MSrfiS?'}  A  Counsel  °f  Perfection.  427 
institutions,  but  to  require  of  them  steady  improvement  and  con- 
stant advance  in  methods  and  results. 
The  growing  interest  and  general  demand  for  the  mill  tax  for 
the  support  of  higher  education  are  shown  in  recent  reports,  that 
for  Virginia  by  Professor  Charles  D.  Maphis,  of  the  University  of 
Virginia ;  that  for  Texas  by  Professor  Arthur  Lef evre,  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Texas ;  and  that  for  Ohio  by  President  Alston  Ellis,  of 
Ohio  University.  That  for  Virginia  is  the  report  made  by  a  com- 
mission to  devise  a  systematic  method  to  meet  the  demands  of  higher 
educational  institutions,  to  prevent  educational  duplication  and 
consequent  financial  waste,  and  to  devise  stable  and  systematic 
methods  for  the  maintenance,  management  and  expansion  of  these 
institutions.  The  report  recommends  for  Virginia  one  medical 
school,  one  polytechnic  school,  and  one  university,  and  a  permanent 
education  commission  with  power  to  cooperate  with  the  governing 
bodies  of  all  institutions  of  higher  education  in  Virginia  through 
representatives. 
Professor  Maphis  has  'collected  and  printed  the  opinions  of 
representatives  of  the  universities  of  California,  Wisconsin,  North 
Dakota,  Minnesota,  Kentucky,  Michigan,  Iowa,  Illinois,  and  of  the 
experts  of  the  Carnegie  Institute  for  the  Advancement  of  Education, 
of  New  York,  and  of  the  Bureau  of  Education  of  Washington. 
Based  on  these  and  other  evidence,  Virginia  is  advised  to  adopt 
a  mill  tax  for  higher  education  and  with  and  through  it  to  reor- 
ganize its  institutions  of  higher  education  so  that  they  may  grow 
with  the  growth  of  the  state  and  with  its  income  and  make  return 
in  increased  work  for  the  state  and  its  people. 
In  the  college  and  university  council  of  Pennsylvania  the  state 
has  a  capital  piece  of  machinery  for  the  distribution  of  the  proceeds 
of  a  state  mill  tax  for  higher  education.  In  that  council  there  are 
the  representatives  of  the  state,  the  governor,  the  attorney  general, 
and  the  superintendent  of  public  instruction,  and  of  the  universities, 
Pennsylvania,  Pittsburgh,  Lehigh  and  Bucknell,  and  of  the  colleges, 
Washington- Jefferson,  State,  Franklin  &  Marshall,  and  an  eminent 
citizen  representing  the  Catholic  institutions  of  higher  education. 
With  such  men  that  council  could  be  safely  entrusted  with  power 
to  make  a  distribution  of  any  sum  raised  by  a  mill  tax,  so  that  it  can 
be  distributed  to  the  greatest  advantage  of  all  the  institutions  of 
higher  education  in  Pennsylvania. 
The  last  report  of  the  Superintendent  of  Education  gives  a  list 
of  six  universities,  twenty-nine  colleges,  four  law  schools,  four 
