November 24, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



695 



munication between the two governing 

 boards lias given rise within the faculty to 

 a psychasthenia universitatis. This psy- 

 chosis has been produced by the lack of 

 opportunity to discuss the larger problems 

 of the university, and as always happens to 

 those suffering from forms of mental re- 

 pressions, or of living in cramped intellec- 

 tual quarters, the tendency to indulge in 

 petty recriminations and to be resentful of 

 criticism has occasionally assumed alarm- 

 ing proportions with some of the character- 

 istics of an epidemic. If it were possible 

 to adopt the treatment generally indicated 

 in psychoses of this nature, a cure could 

 readily be effected by getting rid of the 

 relatives and asking for advice from disin- 

 terested outsiders competent to express an 

 opinion on university problems. Unfor- 

 tunately, complications are apt to arise. 

 Trustees, unaccustomed to the discussion of 

 academic problems, will, when confronted 

 by a crisis, feel the importance of imme- 

 diate action. The faculty naturally resents 

 what it considers to be an encroachment 

 upon its prerogatives, and well-grounded 

 serious misgivings as to the results that will 

 probably follow the interference of laymen 

 in the struggle for the establishment and 

 maintenance of university ideals are sure 

 to arise. 



At present, trustees see things through 

 a glass very darkly, as they themselves are 

 generally strong partisans of institutions 

 and lack not only a special knowledge of 

 university problems, but are often deficient 

 in a true sense of perspective. The choice 

 of trustees in our eastern universities in a 

 large number of instances is not deter- 

 mined by the individual's personal quali- 

 fications for the position, nor by his special 

 knowledge of university problems. The 

 selection depends frequently upon the par- 

 tisanship of the candidate reflected in the 

 uncritical attitude of devotion to his alma 



mater and a certain lack of discrimination, 

 often a product of the hysterical domina- 

 tion of a phase of the college spirit which 

 produces a hypo-sensitiveness in detecting 

 the defects of his own and a corresponding 

 degree of hyper-sensitiveness for picking 

 out those of other institutions. This is one 

 of the reasons why the information acquired 

 by trustees from their friends in the fac- 

 ulty in regard to the relative value of work 

 done in the different departments of the 

 university often has about the same in- 

 trinsic worth when introduced as evidence 

 as a Teutonic valuation of French scholar- 

 ship, or a stand-patter's attitude towards 

 the subject of tariff reform. 



The trustees' lack of a clear understand- 

 ing of the nature of university problems 

 and their failure to cooperate with the fac- 

 ulty in the formulation of a definite policy 

 for the development of the institution, is a 

 very serious tactical error. The public, 

 partly through ignorance, and partly 

 through an instinctive feeling of distrust, 

 caused by the silence of the administration 

 as to the existence of any general plan for 

 the development of the university, does not 

 have any great degree of confidence that 

 funds contributed are always expended to 

 the best advantage. 



A public statement of policy would avert 

 another danger always imminent in the 

 administration of university affairs. The 

 acceptance of benefactions with attending 

 conditions may be a curse and not a bless- 

 ing. The American university has reached 

 a stage in its development when it is no 

 longer to be considered as a debtor to any 

 public-minded, generous citizen who con- 

 tributes to its financial support. The atti- 

 tude passively assumed by trustees, that the 

 policy determining the growth of the insti- 

 tution depends upon the sums of money 

 contributed for maintenance, is not only 



