576 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



intellectual influences that have contributed to the formation of that 

 most attractive and valuable type called the " college-bred man " should 

 never be overlooked even by the most earnest advocate of scholarliness. 

 The traditions of the English university and of more than one fine old 

 college in this country, the atmosphere of ancient culture and public 

 service, the social and even the athletic interests, are of inestimable 

 worth. Hence it is a mistake to maintain that the activities of the 

 man who does not study are always altogether futile. In his favor it 

 is argued — and with great justice — that he may be learning to know 

 life better than he would by close attention to books; and it does not 

 take great faith to believe that some men are actually benefited by an 

 almost wholly unintellectual college life. They play on the field, they 

 manage the team and the fraternity, they sing with the glee club, they 

 write editorials for the daily and stories for the monthly, they sit and 

 chat with their smoking chums, perhaps they even read an occasional 

 book that is not in the curriculum. Still the admission that all is not 

 hopeless does not involve the belief that all is well; the meliorist still 

 stands half way between the pessimist and the optimist. Some incor- 

 rigibly cheerful observers who have discovered likable traits in the 

 American undergraduate treat with airy scorn the insinuation that he 

 is unscholarly. This is the attitude of a contemporary magazine 

 writer who, having learned that two mere college presidents (A. Law- 

 rence Lowell and Woodrow Wilson) deplore the low estate of scholar- 

 ship in our college world, proceeds to show that he knows better. He 

 finds that our undergraduates are enthusiastic (especially in sport), 

 energetic (in non-scholastic activities), honorable, and bent upon reality 

 — ergo everything is lovely. We admit these qualities and rejoice in 

 them; cest magnifique — but it is not the point. Likable qualities 

 doubtless abound in a tribe of American Indians or in a drove of 

 blooded horses; possibly they are more plentiful there than among 

 scholars or artists or successful business men. But it would be as rea- 

 sonable to pretend that such children of nature could paint a Velazquez 

 or finance a railroad as to imagine that merely likable qualities 

 can take the place of intellectual education. The point is not the charm 

 that groups of clean young men of cultured families are almost bound 

 to possess, but whether these men are developing in college in that 

 domain which is preeminently the business of the college. And this, 

 in spite of all the charming avocations, is primarily intellectual, both 

 by reason of its profession before the world and by its high duty toward 

 these young men; even though it should sacrifice social and athletic 

 activities it must be true to its profession and its calling. But there is 

 no need that it should sacrifice them ; it should retain them and vitalize 

 them intellectually. Six hours a day for study and classes is not a 

 schedule likely to lead to nervous dyspepsia; but six hours a day for 



