SCIENCE. 



FEIDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1886. 



COMMENT AND CRITICISM. 



It seems a pity that wealthy men who be- 

 queath money to colleges cannot trust the author- 

 ities to expend the legacy in the way most bene- 

 ficial to educational interests. Nearly every rich 

 man who leaves any thing to a college seems to 

 deem it essential that he indicate how it shall be 

 expended, and the channels of expenditure select- 

 ed are by no means always well chosen. While 

 Mx. Greenleaf, the Boston hermit, who recently 

 left nearly the whole of his large estate to Har- 

 vard college, made conditions that are more ra- 

 tional than usual, yet it is probably true that the 

 president and fellows of Harvard could have used 

 the five hundred thousand dollars — if it prove to 

 be so much — with more benefit to education and 

 in satisfaction of what are the more pressing wants 

 of the college, had they been untrammelled by any 

 testamentary conditions. The foundation of new 

 chairs, the increase of the salaries of poorly paid 

 instructors, the construction of some new labo- 

 ratory, — all suggest themselves as being what 

 Harvard probably needs most. The foundation 

 by Mr. Greenleaf of ten undergraduate scholar- 

 ships of an annual value of three hundred dollars 

 each, is an excellent thing ; and they will, beyond 

 a question, be the means of affording a liberal 

 education to young men who could not otherwise 

 secure it. It may be that Mr. Greenleaf has left 

 his money with fewer conditions than are now 

 reported, but in our view it would have been bet- 

 ter had he left his money without any conditions 

 at all. The president, faculty, and trustees of a 

 college are the proper persons to decide most in- 

 telligently what the institution needs most. 



advertisements. We cannot help imagining the 

 result that would ensue were it extensively ad- 

 vertised that applications were wanted for the 

 chair of history at Harvard, of physics at Colum- 

 bia, or of Latin at Yale. Without any advertise- 

 ment, a vacancy in the faculty of a leading 

 American college not long ago, called forth forty 

 applications from this country and from England, 

 many of them coming from men of eminence in 

 the scholastic world. In selecting a professor 

 from that number, the trustees were driven nearly 

 crazy, and no one can predict the result had 

 applications been solicited by advertisement. 

 Which method is the better for the institution 

 is the important question, and we have no hesi- 

 tancy in saying that we believe nothing is lost by 

 our habit of not advertising. In the case of all 

 our principal colleges, it is undoubtedly the fact 

 that the president and trustees keep their eyes 

 continually open, and when a vacancy occurs 

 they are pretty sure to know who is the best man 

 for the place ; or, in any event, they have made 

 up, unconsciously, a short list from which the 

 selection is to be made. It is to be urged, too, in 

 favor of not advertising, that governing bodies 

 thus escape the importunities of individuals in no 

 way fitted for the position to be filled, but who 

 put in an application in the hope of bettering 

 their condition. 



It very frequently occurs that among the 

 advertisements in English educational and literary 

 papers are to be found some calling for applica- 

 tions for vacant chairs in leading educational 

 institutions. Owens college, Manchester, and the 

 leading colonial universities, frequently advertise 

 in this way. As with us this never happens, the 

 practice of advertising being restricted to schools 

 and small colleges, it seems odd to read these 



No. 203. — 1886. 



The question as to the necessity or advisa- 

 bility of retaining corporal punishment in schools 

 as a means of discipline is by no means settled. 

 The majority of the authorities undoubtedly favor 

 its abolition, but a strong minority are contending 

 for its retention. At the last meeting of the 

 German- Austrian teachers' union, a vigorous de- 

 bate took place on this subject, being precipitated 

 by the report of a special committee in favor of 

 retaining corporal punishment as a last resort in 

 cases of malicious wantonness, obstinate defiance, 

 disobedience, falsehood or dishonesty. Dr. Dittes, 

 a hfelong student of pedagogy, opposed the reso- 

 lutions as embodying a great pedagogic error. He 

 said that if, as claimed, its re-introduction into 

 German schools was necessary, the logical con- 

 clusion must be that the German youth and nation 

 rank, from a moral stand-point, below the French, 



