establishing this distinguished 

 chair and this thoroughly equipped depart- 

 ment? It should be possible in this way for a 

 university to attract a large share of the best 

 graduate students in this department, and thus 

 add further to the influence of the chief and 

 to the attractiveness of his position. The 

 combined prestige, influence and financial de- 

 sirability of such a position would make it a 

 prize for the competition of the ablest of the 

 younger men. There is no reason why such 

 prizes should not act as effective spurs here as 

 elsewhere. Our effort has been devoted more 

 to raising the general level of compensation 

 and attractiveness of all professorial positions 

 than to the recognition of eminent scholarly 

 and scientific success. Certainly there is 

 abundant need for raising the general level of 

 salaries to keep pace with the changing ratio 

 between money and other commodities. But 

 the reward of eminent merit is a thing apart. 



Another consequence of rapid expansion, 

 under the decentralized and rather unorgan- 

 ized conditions of our national activity, in 

 which such an interest as the educational must 

 look out for itself, has been the evolution of 



