Slichter—-Recent Criticism of American Scholarship. 11 
soil. We are too prejudiced to accept such a proposition even 
if proved. ^Nevertheless, may we not agree that, after all, some 
of our ideals have been fallacious ? Have we not gone too much 
on the principle that every one must receive a higher educa¬ 
tion, whether he will or not? If in preparation for such an 
education it is too difficult or too inconvenient to master Greek 
and Latin, have we not accepted too eagerly such things as 
civics and literary readings as equivalents ? Is it not true that 
American colleges and universities have cared too much for 
numbers and for athletic success ? It is not too much democ¬ 
racy that makes it relatively easy for colleges to get buildings ’ 
and so hard to get income, both from individuals and from the 
state ? Is it not true that too much is made of newspaper pub¬ 
licity and too little of scholarly reputation ? 
Answers to these questions show that Jussieu’s criticisms are 
not without some force. Yet it seems to me that there is no in¬ 
dication that democracy is necessarily plebeian. The expe¬ 
rience of Greece and even of our own country seems to show 
that democracy admits of sufficient refinement and that the 
evils that the critic notes are not to be considered as essential 
but merely incidental to certain phases of development. There 
are also a number of facts of a contrary character to those 
sought out by Jussieu. It is encouraging to know that the 
people of Wisconsin have erected as their noblest public build¬ 
ing the Historical Library, a home for advanced scholarship 
and research. It also is significant that as a class the state 
universities, founded and endowed directly by the people, have 
advanced more in investigative scholarship during the past 
decade than in any other line of their growth. 
There are some things inherent in democracy which should 
naturally tend to foster the higher interests of science. There 
are supposed to be, in republican institutions, no artificial re¬ 
straints to hold down and keep obscure the exceptional man, 
the man of genius, no matter how obscure his origin. As 
Professor Simon Uewcomb has well said: “The whole historv 
e/ 
of modern progress, whether in science or industry, is a his¬ 
tory of the efforts of exceptional men.” .... “The 
leader in science, the divinely inspired explorer of nature— 
