The Higher Learning In America:A Memorandum On the Conduct of Universities By Business Men

by Thorstein Veblen

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The Higher Learning In America: Unhappily, this is not all that seemsnecessary to plead in extenuation ofrecurrent infirmities. Circumstances, chiefly ofa personal incidence, have repeatedlydelayed publication beyond what the run ofevents at large would have indicated as apropitious date; and the same circumstanceshave also enjoined a severer and morerepressive curtailment in the available data. Itmay not be out of place, therefore, to indicatein the most summary fashion what has beenthe nature of these fortuitous hindrances.

A Memorandum On the Conduct ofUniversities By Business Menby Thorstein Veblen

1918

PREFACEIt is something more than a dozen years

since the following observations on Americanacademic life were first assembled in writtenform. In the meantime changes of one kindand another have occurred, although notsuch as to alter the course of policy which hasguided American universities. Lines of policywhich were once considered to be tentativeand provisional have since then passed intosettled usage. This altered and more stablestate of the subject matter has permitted arevision to avoid detailed documentation ofmatters that have become commonplace, withsome resulting economy of space andargument. But, unhappily, revision andabridgment carries its own penalties, in theway of a more fragmentary presentation anda more repetitious conduct of the argument;so that it becomes necessary to bespeak adegree of indulgence on that ground.

In its earlier formulation, the argumentnecessarily drew largely on first-handobservation of the conduct of affairs atChicago, under the administration of its firstpresident. As is well known, the firstpresident's share in the management of theuniversity was intimate, masterful andpervasive, in a very high degree; so much sothat no secure line of demarcation could bedrawn between the administration's policyand the president's personal ruling. It is true,salient features of academic policy whichmany observers at that time were inclined tocredit to the proclivities of Chicago's firstpresident, have in the later course of thingsproved to belong to the impersonal essenceof the case; having been approved by themembers of the craft, and so having passed

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into general usage without abatement. Yet,at the time, the share of the Great Pioneer inreshaping American academic policy couldscarcely have been handled in a detachedway, as an impersonal phenomenon of theunfolding historical sequence. The personalnote was, in fact, very greatly in evidence.

temperate survey should presumably havebeen altogether timely.

But fortuitous circumstances againintervened, such as made it seem the part ofinsight and sobriety again to deferpublication, until the colour of an irrelevantpersonal equation should again have hadtime to fade into the background. With thefurther passage of time, it is hoped that nofortuitous shadow will now cloud the issue inany such degree as to detract at all sensiblyfrom whatever value this account of eventsand their causes may have.

And just then, presently, that StrongMan's life was brought to a close. So that itwould unavoidably have seemed a breach ofdecorum to let these observations seek ahearing at that time, even after anypracticable revision and excision which filialpiety would enjoin. Under the rule of Nihil nisibonum, there seemed nothing for it but alarge reticence.

This allusion to incidents which have nomaterial bearing on the inquiry may tolerantlybe allowed, as going to account for a sparinguse of local information and, it is hoped, toextenuate a degree of reserve and reticencetouching divers intimate details of executivepolicy.

But swiftly, with the passage of years,events proved that much of what hadappeared to be personal to the Great Pioneerwas in reality intrinsic to the historicalmovement; so that the innovations presentlylost their personal colour, and so wentimpersonally to augment the grand total ofhuman achievement at large. Meanwhilegeneral interest in the topic had nowiseabated. Indeed, discussion of the academicsituation was running high and in largevolume, and much of it was taking such a turn-controversial, reproachful, hortatory,acrimonious -- that anything in the way of a

It goes without saying that the manybooks, papers and addresses brought out onthe academic situation have had their sharein shaping the essay. More particularly havethese various expressions of opinion andconcern made it possible to take many thingsfor granted, as matter of common notoriety,that would have appeared to requiredocumentation a dozen or fifteen years ago,as lying at that time still in the field of surmise

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and forecast. Much, perhaps the greater bulk,of the printed matter issued on this head inthe interval has, it is true, been of a hortatoryor eloquently optimistic nature, and maytherefore be left on one side. But theacademic situation has also been receivingsome considerable attention with a view togetting an insight into what is going forward.One and another of these writers to whomthe present essay is in debt will be fondreferred to by name in the pages which moreparticularly lean on their support; and the likeis true for various utterances by men inauthority that have been drawn on forillustrative expressions. But a narrow scrutinywould doubtless make it appear that theunacknowledged indebtedness greatlyexceeds what so is accredited and accountedfor. That such is the case must not be takenas showing intentional neglect of the duecourtesies.

appears to be no call for a change in thegeneral argument, and it has not beendisturbed since the earlier date, which isaccordingly left as it stands.

June 1918.

CHAPTER ONEIntroductory: The Place of theUniversity in Modern Life

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In any known civilization there will befound something in the way of esotericknowledge. This body of knowledge will varycharacteristically from one culture to another,differing both in content and in respect of thecanons of truth and reality relied on by itsadepts. But there is this common trait runningthrough all civilizations, as touches this rangeof esoteric knowledge, that it is in all casesheld, more or less closely, in the keeping of aselect body of adepts or specialists --scientists, scholars, savants, clerks, priests,shamans, medicinemen -whateverdesignation may best fit the given case.

March 1916.In the course of the past two years,

while the manuscript has been lying in waitfor the printer, a new situation has beenforcing itself on the attention of men whocontinue to take an interest in theuniversities. On this provocation a fewparagraphs have been added, at the end ofthe introductory chapter. Otherwise there

In the apprehension of the given societywithin which any such body of knowledge isfound it will also be found that the knowledge

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in question is rated as an article of greatintrinsic value, in some way a matter of moresubstantial consequence than any or all ofthe material achievements or possessions ofthe community. It may take shape as asystem of magic or of religious beliefs, ofmythology, theology, philosophy or science.But whatever shape it falls into in the givencase, it makes up the substantial core of thecivilization in which it is found, and it is felt togive character and distinction to thatcivilization.

the most mature, system of knowledge. Itshould by no means be an insuperably difficultmatter to show that this "higher learning" ofthe modern world, the current body of scienceand scholarship, also holds its place on such atenure of use and wont, that it has grownand shifted in point of content, aims andmethods in response to the changes in habitsof life that have passed over the Westernpeoples during the period of its growth andascendancy. Nor should it be embarrassinglydifficult to reach the persuasion that thisprocess of change and supersession in thescope and method of knowledge is stilleffectually at work, in a like response toinstitutional changes that still areincontinently going forward.(1*)

In the apprehension of the group inwhose life and esteem it lives and takeseffect, this esoteric knowledge is taken toembody a systematization of fundamentaland eternal truth; although it is evident toany outsider that it will take its character andits scope and method from the habits of life ofthe group, from the institutions with which itis bound in a web of give and take. Such ismanifestly the case in all the historic phasesof civilization, as well as in all thosecontemporary cultures that are sufficientlyremote from our everyday interests to admitof their being seen in adequate perspective. Apassably dispassionate inquiry into the placewhich modern learning holds in moderncivilization will show that such is also the caseof this latest, and in the mind of its keepers

To the adepts who are occupied with thisesoteric knowledge, the scientists andscholars on whom its keeping devolves, thematter will of course not appear in just thatlight; more particularly so far as regards thatspecial segment of the field of knowledgewith the keeping and cultivation of which theymay, each and several, be occupied. They are,each and several, engaged on the perfectingand conservation of a special line of inquiry,the objective end of which, in the view of itsadepts, will necessarily be the final andirreducible truth as touches matters within its

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scope. But, seen in perspective, these adeptsare themselves to be taken as creatures ofhabit, creatures of that particular manner ofgroup life out of which their preconceptions inmatters of knowledge, and the manner oftheir interest in the run of inquiry, havesprung. So that the terms of finality that willsatisfy the adepts are also a consequence ofhabituation, and they are to be taken asconclusive only because and in so far as theyare consonant with the discipline ofhabituation enforced by that manner of grouplife that has induced in these adepts theirparticular frame of mind.

organization. Distinctive and dominant amongthe constituent factors of this current schemeof use and wont is the pursuit of business,with the outlook and predilections which thatpursuit implies. Therefore any inquiry into theeffect which recent institutional changes mayhave upon the pursuit of the higher learningwill necessarily be taken up in a peculiardegree with the consequences which anhabitual pursuit of business in modern timeshas had for the ideals, aims and methods ofthe scholars and schools devoted to thehigher learning.

The Higher Learning as currentlycultivated by the scholars and scientists ofthe Western civilization differs not genericallyfrom the esoteric knowledge purveyed byspecialists in other civilizations, elsewhereand in other times. It engages the samegeneral range of aptitudes and capacities,meets the same range of human wants, andgrows out of the same impulsive propensitiesof human nature. Its scope and method aredifferent from what has seemed good in othercultural situations, and its tenets and canonsare so far peculiar as to give it a specificcharacter different from these others; but inthe main this specific character is due to adifferent distribution of emphasis among thesame general range of native gifts that have

Perhaps at a farther remove than manyother current phenomena, but none the lesseffectually for that, the higher learning takesits character from the manner of life enforcedon the group by the circumstances in which itis placed. These constraining circumstancesthat so condition the scope and method oflearning are primarily, and perhaps mostcogently, the conditions imposed by the stateof the industrial arts, the technologicalsituation; but in the second place, andscarcely less exacting in detail, the receivedscheme of use and wont in its other bearingshas its effect in shaping the scheme ofknowledge, both as to its content and astouches the norms and methods of its

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always driven men to the pursuit ofknowledge. The stress falls in a somewhatobviously different way among the canons ofreality by recourse to which men systematizeand verify the knowledge gained; which is inits turn due to the different habituation towhich civilized men are subjected, ascontrasted with the discipline exercised byother and earlier cultures.

unavoidably incline men to turn to account, ina system of ways and means, whateverknowledge so becomes available. But theinstinct of workmanship has also another andmore pertinent bearing in these premises, inthat it affords the norms, or the scheme ofcriteria and canons of verity, according towhich the ascertained facts will be construedand connected up in a body of systematicknowledge. Yet the sense of workmanshiptakes effect by recourse to divers expedientsand reaches its ends by recourse to varyingprinciples, according as the habituation ofworkday life has enforced one or anotherscheme of interpretation for the facts withwhich it has to deal.

In point of its genesis and growth anysystem of knowledge may confidently be runback, in the main, to the initiative and biasafforded by two certain impulsive traits ofhuman nature: an Idle Curiosity, and theInstinct of Workmanship.(2*)

In this generic trait the modern learningdoes not depart from the rule that holds forthe common run. Men instinctively seekknowledge, and value it. The fact of thisproclivity is well summed up in saying thatmen are by native gift actuated with an idlecuriosity, -- "idle" in the sense that aknowledge of things is sought, apart from anyulterior use of the knowledge so gained.(3*)This, of course, does not imply that theknowledge so gained will not be turned topractical account. In point of fact, althoughthe fact is not greatly relevant to the inquiryhere in hand, the native proclivity herespoken of as the instinct of workmanship will

The habits of thought induced byworkday life impose themselves as rulingprinciples that govern the quest ofknowledge; it will therefore be the habits ofthought enforced by the current technologicalscheme that will have most (or mostimmediately) to say in the currentsystematization of facts. The working logic ofthe current state of the industrial arts willnecessarily insinuate itself as the logicalscheme which must, of course, effectuallygovern the interpretation and generalizationsof fact in all their commonplace relations. Butthe current state of the industrial arts is not

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all that conditions workmanship. Under anygiven institutional situation, -- and themodern scheme of use and wont, law andorder, is no exception, workmanship is held toa more or less exacting conformity to severaltests and standards that are not intrinsic tothe state of the industrial arts, even if theyare not alien to it; such as the requirementsimposed by the current system of ownershipand pecuniary values.

themselves as indispensable and conclusivein the conduct of the affairs of learning. Whileit remains true that the bias of workmanshipcontinues to guide the quest of knowledge,under the conditions imposed by moderninstitutions it will not be the naiveconceptions of primitive workmanship that willshape the framework of the modern systemof learning; but rather the preconceptions ofthat disciplined workmanship that has beeninstructed in the logic of the moderntechnology and sophisticated with muchexperience in a civilization in whose schemeof life pecuniary canons are definitive.

These pecuniary conditions that imposethemselves on the processes of industry andon the conduct of life, together with thepecuniary accountancy that goes with them --the price system have much to say in theguidance and limitations of workmanship. Andwhen and in so far as the habituation soenforced in the traffic of workday life goesinto effect as a scheme of logic governing thequest of knowledge, such principles as haveby habit found acceptance as beingconventionally salutary and conclusive in thepecuniary conduct of affairs will necessarilyleave their mark on the ideals, aims, methodsand standards of science and those principlesand scholarship. More particularly, standardsof organization, control and achievement, thathave been accepted as an habitual matter ofcourse in the conduct of business will, byforce of habit, in good part reassert

The modern technology is of animpersonal, matter-of-fact character in anunexampled degree, and the accountancy ofmodern business management is also of anextremely dispassionate and impartiallyexacting nature. It results that the modernlearning is of a similarly matter-of-fact,mechanistic complexion, and that it similarlyleans on statistically dispassionate tests andformulations. Whereas it may fairly be saidthat the personal equation once -- in the daysof scholastic learning -- was the central anddecisive factor in the systematization ofknowledge, it is equally fair to say that inlater time no effort is spared to eliminate allbias of personality from the technique or the

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results of science or scholarship. It is the "drylight of science" that is always in request, andgreat pains is taken to exclude all color ofsentimentality.

consideration of expediency or convenience,but must run true to the canons of realityaccepted at the time. These canons of reality,or of verity, have varied from time to time,have in fact varied incontinently with thepassage of time and the mutations ofexperience. As the fashions of modern timehave come on, particularly the later phases ofmodern life, the experience that so hasshaped and reshaped the canons of verity forthe use of inquiring minds has fallen more andmore into the lines of mechanical articulationand has expressed itself ever moreunreservedly in terms of mechanical stress.Concomitantly the canons of reality havetaken on a mechanistic complexion, to theneglect and progressive disuse of all testsand standards of a more genial sort; until inthe off-hand apprehension of modern men,"reality" comes near being identified withmechanical fact, and "verification" is taken tomean a formulation in mechanical terms. Butthe final test of this reality about which theinquiries of modern men so turn is not thetest of mechanical serviceability for humanuse, but only of mechanistically effectualmatter-of-fact.

Yet this highly sterilized, germ-proofsystem of knowledge, kept in a cool, dryplace, commands the affection of moderncivilized mankind no less unconditionally, withno more afterthought of an extraneoussanction, than once did the highlypersonalized mythological and philosophicalconstructions and interpretations that hadthe vogue in the days of the schoolmen.

Through all the mutations that havepassed over this quest of knowledge, from itsbeginnings in puerile myth and magic to its(provisional) consummation in the "exact"sciences of the current fashion, any attentivescrutiny will find that the driving force hasconsistently been of the same kind, traceableto the same proclivity of human nature. In sofar as it may fairly be accounted esotericknowledge, or a "higher learning," all thisenterprise is actuated by an idle curiosity, adisinterested proclivity to gain a knowledge ofthings and to reduce this knowledge to acomprehensible system. The objective end isa theoretical organization. a logicalarticulation of things known, the lines ofwhich must not be deflected by any

So it has come about that moderncivilization is in a very special degree a cultureof the intellectual powers, in the narrower

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sense of the term, as contrasted with theemotional traits of human nature. Itsachievements and chief merits are found inthis field of learning, and its chief defectselsewhere. And it is on its achievements inthis domain of detached and dispassionateknowledge that modern civilized mankindmost ingenuously plumes itself andconfidently rests its hopes. The moreemotional and spiritual virtues that once heldthe first place have been overshadowed bythe increasing consideration given toproficiency in matter-of-fact knowledge. Asprime movers in the tide of civilized life, thesesentimental movements of the human spiritbelong in the past, -at least such is the self-complacent avowal of the modern spokesmenof culture. The modern technology, and themechanistic conception of things that goeswith that technology, are alien to the spirit ofthe "Old Order." The Church, the court, thecamp, the drawing-room, where these elderand perhaps nobler virtues had theirlaboratory and playground, have grownweedy and gone to seed. Much of theapparatus of the old order, with the good oldway, still stands over in a state of decentrepair, and the sentimentally reminiscentendeavors of certain spiritual "hold-overs" stilllend this apparatus of archaism something of

a galvanic life. But that power of aspirationthat once surged full and hot in the cults offaith, fashion, sentiment, exploit, and honor,now at its best comes to such a head as itmay in the concerted adulation of matter-of-fact.

This esoteric knowledge of matter-of-facthas come to be accepted as something worthwhile in its own right, a self-legitimating endof endeavor in itself, apart from any bearing itmay have on the glory of God or the good ofman. Men have, no doubt, always beenpossessed of a more or less urgentpropensity to inquire into the nature ofthings, beyond the serviceability of anyknowledge so gained, and have always beengiven to seeking curious explanations ofthings at large. The idle curiosity is a nativetrait of the race. But in past times such adisinterested pursuit of unprofitableknowledge has, by and large, not been freelyavowed as a legitimate end of endeavour; orsuch has at any rate been the state of thecase through that later segment of historywhich students commonly take account of. Aquest of knowledge has overtly been rated asmeritorious, or even blameless, only in so faras it has appeared to serve the ends of oneor another of the practical interests that havefrom time to time occupied men's attention.

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But latterly, during the past few generations,this learning has so far become an avowed"end in itself" that "the increase and diffusionof knowledge among men" is now freely ratedas the most humane and meritorious work tobe taken care of by any enlightenedcommunity or any public-spirited friend ofcivilization.

which is the most valued spiritual asset ofcivilized mankind.

The truth of this view is borne out by theprofessions even of those lieutenants of thepowers of darkness who are straining to laywaste and debauch the peoples ofChristendom. In high-pitched concert they allswear by the name of a "culture" whose soleinalienable asset is this same intellectualmastery of matters of fact. At the same time itis only by drawing on the resources of thismatter-of-fact knowledge that theprotagonists of reaction are able to carry ontheir campaign of debauchery and desolation.

The expediency of such "increase anddiffusion" is no longer held in doubt, becauseit has ceased to be a question of expediencyamong the enlightened nations, being itselfthe consummation upon which, in theapprehension of civilized men, the advance ofculture must converge. Such has come to bethe long-term common sense judgment ofenlightened public opinion. A settledpresumption to some such effect has foundlodgment as a commonplace conviction in thepopular mind, in much the same measure andin much the same period of time as thecurrent body of systematic knowledge hastaken on the character of matter of fact. Forgood or ill, civilized men have come to holdthat this matter-of-fact knowledge of things isthe only end in life that indubitably justifiesitself. So that nothing more irretrievablyshameful could overtake modern civilizationthan the miscarriage of this modern learning,

Other interests that have once beenheld in higher esteem appear by comparisonto have fallen into abeyance, -- religiousdevotion, political prestige, fighting capacity,gentility, pecuniary distinction, profuseconsumption of goods. But it is only bycomparison with the higher value given to thisenterprise of the intellect that such otherinterests appear to have lost ground. Theseand the like have fallen into relativedisesteem, as being sordid and insubstantialby comparison. Not that these "lower" humaninterests, answering to the "lower" ranges ofhuman intellect, have fallen into neglect; it isonly that they have come to be accounted"lower," as contrasted with the quest of

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knowledge; and it is only on sober secondthought, and perhaps only for the ephemeralpresent, that they are so accounted by thecommon run of civilized mankind. Men still arein sufficiently hot pursuit of all these time-worn amenities, and each for himself is, inpoint of fact, more than likely to make thepursuit of such self-seeking ends the burdenof his life; but on a dispassionate rating, andunder the corrective of deliberate avowal, itwill appear that none of these commendthemselves as intrinsically worth while atlarge. At the best they are rated as expedientconcessions to human infirmity or asmeasures of defense against humanperversity and the outrages of fortune. Thelast resort of the apologists for these moresordid endeavours is the plea that only bythis means can the ulterior ends of acivilization of intelligence be served. Theargument may fairly be paraphrased to theeffect that in order to serve God in the end,we must all be ready to serve the Devil in themeantime.

civilization -- again be relegated to asecondary place in the scheme of things andbecome only an instrumentality in the serviceof some dominant aim or impulse, such as avainglorious patriotism, or dynastic politics, orthe breeding of a commercial aristocracy.More than one of the nations of Europe havemoved so far in this matter already as toplace the primacy of science and scholarshipin doubt as against warlike ambitions; andthe aspirations of the American communityappear to be divided -between patriotism inthe service of the captains of war, andcommerce in the service of the captains offinance. But hitherto the spokesmen of anysuch cultural reversion are careful to declare aperfunctory faith in that civilization ofdisinterested intellectual achievement whichthey are endeavouring to suborn to theirseveral ends. That such pro formadeclarations are found necessary argues thatthe faith in a civilization of intelligence is stillso far intact as to require all reactionaries tomake their peace with it.

It is always possible, of course, that thispre-eminence of intellectual enterprise in thecivilization of the Western peoples is atransient episode; that it may eventually --perhaps even precipitately, with the nextimpending turn in the fortunes of this

Meantime the easy matter-of-coursepresumption that such a civilization ofintelligence justifies itself goes to argue thatthe current bias which so comes toexpression will be the outcome of a secureand protracted experience. What underlies

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and has brought on this bent in the temper ofthe civilized peoples is a somewhat intricatequestion of institutional growth, and can notbe gone into here; but the gradual shifting ofthis matter-of-fact outlook into the primacyamong the ideals of modern. Christendom issufficiently evident in point of fact, to anyattentive student of modern times.Conceivably, there may come an abrupt termto its paramount vogue, through someprecipitate sweep of circumstances; but it didnot come in by anything like the suddenintrusion of a new invention in ideals -- afterthe fashion of a religious conversion nor bythe incursion of a hitherto alien element intothe current scheme of life, but rather by forceof a gradual and unintended, scarcelyperceptible, shifting of emphasis between theseveral cultural factors that conjointly go tomake up the working scheme of things.

other cases of institutional growth anddisplacement, the changes have goneforward for the most part blindly, by impulse,without much foreknowledge of any ulteriorconsequences to which such a sequence ofchange might be said to tend. It is only afterthe new growth of use and wont has takeneffect in an altered range of principles andstandards, that its direction and ulteriorconsequences can be appreciated with anydegree of confidence. But this developmentthat has thrown up matter-of-fact knowledgeinto its place of paramount value for modernculture has in a peculiar degree beenunintended and unforeseen; the like appliesto the case of the schools and the personnelinvolved; and in a peculiar degree the driftand bearing of these changes have also notbeen appreciated while they have been goingforward, doubtless because it has all been apeculiarly unprecedented phenomenon and awholly undesigned drift of habituation. Historyrecords nothing that is fairly comparable. Noera in the historic past has set a pattern forguidance in this matter, and the experience ofnone of the peoples of history affords a clueby which to have judged beforehand of theprobable course and outcome of thisspecifically modern and occidental phase ofculture.

Along with this shifting of matter-of-factknowledge into the foreground among theideals of civilized life, there has also gone ona similarly unpremeditated change in theattitude of those persons and establishmentsthat have to do with this learning, as well asin the rating accorded them by the communityat large. Again it is a matter of institutionalgrowth, of self-wrought changes in thescheme of use and wont; and here as in

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Some slight beginnings and excursions inthe way of a cultivation of matter-of-factlearning there may have been, now andagain, among the many shifting systems ofesoteric lore that have claimed attention hereand there, early and late; and these need byno means be accounted negligible. But theyhave on the whole come to nothing muchbetter than broken excursions, as seen fromthe point of view of the latterday higherlearning, and they have brought into bearingnothing appreciable in the way ofestablishments designed withoutafterthought to further the advance ofdisinterested knowledge. Anything like acultural era that avowedly takes such a questof knowledge as its chief and distinctivecharacteristic is not known to history. Fromthis isolated state of the case it follows,unfortunately, that this modern phase is to bestudied only in its own light; and since thesequence of development has hithertoreached no secure consummation orconclusion, there is also much room forconflicting opinions as to its presumptive orlegitimate outcome, or even as to its presentdrift.

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But notorious facts make this much plain,that civilized mankind looks to this quest ofmatter-of-fact knowledge as its mostsubstantial asset and its most valuedachievement, -- in so far as any consensus ofappreciation or of aspirations is to be foundamong civilized mankind; and there is nosimilar consensus bearing on any otherfeature of that scheme of life thatcharacterizes modern civilization. It is similarlybeyond dispute that men look to the modernsystem of schools and related establishmentsof learning for the furtherance andconservation of this intellectual enterprise.And among the various items of thisequipment the modern university is, bytradition, more closely identified with thequest of knowledge than any other. It standsin a unique and peculiarly intimate relation tothis intellectual enterprise. At least such is thecurrent apprehension of the university's work.The university is the only accepted institutionof the modern culture on which the quest ofknowledge unquestionably devolves; and thevisible drift of circumstances as well as ofpublic sentiment runs also to making this theonly unquestioned duty incumbent on theuniversity.

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It is true, many other lines of work, andof endeavor. that may not fairly be calledwork, are undertaken by schools of universitygrade; and also, many other schools that callthemselves "universities" will havesubstantially nothing to do with the higherlearning. But each and several of these otherlines of endeavor, into which the universitiesallow themselves to be drawn, are open toquestion. Their legitimacy remains an openquestion in spite of the interested argumentsof their spokesmen, who advocate the partialsubmergence of the university in suchenterprises as professional training,undergraduate instruction, supervision andguidance of. the secondary school system,edification of the unlearned by "universityextension" and similar excursions into thefield of public amusement, training ofsecondary school teachers, encouragement ofamateurs by "correspondence," etc. Whatand how much of these extraneous activitiesthe university should allow itself is a matteron which there is no general agreement evenamong those whose inclinations go far in thatdirection; but what is taken for grantedthroughout all this advocacy of outlying detailis the secure premise that the university is inthe first place a seminary of the higherlearning, and that no school can make good

its pretensions to university standing exceptby proving its fitness in this respect.(4*)

The conservation and advancement ofthe higher learning involves two lines of work,distinct but closely bound together: (a)scientific and scholarly inquiry, and (b) theinstruction of students.(5*) The former ofthese is primary and indispensable. It is thiswork of intellectual enterprise that gives itscharacter to the university and marks it offfrom the lower schools. The work of teachingproperly belongs in the university onlybecause and in so far as it incites andfacilitates the university man's work of inquiry,-- and the extent to which such teachingfurthers the work of inquiry is scarcely to beappreciated without a somewhat extendedexperience. By and large, there are but fewand inconsequential exceptions to the rulethat teaching, as a concomitant ofinvestigation, is distinctly advantageous tothe investigator; particularly in so far as hiswork is of the nature of theoretical inquiry.The instruction necessarily involved inuniversity work, therefore, is only such as canreadily be combined with the work of inquiry,at the same time that it goes directly tofurther the higher learning in that it trains theincoming generation of scholars and scientistsfor

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the further pursuit of knowledge.Training for other purposes is necessarily of adifferent kind and is best done elsewhere;and it does not become university work bycalling it so and imposing its burden on themen and equipment whose only concernshould be the higher learning.

A university is a body of mature scholarsand scientists, the "faculty," -- with whateverplant and other equipment may incidentallyserve as appliances for their work in anygiven case. The necessary material equipmentmay under modern conditions be veryconsiderable, as may also the number of care-takers, assistants, etc.; but all that is not theuniversity, but merely its equipment. And theuniversity man's work is the pursuit ofknowledge, together with whatever advisorysurveillance and guidance he may consistentlyafford such students as are entering on thecareer of learning at a point where hisoutlook and methods of work may be of effectfor them. No man whose energies are nothabitually bent on increasing and proving upthe domain of learning belongs legitimately onthe university staff. The university man is,properly, a student, not a schoolmaster. Suchis the unmistakable drift of sentiment andprofessed endeavour, in so far as it is guidedby the cultural aspirations of civilized mankindrather than by the emulative strategy ofindividuals seeking their own preferment.(6*)

University teaching, having a particularand special purpose -- the pursuit ofknowledge -- it has also a particular andspecial character, such as to differentiate itfrom other teaching and at the same timeleave it relatively ineffective for otherpurposes. Its aim is to equip the student forthe work of inquiry, not to give him facility inthat conduct of affairs that turns suchknowledge to "practical account." Hence theinstruction that falls legitimately under thehand of the university man is necessarilysubsidiary and incidental to the work ofinquiry, and it can effectually be carried ononly by such a teacher as is himself occupiedwith the scrutiny of what knowledge isalready in hand and with pushing the inquiryto further gains. And it can be carried on bysuch a teacher only by drawing his studentsinto his own work of inquiry. The student'srelation to his teacher necessarily becomesthat of an apprentice to his master, ratherthan that of a pupil to his schoolmaster.

All this, of course, implies noundervaluing of the work of those men whoaim to prepare the youth for citizenship and apractical career. It is only a question ofdistinguishing between things that belong

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apart. The scientist and the scholar on theone hand, and the schoolmaster on the otherhand, both belong within the later growth ofcivilization; but a differentiation of the twoclasses, and a division of their work, isindispensable if they are to do their work as itshould be done, and as the moderncommunity thoughtfully intends that it shouldbe done. And while such a division of labourhas hitherto not been carried through withany degree of consistency, it is at least underway, and there is nothing but thepresumption of outworn usage that continuesto hold the two lines of work together, to thedetriment of both; backed, it is true, byambitions of self-aggrandizement on the partof many schools and many of theirdirectorates.

incidental to the work of research. Theuniversity man is almost unavoidably ateacher, by precept and example, but he cannot without detriment to his work as scientistor scholar serve

as a taskmaster or a vehicle ofindoctrination. The student who comes up tothe university for the pursuit of knowledge isexpected to know what he wants and towant it, without compulsion. If he falls short inthese respects, if he has not the requisiteinterest and initiative, it is his own misfortune,not the fault of his teacher. What he has alegitimate claim to is an opportunity for suchpersonal contact and guidance as will givehim familiarity with the ways and means ofthe higher learning, -- any informationimparted to him being incidental to this mainwork of habituation. He gets a chance tomake himself a scholar, and what he will dowith his opportunities in this way lies in hisown discretion.

The schoolmaster and his work may beequally, or more, valuable to the communityat large -- presumably more rather than less-- but in so far as his chief interest is of thepedagogical sort his place is not in theuniversity. Exposition, instruction and drillbelong in and professional schools. Theconsistent aim there is, and should be, toinstruct, to inculcate a knowledge of results,and to give the pupil a working facility inapplying it. On the university level suchinformation and training is (should be)

The difference between the modernuniversity and the lower and professionalschools is broad and simple; not so much adifference of degree as of kind. There is nodifficulty about apprehending or appreciatingthis difference; the dispute turns not on thepracticability of distinguishing between thetwo, but on the desirability of letting such a

18

distinction go into effect. It is a controversybetween those who wish to hold fast thatwhich once was good and those who look tomake use of the means in hand for new endsand meet new exigencies.

and professional schools. Citizenship is alarger and more substantial category thanscholarship; and the furtherance of civilizedlife is a larger and more serious interest thanthe pursuit of knowledge for its own idlesake. But the proportions which the quest ofknowledge is latterly assuming in scheme ofcivilized life require that the establishmentsthe to which this interest is committed shouldnot be charged with extraneous duties;particularly not with extraneous mattersthemselves of such grave consequence asthis training for citizenship and practicalaffairs. These are too serious a range ofduties to be taken care of as a side-issue, bya seminary of learning, the members ofwhose faculty, if they are fit for their ownspecial work, are not men of affairs or adeptsin worldly wisdom.

The lower schools (including theprofessional schools) are, in the ideal scheme,designed to fit the incoming generation forcivil life; they are therefore occupied withinstilling such knowledge and habits as willmake their pupils fit citizens of the world inwhatever position in the fabric of workday lifethey may fall. The university on the otherhand is specialized to fit men for a life ofscience and scholarship; and it is accordinglyconcerned, with such discipline only as willgive efficiency in the pursuit of knowledge andfit its students for the increase and diffusionof learning. It follows that while the lowerschools necessarily take over the surveillanceof their pupils' everyday life, and exercise alarge measure of authority and responsibleinterference in that behalf, the universityassumes (or should assume) no responsibilityfor its students' fortunes in the moral,religious, pecuniary, domestic, or hygienicrespect.

III

In point of historical pedigree theAmerican universities are of anotherderivation than their European counterpart;although the difference in this respect is notso sharp a matter of contrast as might beassumed at first sight. The European(Continental) universities appear to havebeen founded, originally, to meet the needs

Doubtless the larger and more seriousresponsibility in the educational systembelongs not to the university but to the lower

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of professional training, more particularlytheological (and philosophical) training in theearlier times. The American universities are,historically, an outgrowth of the Americancollege; and the latter was installed, in itsbeginnings, largely as a means ofprofessional training; chiefly training forDivinity, secondarily for the calling of theschoolmaster. But in neither case, neither inthat of the European university nor in that ofthe American College, was this earlyvocational aim of the schools allowed todecide their character in the long run, nor tocircumscribe the lines of their later growth. Inboth cases, somewhat alike, the two groupsof schools came to their mature development,in the nineteenth century, as establishmentsoccupied with disinterested learning, givenover to the pursuit of intellectual enterprise,rather than as seminaries for training of avocational kind. They still had a vocationalvalue, no doubt, and the vocational needs oftheir students need not have been absentfrom the considerations that guided theirdirectorates. It would particularly be foundthat the (clerical) directorates of the Americancolleges had more than half an eye to theneeds of Divinity even at so late a date aswhen, in the third quarter of the century, thecomplexion of the American college situation

began seriously to change. It is from thisperiod -- from the era of the Civil War and theReconstruction -- that the changes set inwhich have reshaped the academic situationin America.

At this era, some half a century ago, theAmerican college was, or was at leastpressed to be, given over to disinterestedinstruction, not specialized with a vocational,or even a denominational, bias. It was comingto take its place as the superior or crowningmember, a sort of capstone, of the system ofpublic instruction. The life history of any oneof the state universities whose early period ofgrowth runs across this era will readily showthe effectual guidance of such an ideal of acollege, as a superior and definitive memberin a school system designed to afford anextended course of instruction looking to anunbiassed increase and diffusion ofknowledge. Other interests, of a professionalor vocational kind, were also entrusted to thekeeping of these new-found schools; but witha conclusive generality the rule holds that inthese academic creations a collegeestablishment of a disinterested, non-vocational character is counted in as theindispensable nucleus, -- that much was atthat time a matter of course.

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The further development shows twomarked features: The American university hascome into bearing; and the college hasbecome an intermediate rather than aterminal link in the conventional scheme ofeducation. Under the names "undergraduate"and "graduate," the college and theuniversity are still commonly coupled togetheras subdivisions of a complex whole; but thisholding together of the two disparate schoolsis at the best a freak of aimless survival. Atthe worst, and more commonly, it is the resultof a gross ambition for magnitude on the partof the joint directorate. Whether the collegelives by itself as an independentestablishment on a foundation of its own, oris in point of legal formality a subdivision ofthe university establishment, it takes its placein the educational scheme as senior memberof the secondary school system, and it bearsno peculiarly close relation to the universityas a seat of learning. At the closest it standsto the university in the relation of a fittingschool; more commonly its relations are closerwith the ordinary professional and vocationalschools; and for the most part it stands in norelation, beyond that of juxtaposition, withthe one or the other.

Solidarity is by university an advisedlyconcerted adjustment to the needs ofscholarship as they run today. By historicalaccident the older American universities havegrown into bearing on the ground of anunderlying college, and the externalconnection so inherited has not usually beensevered; and by ill-advised, or perhapsunadvised, imitation the younger universitieshave blundered into encumbering themselveswith an undergraduate department tosimulate this presumptively honourablepedigree, to the detriment both of theuniversity and of the college so bound up withit. By this arrangement the college --undergraduate department -- falls into theposition of an appendage, a side issue, to betaken care of by afterthought on the part of abody of men whose chief legitimate interestruns -- should run -- on other things than theefficient management of such anundergraduate training-school, -- providedalways that they are a bona fide universityfaculty, and not a body of secondary-schoolteachers masquerading under the assumedname of a university.

The motive to this inclusion of anundergraduate department in the neweruniversities appears commonly to have beena headlong eagerness on the part of the

The attempt to hold the college and theno means together in bonds of ostensible

21

corporate authorities to show a completeestablishment of the conventionally acceptedpattern, and to enroll as many students aspossible.

nothing else to offer. But the retention orinclusion of the college and its aims within theuniversity corporation has necessarily led tothe retention of college standards andmethods of control even in what is orpurports to be university work; so that it is byno means unusual to find university(graduate) work scheduled in the form of acurriculum, with all that boarding-schoolcircumstance and apparatus that is sounavoidable an evil in all undergraduatetraining. In effect, the outcome of theseshort-sighted attempts to take care of thehigher learning by the means and method ofthe boys' school, commonly is to eliminate thehigher learning from the case and substitutethe aims and results of a boys' training-school.

Whatever may have been true for theearlier time, when the American college firstgrew up and flourished, it is beyond questionthat the undergraduate department whichtakes the place of the college today cannotbe rated as an institution of the higherlearning. At the best it is now a school forpreliminary training, preparatory to enteringon the career of learning, or in preparation forthe further training required for theprofessions; but it is also, and chiefly, anestablishment designed to give theconcluding touches to the education of youngmen who have no designs on learning,beyond the close of the college curriculum. Itaims to afford a rounded discipline to thosewhose goal is the life of fashion or of affairs.How well, or how ill, the college may combinethese two unrelated purposes is a questionthat does not immediately concern thepresent inquiry. It is touched on here only topoint the contrast between the Americancollege and the university.

Undergraduate work being task work, itis possible, without fatal effect, to reduce it tostandard units of time and volume, and socontrol and enforce it by a system ofaccountancy and surveillance; the methods ofcontrol, accountancy and coercion that socome to be worked out have all thatconvincing appearance of tangible efficiencythat belongs to any mechanically defined andstatistically accountable routine, such as willalways commend itself to the spirit of theschoolmaster; the temptation to apply such

It follows from the character of theirwork that while the university should offer noset curriculum, the college has, properly,

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methods of standardized routine wherever itis at all feasible is always present, and it iscogently spoken for by all those to whom drillis a more intelligible conception thanscholarship. The work of learning, whichdistinctively belongs in the university, on theother hand, is a matter of personal contactand co-operation between teacher andstudent, and is not measurable in statisticalunits or amenable to mechanical tests; themen engaged in this work can accordinglyoffer nothing of the same definite character inplace of the rigid routine and accountancyadvocated by the schoolmasters; and theoutcome in nearly all cases where the controlof both departments vests in one compositecorporate body, as it usually does, is thegradual insinuation of undergraduatemethods and standards in the graduateschool; until what is nominally university worksettles down, in effect, into nothing morethan an extension of the undergraduatecurriculum. This effect is had partly byreducing such of the graduate courses as arefound amenable to the formalities of theundergraduate routine, and partly bydispensing with such graduate work as willnot lend itself, even ostensibly, to theschoolmaster's methods.

What has been said of the college in thisconnection holds true in the main also of theprofessional and technical schools. In theiraims, methods and achievements theseschools are, in the nature of the case, foreignto the higher learning. This is, of course, notsaid in disparagement of their work; ratherthe contrary. As is the case with the college,so these schools also are often included inthe university corporation by ties of anexternal and factitious kind, frequently byterms of the charter. But this formal inclusionof them under the corporate charter does notset aside the substantial discrepancybetween their purpose, work and animus andthose of the university proper. It can onlyserve to trouble the single-mindedness ofboth. It leaves both the pursuit of learningand the work of preparation for theprofessions somewhat at loose ends,confused with the bootless illusion that theyare, in some recondite way, parallel variantsof a single line of work.

In aim and animus the technical andprofessional schools are "practical," in themost thorough going manner; while thepursuit of knowledge that occupies thescientists and scholars is not "practical" in theslightest degree. The divergent lines ofinterest to be taken care of by the

23

professional schools and the university,respectively, are as widely out of touch asmay well be within the general field of humanknowledge. The one is animated wholly byconsiderations of material expediency, andthe range of its interest and efforts is strictlylimited by consideration of the useful effect towhich the proficiency that it gives is to beturned; the other knows nothing ofexpediency, and is influenced by noconsideration of utility or disutility, in itsappreciation of the knowledge to be sought.The animus of the one is worldly wisdom; ofthe other, idle curiosity. The two areincommensurably at variance so far asregards their purpose, and in great measurealso as regards their methods of work, andnecessarily so.

any presumption that the two shouldexpediently be included in the same corporateestablishment, or even that they need benear neighbors or need maintain peculiarlyclose relations of personnel. The technicalschools, and in a less degree the professionalschools not properly classed as technical,depend in large measure on results workedout by the scientists, who properly belong inthe universities. But the material so made useof for technical ends are taken over andturned to account without afterthought. Thetechnologist's work is related to that of thescientists very much as the work of thedesigner is related to that of the inventor. Toa considerable extent the scientists similarlydepend on the work of the technical men forinformation, and for correction and verificationof their own theoretical work. But there is, onthis account, nothing to gain by associatingany given technical school with any givenuniversity establishment; incorporation in anygiven university does not in any degreefacilitate the utilization of the results of thesciences by the technical men; nor is it foundin practice to further the work of the sciences.The schools in question do not in any peculiardegree draw on the work of the scientistsattached to their particular university, nor dothese scientists, on the other hand, have any

But with all this divergence of purposeand animus there is after all a broad and verysubstantial bond of community between thetechnical schools, on the one hand, and theproper work of the university, on the otherhand, in that the two are, in great measure,occupied with the same general range ofmaterials and employ somewhat the samelogical methods in handling these materials.But the relation that results from thiscommunity of material is almost whollyexternal and mechanical. Nor does it set up

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special use for the work of their associatedtechnical schools. In either case the sourcedrawn on is the general literature of thesubject, the body of materials available atlarge, not the work of particular men attachedto particular schools. The generalizations ofscience are indispensable to the technicalmen; but what they draw on is the body ofscience at large, regardless of what any givenuniversity establishment may have had to dowith the work out of which the particularitems of scientific information have emerged.Nor is this scientific material useful to thetechnologists for the further pursuit ofscience; to them the scientific results aredata, raw material to be turned to practicaluse, not means by which to carry scientificinquiry out to further results.

university man as a scholar or scientist. Whatis of importance to him in all these matterswith which the professions and technologistsare busy is their bearing on those matters offact into which his scientific interest leads himto inquire. The tests and experiments carriedout at these technical schools, as well as theexperience gathered by the members of theirstaff, will occasionally afford him material forfurther inquiry or means whereby to checkresults already arrived at; but for suchmaterial he does not by preference resort toany one of the technical schools ascontrasted with any other, and it is quite anidle question whether the source of any suchserviceable information is a school attachedto his own university. The investigator findshis material where he can; which comes tosaying that he draws on the general body oftechnical knowledge, with no afterthought asto what particular technical school may havestood in some relation or other to theinformation which he finds useful.

Similarly, the professions and thetechnical schools afford valuable data for theuse of the professed scholars and scientists,information that serves as material ofInvestigation, or that will at least be useful asa means of extending correcting, verifying andcorrelating lines of inquiry on which they areengaged. But the further bearing of thesefacts upon the affairs of life, their expediencyor futility, is of no interest or consequence.The affairs of life, except the affairs oflearning, do not touch the interest of the

Neither to the man engaged in universitywork nor to the technical schools that mayserve him as occasional sources of material isthere any advantage to be derived from theirinclusion in the university establishment.Indeed, it is a detriment to both parties, ashas already been remarked, but more

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decidedly to the university men. By includingthe technical and professional schools in theuniversity corporation the technologists andprofessional men attached to these schoolsare necessarily included among the academicstaff, and so they come to take their part inthe direction of academic affairs at large. Inwhat they so do toward shaping theacademic policy they will not only count for allthey are worth, but they are likely to count forsomething more than their due share in thisrespect; for they are to some extent trainedto the conduct of affairs, and so come in forsomething of that deference that is currentlypaid to men of affairs, at the same time thatthis practical training gives them anadvantage over their purely academiccolleagues, in the greater assurance andadroitness with which they are able topresent their contentions. By virtue of thissame training, as well as by force of currentpractical interest, the technologist and theprofessional man are, like other men ofaffairs, necessarily and habitually impatient ofany scientific or scholarly work that does notobviously lend itself to some practical use.The technologist appreciates what ismechanically serviceable; the professionalman, as, for instance, the lawyer, appreciateswhat promises pecuniary gain; and the two

unite with the business-man at large inrepudiating whatever does not look directly tosuch a utilitarian outcome. So that asmembers of the academic staff these men arelikely to count at their full weight toward thediversion of the university's forces fromdisinterested science and scholarship to suchpalpably utilitarian ends.

But the active measures so taken by theacademic authorities at the instance of theschoolmasters and "practical" men are by nomeans the only line along which theirpresence in the academic corporation affectsthe case. Intimate association with these"utilitarians" unavoidably has its corruptingeffect on the scientists and scholars, andinduces in them also something of the samebias toward "practical" results in their work;so that they no longer pursue the higherlearning with undivided interest, but withmore or less of an eye to the utilitarian mainchance; whereby the advantages ofspecialization, which are the reason for theseschools, are lost, and the pride of the moderncommunity is wounded in its most sensitivespot -- the efficiency of its specialists.

So also, on the other hand, the formalincorporation of these technological andprofessional men in the academic body, withits professedly single-minded interest in

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learning, has its effect on their frame of mind.They are, without intending it, placed in afalse position, which unavoidably leads themto court a specious appearance ofscholarship, and so to invest theirtechnological discipline with a degree ofpedantry and sophistication; whereby it ishoped to give these schools and their worksome scientific and scholarly prestige, and solift it to that dignity that is pressed to attachto a non-utilitarian pursuit of learning.Doubtless this pursuit of scholarly prestige iscommonly successful, to the extent that itproduces the desired conviction of awe in thevulgar, who do not know the difference; butall this make-believe scholarship, howeversuccessfully staged, is not what these schoolsare designed for; or at least it is not what isexpected of them, nor is it what they can dobest and most efficiently.

pursuit of matter-of-fact knowledge -- are tobe rated as interlopers.

IV

To all this there is the ready objection ofthe schoolmasters and utilitarians that such aproject is fantastic and unpractical, uselessand undesirable; that such has not been themission of the university in the past, nor itsaccepted place and use in the educationalsystem of today and yesterday,. that theuniversities of Christendom have from theirfirst foundation been occupied withprofessional training and useful knowledge;that they have been founded for utilitarianpurposes and their work has been guidedmainly or altogether by utilitarianconsiderations; -- all of which is concededwithout argument. The historical argumentamounts to saying that the universities werefounded before modern civilization took on itsmodern character, before the disinterestedpursuit of knowledge had come to take thefirst place among the ideals of civilizedmankind, and that they were established totake care of those interests which were thenaccounted of first importance, and that thisintellectual enterprise in pursuit ofdisinterested knowledge consequently was

To the substantial gain of both parties,though with some lesion of the vanity of both,the separation between the university andthe professional and technical schools shouldbe carried through and made absolute. Onlyon such conditions can either the one or theother do its own work in a workmanlikemanner. Within the university precincts anyaim or interest other than those ofirresponsible science and scholarship --

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not at that time confided to the care of anyspecial establishment or freely avowed as alegitimate interest in its own right.

bent of modern civilization, as contrasted withthe barbarian spirit of things in the mediaevalspiritual world.

It is true that, by historical accident, theuniversity at large has grown out ofprofessional training-schools, primarilyschools for training in theology, secondarily inlaw and medicine. It is also true, in like wiseand in like degree, that modern science andscholarship have grown out of the technologyof handicraft and the theological philosophy ofthe schoolmen.(7*) But just as it would be abootless enterprise to cut modern scienceback into handicraft technology, so would itbe a gratuitous imbecility to prune back themodern university to that inchoate phase ofits life-history and make it again a corporationfor the training of theologians, jurists anddoctors of medicine. The historical argumentdoes not enjoin a return to the beginning ofthings, but rather an intelligent appreciationof what things are coming to.

In a general way, the place of theuniversity in the culture of Christendom is stillsubstantially the same as it has been fromthe beginning. Ideally, and in the popularapprehension, it is, as it has always been, acorporation for the cultivation and care of thecommunity's highest aspirations and ideals.But these ideals and aspirations havechanged somewhat with the changingscheme of the Western civilization; and so theuniversity has also concomitantly so changedin character, aims and ideals as to leave it stillthe corporate organ of the community'sdominant intellectual interest. At the sametime, it is true, these changes in the purposeand spirit of the university have always been,and are always being, made only tardily,reluctantly, concessively, against the protestsof those who are zealous for thecommonplaces of the day before yesterday.Such is the character of institutional growthand change; and in its adaptation to thealtered requirements of an altered scheme ofculture the university has in this matter beensubject to the conditions of institutionalgrowth at large. An institution is, after all, aprevalent habit of thought, and as such it is

The genesis of the university at large,taken as an institution of civilized life, is anincident of the transition from the barbarianculture of the middle ages to modern times,and its later growth and acquirement ofcharacter is an incident of the further growthof modern civilization; and the character ofthis later growth of the university reflects the

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subject to the conditions and limitations thatsurround any change in the habitual frame ofmind prevalent in the community.

life is embodied in the competitive system. Inthat earlier time, practical sagacity and theserviceability of any knowledge acquired, itsbearing on individual advantage, spiritual ortemporal, was the ruling consideration, asnever before or since. The best of men in thatworld were not ashamed to avow that aboundless solicitude for their own salvationwas their worthiest motive of conduct, and itis plain in all their speculations that they wereunable to accept any other motive or sanctionas final in any bearing. Saint and sinner alikeknew no higher rule than expediency, for thisworld and the next. And, for that matter, so itstill stands with the saint and the sinner, --who make up much of the commonplacehuman material in the modern community;although both the saint and the sinner in themodern community carry, largely byshamefaced subreption, an ever increasingside-line of other and more genial intereststhat have no merit in point of expediencywhether for this world or the next.

The university of medieval and earlymodern times, that is to say the barbarianuniversity, was necessarily given over to thepragmatic, utilitarian disciplines, since that isthe nature of barbarism; and the barbarianuniversity is but another, somewhatsublimated, expression of the same barbarianframe of mind. The barbarian culture ispragmatic, utilitarian, worldly wise, and itslearning partakes of the same complexion.The barbarian, late or early, is typically anunmitigated pragmatist; that is the spiritualtrait that most profoundly marks him off fromthe savage on the one hand and from thecivilized man on the other hand. "He turns akeen, untroubled face home to the instantneed of things."

The high era of barbarism in Europe, theDark and Middle Ages, is marked off fromwhat went before and from what hasfollowed in the cultural sequence, by a hardand fast utilitarian animus. The all-dominatingspiritual trait of those times is that men thenmade the means of life its end. It is perhapsneedless to call to mind that much of thisanimus still survives in later civilized life,especially in so far as the scheme of civilized

Under the rule of such a cultural ideal thecorporation of learning could not well takeany avowed stand except as anestablishment for utilitarian instruction, thepractical expediency of whose work was thesole overt test of its competency. And such itstill should continue to be according to the

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avowed aspirations of the stalercommonplace elements in the communitytoday. By subreption, and by a sophisticatedsubsumption under some ostensibly practicalline of interest and inquiry, it is true, theuniversity men of the earlier time spent muchof their best endeavour on matters ofdisinterested scholarship that had no bearingon any human want more to the point thanan idle curiosity; and by a similar turn ofsubreption and sophistication the laterspokesmen of the barbarian ideal take muchcomplacent credit for the "triumphs of modernscience" that have nothing but an ostensiblebearing on any matter of practical expediency,and they look to the universities to continuethis work of the idle curiosity under someplausible pretext of practicality.

divinity, secondarily in law and politics, andpresently in medicine and also in the otherprofessions that serve a recognized utilitarianinterest. After that fashion of a university thatanswered to this manner of ideals andaspirations had once been installed andgained a secure footing, its pattern acquireda degree of authenticity and prescription, sothat later seminaries of learning cameunquestioningly to be organized on the samelines; and further changes of academic policyand practice, such as are demanded by thelater growth of cultural interests and ideals,have been made only reluctantly and with asuspicious reserve, gradually and by acircuitous sophistication; so that much of thenon-utilitarian scientific and scholarly workindispensable to the university's survivalunder modern conditions is still scheduledunder the faculties of law or medicine, or evenof divinity.

So the university of that era unavoidablycame to be organized as a more or lesscomprehensive federation of professionalschools or faculties devoted to such branchesof practical knowledge as the ruling utilitarianinterests of the time demanded. Under thisovershadowing barbarian tradition theuniversities of early modern times started outas an avowed contrivance for indoctrination inthe ways and means of salvation, spiritualand temporal, individual and collective, -insome sort a school of engineering, primarily in

But the human propensity for inquiry intothings, irrespective of use or expediency,insinuated itself among the expositors ofworldly wisdom from the outset; and from thefirst this quest of idle learning has soughtshelter in the university as the onlyestablishment in which it could find a domicile,even on sufferance, and so could achieve thatfooting of consecutive intellectual enterprise

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running through successive generations ofscholars which is above all else indispensableto the advancement of knowledge. Under theregime of unmitigated pragmatic aims thatruled the earlier days of the Europeanuniversities, this pursuit of knowledge for itsown sake was carried on as a work ofscholarly supererogation by men whoseostensibly sole occupation was thepromulgation of some accredited line ofsalutary information. Frequently it had to becarried on under some colourablemasquerade of practicality. And yet sopersistent has the spirit of idle curiosityproved to be, and so consonant with thelong-term demands even of the laity, that thedissimulation and smuggling-in ofdisinterested learning has gone on ever moreopenly and at an ever increasing rate of gain;until in the end, the attention given toscholarship and the non-utilitarian sciences inthese establishments has come far to exceedthat given to the practical disciplines for whichthe several faculties were originally installed.As time has passed and as successive culturalmutations have passed over the community,shifting the centre of interest and bringingnew ideals of scholarship, and bringing thewhole cultural fabric nearer to its moderncomplexion, those purposes of crass

expediency that were of such great momentand were so much a matter of course inearlier academic policy, have insensibly fallento the rank of incidentals. And what had oncebeen incidental, or even an object ofsurreptitious tolerance in the university,remains today as the only unequivocal duty ofthe corporation of learning, and stands out asthe one characteristic trait without which noestablishment can claim rank as a university.

Philosophy -- the avowed body oftheoretical science in the late medieval time --had grown out of the schoolmen'sspeculations in theology, being in point ofderivation a body of refinements on the divinescheme of salvation; and with a view to quiettitle, and to make manifest their devotion tothe greater good of eschatologicalexpediency, those ingenious speculatorswere content to proclaim that their philosophyis the handmaid of theology -- Philosophiatheologiae ancillans. But their philosophy hasfallen into the alembic of the idle curiosity andhas given rise to a body of modern science,godless and unpractical, that has no intendedor even ostensible bearing on the religiousfortunes of mankind; and their sanctimoniousmaxim would today be better accepted as thesubject of a limerick than of a homily. Exceptin degree, the fortunes of the temporal

31

pragmatic disciplines, in Law and Medicine,have been much the same as that of theirelder sister, Theology. Professionalism andpractical serviceability have been graduallycrowded into the background of academicinterests and overlaid with quasi-utilitarianresearch -- such as the history ofjurisprudence, comparative physiology, andthe like. They have in fact largely beeneliminated.(8*)

inquiry must have free play in theseseminaries of the higher learning, withoutafterthought as to the practical or utilitarianconsequences which this free inquiry mayconceivably have for the professional trainingor for the social, civil or religious temper of thestudents or the rest of the community.Nothing is felt to be so irremediably vicious inacademic policy as a coercive bias, religious,political, conventional or professional, in so faras it touches that quest of knowledge thatconstitutes the main interest of the university.

And changes running to this effect havegone farthest and have taken mostconsistent effect in those communities thatare most fully imbued with the spirit of themodern peaceable civilization. It is in themore backward communities and schools thatthe barbarian animus of utilitarianism stillmaintains itself most nearly intact, whether ittouches matters of temporal or of spiritualinterest. With the later advance of culture, asthe intellectual interest has graduallydisplaced the older ideals in men's esteem,and barring a reactionary episode here andthere, the university has progressively cometo take its place as a seat of the higherlearning, a corporation for the pursuit ofknowledge; and barring accidental reversions,it has increasingly asserted itself as animperative necessity, more and moreconsistently, that the spirit of disinterested

Professional training and technologicalwork at large have of course not lost ground,either in the volume and the rigour of theirrequirements or in the application bestowedin their pursuit; but as within the circle ofacademic interests, these utilitariandisciplines have lost their preferential placeand have been pushed to one side; so thatthe professional and technical schools arenow in fact rated as adjuncts rather than asintegral constituents of the universitycorporation. Such is the unmistakable senseof this matter among academic men. At thesame time these vocational schools have, onewith another, progressively taken on more ofa distinctive, independent and close-knitstructure; an individual corporate existence,autonomous and academically self-sufficient,

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even in those cases where they mosttenaciously hold to their formal connectionwith the university corporation. They havereached a mature phase of organization,developed a type of personnel and controlpeculiar to themselves and their specialneeds, and have in effect come out fromunder the tutelage of the comprehensiveacademic organization of which they once intheir early days were the substantial core.These schools have more in common amongthemselves as a class than their class havewith the academic aims and methods thatcharacterize the university proper. They are infact ready and competent to go on their ownrecognizances, -- indeed they commonlyresent any effective interference orsurveillance from the side of the academiccorporation of which they nominally continueto be members, and insist on going their ownway and arranging their own affairs as theyknow best. Their connection with theuniversity is superficial and formal at the best,so far as regards any substantial control oftheir affairs and policy by the universityauthorities at large; it is only in theirinterference with academic policy, and ininjecting their own peculiar bias intouniversity affairs, that they countsubstantially as corporate members of the

academic body. And in these respects, what issaid of the professional and technical schoolsholds true also of the undergraduatedepartments.

It is quite feasible to have a universitywithout professional schools and without anundergraduate department; but it is notpossible to have one without due provisionfor that non-utilitarian higher learning aboutwhich as a nucleus these utilitarian disciplinescluster. And this in spite of the solicitousendeavours of the professional schools tomake good their footing as the substantialcore of the corporation.

V

As intimated above, there are two mainreasons for the continued and tenaciousconnection between these schools and theuniversities: (a) ancient tradition, fortified bythe solicitous ambition of the universitydirectorate to make a brave show ofmagnitude, and (b) the anxiety of theseschools to secure some degree of scholarlyauthentication through such a formalconnection with a seat of learning. These twomotives have now and again pushed mattersfairly to an extreme in the reactionarydirection. So, for instance, the chances of

33

intrigue and extra-academic clamour havelatterly thrown up certain men of untempered"practicality" as directive heads of certainuniversities, and some of these have gone sofar as to avow a reactionary intention tomake the modern university a cluster ofprofessional schools or faculties, after theancient barbarian fashion.(9*) But such apolicy of return to the lost crudities isunworkable in the long run under modernconditions. It may serve excellently as atransient expedient in a campaign ofpopularity, and such appears to have been itschief purpose where a move of this kind hasbeen advocated, but it runs on superficialgrounds and can afford neither hope nor fearof a permanent diversion in the direction sospoken for.

the same time equally prevalent through thecommunity a long-term bias of another kind,such as will not enduringly tolerate the sordideffects of pursuing an educational policy thatlooks mainly to the main chance, andunreservedly makes the means of life its chiefend. By virtue of this long-term idealistic drift,any seminary of learning that plays fast andloose in this way with the cultural interestsentrusted to its keeping loses caste and fallsout of the running. The universities that aresubjected in this fashion to an experimentalreversion to vocationalism, it appears, willunavoidably return presently to something ofthe non-professional type, on pain of fallinginto hopeless discredit. There have beensome striking instances, but current not ionsof delicacy will scarcely admit a citation of names and dates. And while the long-term drift ofthe modern idealistic bias may not permit theuniversities permanently to be diverted to theservice of Mammon in this fashion, yet theunremitting endeavours of "educators"seeking prestige for worldly wisdom results atthe best in a fluctuating state of compromise,in which the ill effects of such bids forpopularity are continually being outworn bythe drift of academic usage.

In the modern community, under thestrain of the price system and the necessitiesof competitive earning and spending, manymen and women are driven by an habitualbias in favour of a higher "practical" efficiencyin all matters of education; that is to say, amore single-minded devotion to the needs ofearning and spending. There is, indeed, muchof this spirit abroad in the community, andany candidate for popular favour and prestigemay find his own advantage in conciliatingpopular sentiment of this kind. But there is at

The point is illustrated by the Americanstate universities as a class, although the

34

illustration is by no means uniformlyconvincing. The greater number of these stateschools are not, or are not yet, universitiesexcept in name. These establishments havebeen founded, commonly, with a professedutilitarian purpose, and have started out withprofessional training as their chief avowedaim. The purpose made most of in theirestablishment has commonly been to trainyoung men for proficiency in some gainfuloccupation; along with this have gone manyhalf-articulate professions of solicitude forcultural interests to be taken care of by thesame means. They have been installed bypoliticians looking for popular acclaim, ratherthan by men of scholarly or scientific insight,and their management has not infrequentlybeen entrusted to political masters ofintrigue, with scant academic qualifications;their foundations has been the work ofpractical politicians with a view to conciliatethe good will of a lay constituency clamouringfor things tangibly "useful" -- that is to say,pecuniarily gainful. So these experts in short-term political prestige have made provision forschools of a "practical" character; but theyhave named these establishments"universities" because the name carries an airof scholarly repute, of a higher, moresubstantial kind than any naked avowal of

material practicality would give. Yet, in thoseinstances where the passage of time hasallowed the readjustment to take place,these quasi-"universities," installed by men ofaffairs, of a crass "practicality," and inresponse to the utilitarian demands of anunlearned political constituency, have in thelong run taken on more and more of anacademic, non-utilitarian character, and havebeen gradually falling into line as universitiesclaiming a place among the seminaries of thehigher learning. The long-term drift of moderncultural ideals leaves these schools no finalresting place short of the university type,however far short of such a consummationthe greater number of them may still befound.

What has just been said of the placewhich the university occupies in moderncivilization, and more particularly of themanner in which it is to fill its place, may seemsomething of a fancy sketch. It is assuredlynot a faithful description of any concrete case,by all means not of any given Americanuniversity; nor does it faithfully describe theline of policy currently pursued by thedirectorate of any such establishment. Yet it istrue to the facts, taken in a generalized way,and it describes the type to which theAmerican schools unavoidably gravitate by

35

force of the community's long-term idealisticimpulsion, in so far as their drift is notcontinually corrected and offset by vigilantauthorities who, from motives of their own,seek to turn the universities to account in oneway and another. It describes an institutionalideal; not necessarily an ideal nursed by anygiven individual, but the ideal logicallyinvolved in the scheme of modern civilization,and logically coming out of the historicaldevelopment of Western civilization hitherto,and visible to any one who willdispassionately stand aside and look to thedrift of latterday events in so far as they bearon this matter of the higher learning, itsadvancement and conservation.

ulterior sense, ought to be sought after in thedetermination of academic policy and theconduct of academic affairs will, however, notcoincide with the other question, as to whatactually is being accomplished in thesepremises, on the one hand, nor as to whatthe long-term cultural aspirations of civilizedmen are setting toward, on the other hand.

Now, it is not intended here to argue themerits of the current cultural ideals ascontrasted with what, in some ulterior sense,ought to be aimed at if the drift of currentaspirations and impulse should conceivablypermit a different ideal to be put into effect. Itis intended only to set forth what place, inpoint of fact and for better or worse, thehigher learning and the university hold in thecurrent scheme of Western civilization, asdetermined by that body of instinctiveaspirations and proclivities that holds thiscivilization to its course as it runs today; andfurther to show how and how far certaininstitutional factors comprised in this modernscheme of life go to help or hinder therealization of this ideal which men'saspirations and proclivities so make worthwhile to them. The sketch here offered incharacterization of the university and itswork, therefore, endeavours to take accountof the community's consensus of impulses and

Many if not most of those men who areoccupied with the guidance of universityaffairs would disown such a projected ideal,as being too narrow and too unpractical to fitinto the modern scheme of things, which isabove all else a culture of affairs; that it doesnot set forth what should be aimed at by anywho have the good of mankind at heart, orwho in any sensible degree appreciate theworth of real work as contrasted with theleisurely intellectual finesse of the confirmedscientist and man of letters. These and thelike objections and strictures may be welltaken, perhaps. The question of what, in any

36

desires touching the animus and aims thatshould move the seminaries of the higherlearning, at the same time that it excludesthose subsidiary or alien interests in whosefavour no such consensus is found to prevail.

unremitting habituation the currentcompetitive system of acquisition andexpenditure induces in all classes such a biasas leads them to overrate ways and meansas contrasted with the ends which theseways and means are in some sense designedto serve.

There are many of these workdayinterests, extraneous to the higher learning,each and several of which may be abundantlygood and urgent in its own right; but, whilethey need not be at cross purposes with thehigher learning, they are extraneous to thatdisinterested pursuit of knowledge in whichthe characteristic intellectual bent of moderncivilization culminates. These others arepatent, insistent and palpable, and thereneed be no apprehension of their going bydefault. The intellectual predilection -- the idlecuriosity -- abides and asserts itself whenother pursuits of a more temporal but moreimmediately urgent kind leave men free totake stock of the ulterior ends and values oflife; whereas the transient interests,preoccupation with the ways and means oflife, are urgent and immediate, and employmen's thought and energy through thegreater share of their life. The question ofmaterial ways and means, and the detailrequirements of the day's work, are for everat hand and for ever contest the claims of anyavowed ulterior end; and by force of

So, one class and another, biassed bythe habitual preoccupation of the class, willaim to divert the academic equipment to someparticular use which habit has led them torate high; or to include in the academicdiscipline various lines of inquiry and trainingwhich are extraneous to the higher learningbut which the class in question may speciallyhave at heart; but taking them one withanother, there is no general or abidingconsensus among the various classes of thecommunity in favour of diverting the academicestablishment to any other specific uses, or ofincluding in the peculiar work of the universityanything beyond the pursuit of knowledge forits own sake.

Now, it may be remarked by the way,that civilized mankind should have come so toset their heart on this chase after a fugitiveknowledge of inconsequential facts may belittle to the credit of the race or of thatscheme of culture that so centres about thiscult of the idle curiosity. And it is perhaps to

37

their credit, as well as to the credit of thecommunity whose creatures they are, thatthe spokesmen of some tangible ideal, somematerially expedient aspiration, embodyingmore of worldly wisdom, are for ever urgingupon the institutions of the higher leaningone or another course of action of a morepalpably expedient kind. But, for better orworse, the passage of time brings out thefact that these sober and sensible courses ofpolicy so advocated are after all essentiallyextraneous, if not alien, to those purposes forwhich a university can be maintained, on theground afforded by the habits of thoughtprevalent in the modern civilized community.

pecuniary traffic, business enterprise. So thatthe graver issues of academic policy whichnow tax the discretion of the directivepowers, reduce themselves in the main to aquestion between the claims of science andscholarship on the one hand and those ofbusiness principles and pecuniary gain on theother hand. In one shape or another thisproblem of adjustment, reconciliation orcompromise between the needs of the higherlearning and the demands of businessenterprise is for ever present in thedeliberations of the university directorate.This question gathers in its net all thoseperplexing details of expediency that nowclaim the attention of the ruling bodies.One and another of these "practical" and

expedient interests have transiently come tothe front in academic policy, and have in theirtime given a particular bent to the pursuit ofknowledge that has occupied the universities.Of these extraneous interests the two mostnotable have, as already indicated above,been the ecclesiastical and the political. But inthe long run these various interests andideals of expediency have, all and several,shown themselves to be only factionalelements in the scheme of culture, and havelost their preferential voice in the shaping ofacademic life. The place in men's esteem oncefilled by church and state is now held by

VI

Since the paragraphs that make up theforegoing chapter were written the Americanacademic community has been thrown into anew and peculiar position by the fortunes ofwar. The progress and the further promise ofthe war hold in prospect new and untriedresponsibilities, as well as an unexampledopportunity. So that the outlook now (June1918) would seem to be that the Americansare to be brought into a central place in therepublic of learning; to take a position, not so

38

much of dominance as of trust andguardianship; not so much by virtue of theirown superior merit as by force of theinsolvency of the European academiccommunity.

team-work, -- that much there is no denying,and it is useless to blink the fact.

There has already a good deal ofdisillusionment taken effect throughout thenations of Christendom in respect of thetemper and trustworthiness of Germanscholarship these past three or four years,and it is fairly beyond computation whatfurther shift of sentiment in this respect is tobe looked for in the course of a furtherPossible period of years given over to thesame line of experience. Doubtless, theGerman scholars, and therefore the Germanseats of learning whose creatures and whosecustodians these German scholars are, haveearned much of the distrust and dispraisethat is falling to their share. There is nooverlooking the fact that they have provedthe frailty of their hold on those elementaryprinciples of sobriety and single mind thatunderlie all sound work in the field of learning.To any one who has the interest of the higherlearning at heart, the spectacle of maudlinchauvinism and inflated scurrility unremittinglyplaced on view by the putative leaders ofGerman science and scholarship can not butbe exceedingly disheartening.

Again, it is not that the war is expectedto leave the lines of European scholars andscientists extinct; although there is nodenying the serious inroads made by the war,both in the way of a high mortality amongEuropean men of learning, and in the way ofa decimation of the new men on whom thehopes of the higher learning for the incominggeneration should have rested. There is alsoa serious diversion of the young forces fromlearning to transiently urgent matters of amore material, and more ephemeral nature.But possibly more sinister than all theselosses that are in a way amenable tostatistical record and estimate, is the currentand prospective loss of morale.

Naturally, it would be difficult andhazardous to offer an appraisal of thisprospective loss of morale, with which it is tobe expected that the disintegrated Europeancommunity of learned men will come throughthe troubled times. But that there is much tobe looked for on this score, that there is muchto be written off in the way of loweredaggregate efficiency and loss of the spirit of

It may be argued, and it may be true, ofcourse, that much of this failure of intelligenceand spiritual force among Germany's men of

39

learning is of the nature of a transient eclipseof their powers; that with the return ofsettled conditions there is due to come areturn of poise and insight. But when all dueargument has been heard, it remains truethat the distrust set afoot in the mind of theirneighbours, by this highly remarkableexhibition of their personal equation, will longinure to the disability of Germany's men oflearning as a force to be counted on in thatteamwork that is of the essence of things forthe advancement of learning. In effect,Germany, and Germany's associates in thiswarlike enterprise, will presumably be foundbankrupt in this respect on the return ofpeace, even beyond the other nations.

although here again it is only a relativedegree of immunity that they enjoy.

And all this holds true of the Americans inmuch the same way as of the rest; exceptthat the Americans have, at least hitherto,not been exposed to the blight in anythinglike the same degree as any one of thoseother peoples with whom they come incomparison here. It is, of course, not easy tosurmise what may yet overtake them, and theothers with them; but judged on the courseof things hitherto, and on the apparentpromise of the calculable future, it is scarcelyto be presumed that the Americans are dueto suffer so extreme a degree of dilapidationas the European peoples, -- even apart fromthe accentuated evil case of the Germans.The strain has hitherto been lighter here, andit promises so to continue, whether thefurther duration of the war shall turn out tobe longer or shorter. The Americans are, afterall, somewhat sheltered from the impact; andso soon as the hysterical anxiety induced bythe shock has had time to spend itself, itshould reasonably be expected that thispeople will be able soberly to take stock of itsassets and to find that its holdings in thedomain of science and scholarship are, in themain, still intact.

These others have also not escaped thetouch of the angel of decay, but the visiblecorruption of spiritual and intellectual valuesdoes not go the same length among them.Nor have these others suffered so heavy atoll on their prospective scholarly man power.It is all a matter of degree and of differentialdecline, coupled with a failure of corporateorganization and of the usages and channelsof communion and co-operation. Chauvinisticself-sufficiency and disesteem of theirneighbours have apparently also not gone sodeep and far among the other nations;

40

Not that no loss has been incurred, northat no material degree of derangement is tobe looked for, but in comparison with whatthe experience of the war is bringing to theEuropeans, the case of the Americans shouldstill be the best there is to be looked for andthe best is always good enough, perforce. Soit becomes a question, what the Americanswill do with the best opportunity which thecircumstances offer. And on their conduct oftheir affairs in this bearing turns not only theirown fortune in respect of the interests ofscience and scholarship, but in great measurethe fortunes of their overseas friends and co-partners in the republic of learning as well.

contingent of American men of learning shallsee fit to pursue. They are not all that is to beleft over when the powers of decay shallbegin to retire, nor are they, perhaps, to bethe best and most valuable contingent amongthese prospective survivors; but they occupya strategic position, in that they are todayjustly to be credited with disinterestedmotives, beyond the rest, at the same timethat they command those material resourceswithout which the quest of knowledge canhope to achieve little along the modern linesof inquiry. By force of circumstances they arethrown into the position of keepers of theways and means whereby the republic oflearning is to retrieve its fortunes. By force ofcircumstances they are in a position, if they sochoose, to shelter many of those masters offree inquiry whom the one-eyed forces ofreaction and partisanship overseas will seekto suppress and undo; and they are also in aposition, if they so choose, to installsomething in the way of an internationalclearing house and provisional headquartersfor the academic community throughout thatrange of civilized peoples whose goodwillthey now enjoy -- a place of refuge and aplace of meeting, confluence anddissemination for those views and ideas that

The fortunes of war promise to leave theAmerican men of learning in a strategicposition, in the position of a strategic reserve,of a force to be held in readiness, equippedand organized to meet the emergency that soarises, and to retrieve so much as may be ofthose assets of scholarly equipment andpersonnel that make the substantial code ofWestern civilization. And so it becomes aquestion of what the Americans are minded todo about it. It is their opportunity, and at thesame time it carries the gravest responsibilitythat has yet fallen on the nation; for thespiritual fortunes of Christendom are boundup with the line of policy which this surviving

41

live and move and have their being in thehigher learning.

makes the needed work of reconstruction allthe more difficult and all the more imperative.Unhappily, the state of sentiment on bothsides of the line of cleavage will presumablynot admit a cordial understanding and co-operation between the German contingentand the rest of the civilized nations, for sometime to come. But the others are in a frame ofmind that should lend itself generously to alarger measure of co-operation in this respectnow than ever before.

There is, therefore, a work ofreconstruction to be taken care of in therealm of learning, no less than in the workingscheme of economic and civil institutions. Andas in this other work of reconstruction, sohere; if it is to be done without undueconfusion and blundering it is due to be setafoot before the final emergency is at hand.But there is the difference that, whereas theframework of civil institutions may still, withpassable success, be drawn on national linesand confined within the national frontiers;and while the economic organization can also,without fatal loss, be confined in a similarfashion, in response to short-sighted patrioticpreconceptions; the interests of science, andtherefore of the academic community, do notrun on national lines and can not similarly beconfined within geographical or politicalboundaries. In the nature of the case theseinterests are of an international character andcan not be taken care of except byunrestricted collusion and collaborationamong the learned men of all those peopleswhom it may concern. Yet there is nomistaking the fact that the spirit of invidiouspatriotism has invaded these premises, too,and promises to bungle the outcome; which

So it may not seem out of place to offer asuggestion, tentatively and under correction,looking to this end. A beginning may well bemade by a joint enterprise among Americanscholars and universities for the installation ofa freely endowed central establishmentwhere teachers and students of allnationalities, including Americans with therest, may pursue their chosen work as guestsof the American academic community at large,or as guests of the American people in thecharacter of a democracy of culture. Thereshould also be nothing to hinder theinstallation of more than one of theseacademic houses of refuge andentertainment; nor should there be anythingto hinder the enterprise being conducted onsuch terms of amity, impartiality andcommunity interest as will make recourse to it

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an easy matter of course for any scholarswhom its opportunities may attract. The samecentral would at the same time, and for thetime being, take care of those channels ofcommunication throughout the academicworld that have been falling into enforcedneglect under the strain of the war. So alsoshould provision be made, perhaps bestunder the same auspices, for the (transient)taking-over of the many essential lines ofpublicity and publication on which the menengaged in scholarly and scientific inquiryhave learned to depend, and which have alsobeen falling into something of a decline duringthe war.

an occasion for the pooling of common issuesamong the universities, might hopefully beexpected to be welcomed as a measure ofpresent relief from some part of the pecuniarystrain under which they are now working.

But competition is well ingrained in thehabitual outlook of the American schools. Totake the issue to neutral ground, therefore,where this competitive animus may hopefullybe counted on to find some salutaryabatement, it may be suggested that apracticable nucleus for this proposed jointenterprise can well be found in one oranother -- perhaps in one and another -- ofthose extra-academic foundations forresearch of which there already are several inexistence, -- as, e.g., the Carnegie Institution.With somewhat enlarged powers, or perhapsrather with some abatement of restrictions,and with such additional funds as may berequired, the necessary work andorganization should readily be taken care ofby such an institution. Further growth andramification would be left to future counseland advisement.

Measures looking to this end might wellbe made, at the same time, to serve no lessuseful a purpose within the AmericanAcademic community. As is well known, thereprevails today an extensive and wastefulcompetitive duplication of plant, organizationand personnel among the Americanuniversities, as regards both publications andcourses of instruction. Particularly is this truein respect of that advanced work of theuniversities that has to do with the higherlearning. At the same time, these universitiesare now pinched for funds, due to the currentinflation of prices. So that any proposal of thisnature, which might be taken advantage of as

The contemplated enterprise wouldnecessarily require a certain planning andorganization of work and something in theway of an administrative and clerical staff,asetting up of something in the way of

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"organization tables"; but there can be noquestion of offering detailed proposals onthat head here. Yet the caution may well beentered here that few specifications arebetter than many, in these premises, and thatthe larger the latitude allowed from theoutset, the fewer the seeds of eventualdefeat, -- as is abundantly illustrated bycontraries.

the American people, collectively, will be at allworse off in point of disposable means at theclose of the war than they were at itsbeginning; quite the contrary in fact. To anyone who will look to the facts it is evident thatthe experience of the war, and the measurestaken and to be taken, are leading to aheightened industrial productiveness and aconcomitant elimination of waste. Theresulting net gain in productive efficiency hasnot gone at all far, and there need be noapprehension of its going to great lengths;but, for more or less, it is going so far assafely to promise a larger net annualproduction of useful goods in the immediatefuture than in the immediate past; and thedisposable means of any people is always amatter of the net annual production, and itneed be a question of nothing else. Themanner in which this net product is, and is tobe, shared among the classes and individualsof the community is another question, whichdoes not belong here.

It is also evident that such an enterprisewill involve provision for some expenditure offunds; presumably a somewhat generousexpenditure; which comes near implying thatrecourse should be had to the publicrevenues, or to resources that maylegitimately be taken over by the publicauthorities from private hands where theynow serve no useful purpose. There are manyitems of material resources in the country thatcome legitimately under this head. At thesame time it is well in this connection to call tomind that there is no prospect of thecountry's being in any degree impoverished inthe course of the war; so that there need beno apprehension of a shortage of means forthe carrying on of such an enterprise, if onlythe available sources are drawn on withoutprejudice. In the mind of any disinterestedstudent of the American economic situation,there can be no serious apprehension that

A question of graver weight and ofgreater perplexity touches the presumptiveattitude of the several universities and theirdiscretionary authorities in the face of anyproposed measure of this kind; where thescope of the enterprise is so far beyond theirhabitual range of interest. When one calls to

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mind the habitual parochialism of thegoverning boards of these seminaries of thehigher learning, and the meticulousmanoeuvres of their executives seeking eachto enhance his own prestige and the prestigeof his own establishment, there is not much ofan evident outlook for large and generousmeasures looking to the common good. Andyet it is also to be called to mind that thesegoverning boards and executives are, afterall, drawn from the common stock ofhumanity, picked men as they may be; andthat they are subject, after all, to somewhatthe same impulses and infirmities as thecommon run, picked though they may be witha view to parochialism and blameless futility.Now, what is overtaking the temper of thecommon run under the strain of the warsituation should be instructive as to what maybe also looked for at the bands of these menin whose discretion rest the fortunes of theAmerican universities. There should be atleast a fighting chance that, with somethinglarger, manlier, more substantial, to occupytheir attention and to shape the day's workfor them, these seminaries of learning may,under instant pressure, turn their best effortsto their ostensible purpose, "the increase anddiffusion of knowledge among men," and toforego their habitual preoccupation with petty

intrigue and bombastic publicity, until thereturn of idler days.

NOTES:

1. An inquiry of this kind has beenattempted elsewhere: Cf. The Instinct ofWorkmanship. chapter vii, pp. 321-340; "ThePlace of Science in Modern Civilization",American Journal of Sociology. Vol. XI (March,1906), pp. 585-609; "The Evolution of theScientific Point of View," University ofCalifornia Chronicle (1908), Vol. X, No. 4, pp.395-416.

2. Cf. The Instinct of Workmanship andthe State of the Industrial Arts, ch.i and pp.30-45, 52-62, 84-89.

3. In the crude surmises of the pioneersin pragmatism this proposition was implicitlydenied; in their later and more advisedlyformulated positions the expositors ofpragmatism have made peace with it.

4. The essential function of the universityis to bring together, for the transmission ofexperience and impulse, the sages of thepassing and the picked youths of the cominggeneration. By the extent and fulness withwhich they establish these social contacts,and thus transmit the wave of cumulativeexperience and idealist impulse -- the real

45

sources of moral and intellectual progress --the universities are to be judged. -- VictorBranford, Interpretations and Forecasts, ch.VI. "The Present as a Transition." p 288.

Fatherland, something of a correlative changehas also latterly come in evidence in theGerman universities; so that what issubstantially "cameralistic science" -- trainingand information for prospective civil servantsand police magistrates is in some appreciablemeasure displacing disinterested inquiry inthe field of economics and political theory.This is peculiarly true of those corporations oflearning that come closely in touch with theCultus Ministerium.

5. Cf., Geo. T. Ladd, University Control, p.349.

6. Cf., e.g., J. McKeen Cattell, UniversityControl, Part III, ch. V., "Concerning theAmerican University." "The university is thosewho teach and those who learn and the workthey do." "The university is its men and theirwork. But certain externals are necessary orat least usual -- buildings and equipment, apresident and trustees."

9. Cf. "Some Considerations On theFunction of the State University." (InauguralAddress of Edmund Janes James, Ph.D.,LL.D.), Science, November 17, 1905."The papers by other writers associated

with Mr Cattell in this volume run to the sameeffect whenever they touch the same topic;and, indeed, it would be difficult to find adeliberate expression to the contrary amongmen entitled to speak in these premises.

It may be in place to add here that thevolume referred to, on University Control, hasbeen had in mind throughout the followinganalysis and has served as ground andmaterial for much of the argument.

7. Cf. The Instinct of Workmanship, ch. vi,vii.

8. With the current reactionary trend ofthings political and civil toward mediaeval-barbarian policies and habits of thought in the

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CHAPTER II so today is due to the failure of theoreticalinterests of a different kind; directly andimmediately it is due to the fact that in theimmediate present the cult of knowledge has,by default, taken over that primacy amonghuman interests which an eschatologicallythrifty religious sentiment once held in theesteem of Christendom. So long as the fear ofGod still continued to move the generality ofcivilized men in sufficient measure, theirtheoretical knowledge was organized for "theglory of God and the good of man," -- thelatter phrase being taken in theeschatological sense; and so long theresulting scheme of learning was laid out andcultivated with an eye to the main chance in ahereafter given over, in the main and for itsmajor effect, to pains and penalties. With thelatterday dissipation of this fear of God, thescheme of knowledge handed down out of adevout past and further amplified in the(theoretically) Godless present, has, byatrophy of disuse, lost its ulterior view to suchspiritual expediency, and has come to standover as an output of intellectual enterpriseworking under the impulsion and guidance ofan idle curiosity simply. All this may not bemuch to the credit of civilized mankind, butdispassionate reflection will not leave the factin doubt. And the outcome for the university,

The Governing Boards

In the working theory of the moderncivilized community, -that is to say in thecurrent common-sense apprehension of whatis right and good, as it works out in the longrun, -- the university is a corporation oflearning, disinterested and dispassionate. Toits keeping is entrusted the community's jointinterest in esoteric knowledge. It is givenover to the single-minded pursuit of scienceand scholarship, without afterthought andwithout a view to interests subsidiary orextraneous to the higher learning. It is,indeed, the one great institution of moderntimes that works to no ulterior end and iscontrolled by no consideration of expediencybeyond its own work. Typically, normally, inpoint of popular theory, the university ismoved by no consideration other than "theincrease and diffusion of knowledge amongmen." This is so because this profitless questof knowledge has come to be the highest andulterior aim of modern culture.

Such has been the case, increasingly, forsome generations past; but it is not untilquite recently that such a statement wouldhold true unequivocally and with anunqualified generality. That the case stands

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considered as an institution of this modernculture, is such as this conjuncture ofcircumstances will require.

expenditure for the sake of further gain andexpenditure, with nothing that will standscrutiny as a final term to this traffic in waysand means, -- except only this cult of the idlecuriosity to which the seats of learning are, intheory, dedicate. But unremitting habituationto the competitive pursuit of ways and meanshas determined that "practical" interests ofthis complexion rule workday life in themodern community throughout, and they aretherefore so intimately and ubiquitouslybound up with current habits of thought, andhave so strong and immediate a hold oncurrent workday sentiment, that, hitherto, inno case have the seats of learning been ableto pursue their quest of knowledge withanything like that single-mindedness whichacademic men are moved to profess in theirmoments of academic elation.

But while such is the dispassionateworking theory, the long-term drift of moderncommon sense as touches the work of theuniversity, it is also a matter of course thatthis ideally single-minded course of action hasnever been realized in any concrete case.While it holds true, by and large, that modernChristendom has outlived the fear of God, --that is to say of "the Pope, the Turk, and theDevil," -- it does not therefore follow that mentake a less instant interest in the affairs oflife, or carry on the traffic of their lives with aless alert eye to the main chance, than theyonce did under the habitual shadow of thatbarbarian fear. The difference is, for thepurpose in hand, that the same solicitousattention that once converged on such anavoidance of ulterior consequences nowcentres on questions of present ways andmeans. Worldly wisdom has not fallen intodecay or abeyance, but it has become awisdom of ways and means that lead tonothing beyond further ways and means.Expediency and practical considerations havecome to mean considerations of a pecuniarykind; good, on the whole, for pecuniarypurposes only; that is to say, gain and

Some one vital interest of this practicalsort, some variant of the quest of gain, isalways at hand and strenuously effective inthe community's life, and therefore dominatestheir everyday habits of thought for the timebeing. This tone-giving dominance of such aworkday interest may be transient orrelatively enduring; it may be more or lessurgently important and consequential underthe circumstances in which the community isplaced, or the clamour of its spokesmen and

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beneficiaries may be more or less ubiquitousand pertinacious; but in any case it will haveits effect in the counsels of the "Educators,"and so it will infect the university as well asthe lower levels of the educational system. Sothat, while the higher learning still remains asthe enduring purpose and substantial interestof the university establishment, the dominantpractical interests of the day will, transientlybut effectually, govern the detail lines ofacademic policy, the range of instructionoffered, and the character of the personnel;and more particularly and immediately will thecharacter of the governing boards and theacademic administration so be determined bythe current run of popular sentiment touchingthe community's practical needs and aims;since these ruling bodies stand, in one way oranother, under the critical surveillance of a layconstituency.

reflected the ingrained devoutness of thatportion of the American community to whichthe higher schools then were of muchsignificance. At the same time it reflected thehistorical fact that the colleges of the earlydays had been established primarily astraining schools for ministers of the church. Intheir later growth, in the recent past, whilethe chief purpose of these seminaries has nolonger been religious, yet ecclesiasticalprepossessions long continued to mark thepermissible limits of the learning which theycultivated, and continued also to guard thecurriculum and discipline of the schools.

That phase of academic policy is past.Due regard at least is, of course, still had tothe religious proprieties -- the Americancommunity, by and large, is still the mostdevout of civilized countries -- but such regardon the part of the academic authorities nowproceeds on grounds of businesslikeexpediency rather than on religious convictionor on an ecclesiastical or priestly bias in theruling bodies. It is a concessive precaution onthe part of a worldly-wise directorate, in viewof the devout prejudices of those who knowno better. The rule of the clergy belongsvirtually to the prehistory of the Americanuniversities. While that rule held there werefew if any schools that should properly be

The older American universities havegrown out of underlying colleges, --undergraduate schools. Within the memory ofmen still living it was a nearly unbroken rulethat the governing boards of these higherAmerican schools were drawn largely from theclergy and were also guided mainly byecclesiastical, or at least by devotional,notions of what was right and needful inmatters of learning. This state of things

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rated as of university grade. Even now, it istrue, much of the secondary school system,including the greater part, though adiminishing number, of the smaller colleges, isunder the tutelage of the clergy; and theacademic heads o£ these schools are almostuniversally men of ecclesiastical standing andbias rather than of scholarly attainments. Butthat fact does not call for particular noticehere, since these schools lie outside theuniversity field, and so outside the scope ofthis inquiry.

discretionary control in matters of universitypolicy now rests finally in the hands ofbusinessmen.

The reason which men prefer to allegefor this state of things is the sensible need ofexperienced men of affairs to take care of thefiscal concerns of these universitycorporations; for the typical modern universityis a corporation possessed of large propertyand disposing of large aggregateexpenditures, so that it will necessarily havemany and often delicate pecuniary intereststo be looked after. It is at the same time heldto be expedient in case of emergency to haveseveral wealthy men identified with thegoverning board, and such men of wealth arealso commonly businessmen. It is apparentlybelieved, though on just what ground thissanguine belief rests does not appear, that incase of emergency the wealthy members ofthe boards may be counted on to spend theirsubstance in behalf of the university. In pointof fact, at any rate, poor men and menwithout large experience in business affairsare felt to have no place in these bodies. If byany chance such men, without the duepecuniary qualifications, should come to makeup a majority, or even an appreciable minorityof such a governing board, the situationwould be viewed with some apprehension by

For a generation past, while theAmerican universities have been coming intoline as seminaries of the higher learning,there has gone on a wide-reachingsubstitution of laymen in the place ofclergymen on the governing boards. Thisprogressive secularization is sufficientlynotorious, even though there are someamong the older establishments the terms ofwhose charters require a large proportion ofclergymen on their boards. This secularizationis entirely consonant with the prevailing driftof sentiment in the community at large, as isshown by the uniform and uncritical approvalwith which it is regarded. The substitution is asubstitution of businessmen and politicians;which amounts to saying that it is asubstitution of businessmen. So that the

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all persons interested in the case andcognizant of the facts. The only exceptionmight be cases where, by tradition, the boardhabitually includes a considerable proportionof clergymen:

degree qualified to judge. Beyond this, astouches the actual running administration ofthe corporation's investments, income andexpenditures, -- all that is taken care of bypermanent officials who have, as theynecessarily must, sole and responsible chargeof those matters. Even the auditing of thecorporation's accounts is commonly vested insuch officers of the corporation, who havenone but a formal, if any, direct connectionwith the governing board. The governingboard, or more commonly a committee of theboard, on the other hand, will then formallyreview the balance sheets and bundles ofvouchers duly submitted by the corporation'sfiscal officers and their clerical force, -- withsuch effect of complaisant oversight as willbest be appreciated by any person who hasbad the fortune to look into the accounts of alarge corporation.

"Such great regard is always lentBy men to ancient precedent."

The reasons alleged are no doubtconvincing to those who are ready to be soconvinced, but they are after all moreplausible at first sight than on reflection. Inpoint of fact these businesslike governingboards commonly exercise little if any currentsurveillance of the corporate affairs of theuniversity, beyond a directive oversight of thedistribution of expenditures among theseveral academic purposes for which thecorporate income is to be used; that is to say,they control the budget of expenditures;which comes to saying that they exercise apecuniary discretion in the case mainly in theway of deciding what the body of academicmen that constitutes the university may ormay not do with the means in hand; that is tosay, their pecuniary surveillance comes in themain to an interference with the academicwork, the merits of which these men of affairson the governing board are in no special

So far as regards its pecuniary affairsand their due administration, the typicalmodern university is in a position, withoutloss or detriment, to dispense with theservices of any board of trustees, regents,curators, or what not. Except for theinsuperable difficulty of getting a hearing forsuch an extraordinary proposal, it should beno difficult matter to show that thesegoverning boards of businessmen commonly

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are quite useless to the university for anybusinesslike purpose. Indeed, except for astubborn prejudice to the contrary, the factshould readily be seen that the boards are ofno material use in any connection; their soleeffectual function being to interfere with theacademic management in matters that arenot of the nature of business, and that lieoutside their competence and outside therange of their habitual interest.

with academic matters which they do notunderstand. The sole ground of theirretention appears to be an unreflectingdeferential concession to the usages ofcorporate organization and control, such ashave been found advantageous for thepursuit of private gain by businessmenbanded together in the exploitation of joint-stock companies with limited liability.(1*)

The fact remains, the modern civilizedcommunity is reluctant to trust its seriousinterests to others than men of pecuniarysubstance, who have proved their fitness forthe direction of academic affairs by acquiring,or by otherwise being possessed of,considerable wealth.(2*) It is not simply thatexperienced businessmen are, on maturereflection, judged to be the safest and mostcompetent trustees of the university's fiscalinterests. The preference appears to bealmost wholly impulsive, and a matter ofhabitual bias. It is due for the greater part tothe high esteem currently accorded to men ofwealth at large, and especially to wealthymen who have succeeded in business, quiteapart from any special capacity shown bysuch success for the guardianship of anyinstitution of learning. Business success is bycommon consent, and quite uncritically, takento be conclusive evidence of wisdom even in

The governing boards -- trustees,regents, curators, fellows, whatever theirstyle and title -- are an aimless survival fromthe days of clerical rule, when they werepresumably of some effect in enforcingconformity to orthodox opinions andobservances, among the academic staff. Atthat time, when means for maintenance ofthe denominational colleges commonly had tobe procured by an appeal to impecuniouscongregations, it fell to these bodies ofchurchmen to do service as sturdy beggarsfor funds with which to meet currentexpenses. So that as long as the boardswere made up chiefly of clergymen theyserved a pecuniary purpose; whereas, sincetheir complexion has been changed by thesubstitution of businessmen in the place ofecclesiastics, they have ceased to exerciseany function other than a bootless meddling

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matters that have no relation to businessaffairs. So that it stands as a matter of coursethat businessmen must be preferred for theguardianship and control of that intellectualenterprise for the pursuit of which theuniversity is established, as well as to takecare of the pecuniary welfare of the universitycorporation. And, full of the same naive faiththat business success "answereth all things,"these businessmen into whose hands thistrust falls are content to accept theresponsibility and confident to exercise fulldiscretion in these matters with which theyhave no special familiarity. Such is theoutcome, to the present date, of the recentand current secularization of the governingboards. The final discretion in the affairs ofthe seats of learning is entrusted to men whohave proved their capacity for work that hasnothing in common with the higherlearning.(3*)

that the spirit of enterprise or of unrest iswanting in this community, but only that, byselective effect of the conditioningcircumstances, persons affected with thatspirit are excluded from the management ofbusiness, and so do not come into the classof successful businessmen from which thegoverning boards are drawn. Americaninventors are bold and resourceful, perhapsbeyond the common run of their classelsewhere, but it has become a commonplacethat American inventors habitually die poor;and one does not find them represented onthe boards in question. American engineersand technologists are as good and efficient astheir kind in other countries. but they do notas a class accumulate wealth enough toentitle them to sit on the directive board ofany self-respecting university, nor can theyclaim even a moderate rank as "safe andsane" men of business. American explorers,prospectors and pioneers can not be said tofall short of the common measure inhardihood, insight, temerity or tenacity; butwealth does not accumulate in their hands,and it is a common saying, of them as of theinventors, that they are not fit to conducttheir own (pecuniary) affairs; and thereminder is scarcely needed that neither theynor their qualities are drawn into the counsels

As bearing on the case of the Americanuniversities, it should be called to mind thatthe businessmen of this country, as a class,are of a notably conservative habit of mind. Ina degree scarcely equalled in any communitythat can lay claim to a modicum of intelligenceand enterprise, the spirit of Americanbusiness is a spirit of quietism, caution,compromise, collusion, and chicane. It is not

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of these governing boards. The wealth andthe serviceable results that come of theendeavours of these enterprising andtemerarious Americans habitually inure to thebenefit of such of their compatriots as areendowed with a "safe and sane" spirit of"watchful waiting," -- of caution, collusion andchicane. There is a homely but well-acceptedAmerican colloquialism which says that "Thesilent hog eats the swill." As elsewhere, butin a higher degree and a more cogent sensethan elsewhere, success in business affairs,in such measure as to command the requisitedeference, comes only by getting somethingfor nothing. And, baring -- accidents andwithin the law, it is only the waiting game andthe defensive tactics that will bring gains ofthat kind, unless it be strategy of the natureof finesse and chicane. Now it happens thatAmerican conditions during the past onehundred years have been peculiarlyfavourable to the patient and circumspectman who will rather wait than work; and it isalso during these hundred years that thecurrent traditions and standards of businessconduct and of businesslike talent have takenshape and been incorporated in thecommunity's common sense. America hasbeen a land of free and abounding resources;which is to say, when converted into terms of

economic theory, that it is the land of theunearned increment. In all directions,wherever enterprise and industry have gone,the opportunity was wide and large for suchas had the patience or astuteness to placethemselves in the way of this multifarious flowof the unearned increment, and wereendowed with the retentive grasp. Puttingaside the illusions of public spirit and diligentserviceability, sedulously cultivated by theapologists of business, it will readily be seenthat the great mass of reputably largefortunes in this country are of such an origin;nor will it cost anything beyond a similarlesion to the affections to confirm the viewthat such is the origin and line of derivation ofthe American propertied business communityand its canons of right and honest living.

It is a common saying that the moderntaste has been unduly commercialized by theunremitting attention necessarily given tomatters of price and of profit and loss in anindustrial community organized on businessprinciples; that pecuniary standards ofexcellence are habitually accepted andapplied with undue freedom and finality. Butwhat is scarcely appreciated at its full value isthe fact that these pecuniary standards ofmerit and efficiency are habitually applied tomen as well as to things, and with little less

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freedom and finality. The man who applieshimself undeviatingly to pecuniary affairs witha view to his own gain, and who is habituallyand cautiously alert to the main chance, is notonly esteemed for and in respect of hispecuniary success, but he is also habituallyrated high at large, as a particularly wise andsane person. He is deferred to as being wiseand sane not only in pecuniary matters butalso in any other matters on which he mayexpress an opinion.

great and unquestioned weight in temporalmatters as well; he was then accepted as thetype of wise, sane and benevolent humanity,in his own esteem as well as in the esteem ofhis fellows. In like manner also, in other timesand under other cultural conditions thefighting-man has held the first place in men'sesteem and has been deferred to in mattersthat concerned his trade and in matters thatdid not.

Now, in that hard and fast body ofaphoristic wisdom that commands the faith ofthe business community there is comprisedthe conviction that learning is of no use inbusiness. This conviction is, further, backedup and coloured with the tenet, heldsomewhat doubtfully, but also, and therefore,somewhat doggedly, by the common run ofbusinessmen, that what is of no use inbusiness is not worth while. More than one ofthe greater businessmen have spoken,advisedly and with emphasis, to the effectthat the higher learning is rather a hindrancethan a help to any aspirant for businesssuccess;(4*) more particularly to any manwhose lot is cast in the field of businessenterprise of a middling scale andcommonplace circumstances. And notoriously,the like view of the matter prevailsthroughout the business community at large.

A very few generations ago, be fore thepresent pecuniary era of civilization had madesuch headway, and before the common manin these civilized communities had lost thefear of God, the like wide-sweeping andobsequious veneration and deference wasgiven to the clergy and their opinions; for thechurchmen were then, in the popularapprehension, proficient in all those mattersthat were of most substantial interest to thecommon man of that time. Indeed, thesalvation of men's souls was then a matter ofas grave and untiring solicitude as theircommercial solvency has now become. Andthe trained efficiency of the successfulclergyman of that time for the conduct ofspiritual and ecclesiastical affairs lent him aprestige with his fellow men such as to givehis opinions, decisions and preconceptions

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What these men are likely to have in mind inpassing this verdict, as shown by variousexpressions on this head, is not so much thehigher learning in the proper sense, butrather that slight preliminary modicum that isto be found embodied in the curriculum of thecolleges, -- for the common run ofbusinessmen are not sufficiently conversantwith these matters to know the difference, orthat there is a difference, between thecollege and the university. They are busy withother things.

related to business success, to the moredefensible ground of the undergraduatecurriculum, considered as introductory tothose social amenities that devolve on thesuccessful man of business; and in so far asthey confine themselves to the topic ofeducation and business they commonly spendtheir efforts in arguing for the business utilityof the training afforded by the professionaland technical schools, included within theuniversity corporation or otherwise. There isground for their contention in so far as"university training" is (by subreption) takento mean training in those "practical" branchesof knowledge (Law, Politics, Accountancy,etc.) that have a place within the universityprecincts only by force of a non-sequitur. Andthe spokesmen for these views are commonlyalso, and significantly, eager to make goodtheir contention by advocating theintroduction of an increased proportion ofthese "practical" subjects into the schedule ofinstruction.

It is true, men whose construction of thefacts is coloured by their wish to commendthe schools to the good will of the businesscommunity profess to find ground for thebelief that university training, or rather thetraining of the undergraduate school, givesadded fitness for a business career,particularly for the larger business enterprise.But they commonly speak apologetically andoffer extenuating considerations, such asvirtually to concede the case, at the sametime that they are very prone to evade theissue by dwelling on accessory and subsidiaryconsiderations that do not substantially touchthe question of trained capacity for theconduct of business affairs.(5*) Theapologists commonly shift from theundebatable ground of the higher learning as

The facts are notorious and leave littleroom for cavil on the merits of the case.Particularly is the award of the factsunequivocal in America, -- the native groundof the self-made businessman, and at thesame time the most admirably thorough-paced business community extant. The

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American business community is well enoughas it is, without the higher learning, and it isfully sensible that the higher learning is not abusiness proposition.

dislocation amounting to a revolutionarychange.

On the other hand, the higher learningand the spirit of scientific inquiry have much incommon with modern industry and itstechnological discipline. More particularly isthere a close bond of sympathy andrelationship between the spirit of scientificinquiry and the habit of mind enforced by themechanical industries of the modern kind. Inboth of these lines of activity men areoccupied with impersonal facts and deal withthem in a matter-of-fact way. In both, as faras may be, the personal equation is sought tobe eliminated, discounted and avoided, so asto leave no chance for discrepancies due topersonal infirmity or predilection. But it is onlyon its mechanical side that the industrialorganization so comes in touch with modernscience and the pursuit of matter-of-factknowledge; and it is only in so far as theirhabits of thought are shaped by the disciplineof the mechanical industries that there isinduced in the industrial population the samebent as goes to further or to appreciate thework of modern science. But it would be quitenugatory to suggest that the governingboards of the universities should be made upof, or should comprise, impecunioustechnologists and engineers.

But a good rule works both ways. Ifscholarly and scientific training, such as maywithout shame be included under the captionof the higher learning, unfits men for businessefficiency, then the training that comes ofexperience in business must also be held tounfit men for scholarly and scientific pursuits,and even more pronouncedly for thesurveillance of such pursuits. Thecircumstantial evidence for the latterproposition is neither less abundant nor lessunequivocal than for the former. If the higherlearning is incompatible with businessshrewdness, business enterprise is, by thesame token, incompatible with the spirit ofthe higher learning. Indeed, within theordinary range of lawful occupations thesetwo lines of endeavour, and the animus thatbelongs to each, are as widely out of touch asmay be. They are the two extreme terms ofthe modern cultural scheme; although at thesame time each is intrinsic and indispensableto the scheme of modern civilization as itruns. With the excision or serious crippling ofeither, Western Civilization would suffer a

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There is no similar bond of consanguinitybetween the business occupations and thescientific spirit; except so far as regards thoseclerical and subaltern employments that liewholly within the mechanical routine ofbusiness traffic; and even as regards theseemployments and the persons so occupied itis, at the most, doubtful whether theirtraining does not after all partake more ofthat astute and invidious character of cunningthat belongs to the conduct of businessaffairs than of the dispassionate animus ofscientific inquiry.

mental reservation or ulterior purposes ofexpediency. Business enterprise proceeds onulterior purposes and calculations ofexpediency; it depends on shrewd expedientsand lives on the margin of error, on thefluctuating margin of human miscalculation.The training given by these two lines ofendeavour -- science and business -- is whollydivergent; with the notorious result that forthe purposes of business enterprise thescientists are the most ignorant, gullible andincompetent class in the community. They arenot only passively out of touch with thebusiness spirit, out of training by neglect, butthey are also positively trained out of thehabit of mind indispensable to businessenterprise. The converse is true of the men ofbusiness affairs.(6*)

These extenuating considerations do nottouch the case of that body of businessmen,in the proper sense of the term, from whichthe membership of the governing boards isdrawn. The principles that rule businessenterprise of that larger and pecuniarilyeffectual sort are a matter of usage,appraisement, contractual arrangement andstrategic manoeuvres. They are the principlesof a game of competitive guessing andpecuniary coercion, a game carried on whollywithin the limits of the personal equation, anddepending for its movement and effect onpersonal discrepancies of judgment. Sciencehas to do with the opaquely veracioussequence of cause and effect, and it dealswith the facts of this sequence without

Plato's classic scheme of folly, whichwould have the philosophers take over themanagement of affairs, has been turned onits head; the men of affairs have taken overthe direction of the pursuit of knowledge. Toany one who will take a dispassionate look atthis modern arrangement it looks foolish, ofcourse, -- ingeniously foolish; but, also, ofcourse, there is no help for it and no prospectof its abatement in the calculable future.

It is a fact of the current state of things,grounded in the institutional fabric of

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Christendom; and it will avail little tospeculate on remedial corrections for thisstate of academic affairs so long as theinstitutional ground of this perversion remainsintact. Its institutional ground is the currentsystem of private ownership. It claims theattention of students as a feature of thelatterday cultural growth, as an outcome ofthe pecuniary organization of modern society,and it is to be taken as a base-line in anyinquiry into the policy that controls modernacademic life and work -- just as any inquiryinto the circumstances and establishments oflearning in the days of scholasticism musttake account of the ecclesiastical rule of thattime as one of the main controlling facts in thecase. The fact is that businessmen hold theplenary discretion, and that businessprinciples guide them in their management ofthe affairs of the higher learning; and suchmust continue to be the case so long as thecommunity's workday material interestscontinue to be organized on a basis ofbusiness enterprise. All this does not promisewell for the future of science and scholarshipin the universities, but the current effects ofthis method of university control aresufficiently patent to all academic men, -- andthe whole situation should perhaps troublethe mind of no one who will be at pains to

free himself from the (possibly transient)preconception that "the increase and diffusionof knowledge among men" is, in the end,more to be desired than the acquisition andexpenditure of riches by the astuter men inthe community. Many of those who fancythemselves conversant with thecircumstances of American academic life wouldquestion the view set forth above, and theywould particularly deny that businessprinciples do or can pervade the corporatemanagement of the universities in anythinglike the degree here implied. They wouldcontend that while the boards of control arecommonly gifted with all the disabilitiesdescribed -- that much being not open todispute -- yet these boards do not, on thewhole, in practice, extend the exercise of theirplenary discretion to the directive control ofwhat are properly speaking academicmatters; that they habitually confine theirwork of directorship to the pecuniary affairs ofthe corporation; and that in so far as theymay at times interfere in the university'sscholarly and scientific work, they do so intheir capacity as men of culture, not as men ofproperty or of enterprise. This latter wouldalso be the view to which the men of propertyon the boards would themselves particularlyincline. So it will be held by the spokesmen of

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content that virtually full discretion in allmatters of academic policy is delegated to theacademic head of the university, fortified bythe advice and consent of the seniormembers of his faculty; by the free choice ofthe governing boards, in practice drawn outfrom under the control of these businessmenin question and placed in the hands of thescholars. And such, commonly, is at leastostensibly the case, in point of form; moreparticularly as regards those olderestablishments that are burdened withacademic traditions running back beyond thedate when their governing boards were takenover by the businessmen, and moreparticularly in the recent past than in theimmediate present or for the establishmentsof a more recent date.

appreciate, a sagacious governing board may,for instance, determine to expend the greaterproportion of the available income of theuniversity in improving and decorating its realestate, and they may with businesslike thriftset aside an appreciable proportion of theremainder for a sinking fund to meet vaguelyunforeseen contingencies, while the academicstaff remains (notoriously) underpaid and soscantily filled as seriously to curtail theirworking capacity. Or the board may, again, ashas also happened, take a thrifty resolutionto "concede" only a fraction -- say ten orfifteen per-cent -- of the demands of the stafffor books and similar working materials forcurrent use; while setting aside a good shareof the funds assigned for such use, toaccumulate until at some future date suchmaterials may be purchased at morereasonable prices than those now ruling.These illustrations are not supplied by fancy.There is, indeed, a visible reluctance on thepart of these businesslike boards to expendthe corporation's income for those intangible,immaterial uses for which the university isestablished. These uses leave no physical,tangible residue, in the way of durable goods,such as will justify the expenditure in terms ofvendible property acquired; therefore theyare prima facie imbecile, and correspondingly

This complaisant view overlooks the factthat much effective surveillance of theacademic work is exercised through theboard's control of the budget. The academicstaff can do little else than what thespecifications of the budget provide for;without the means with which the corporateincome should supply them they are ashelpless as might be expected.

Imbued with an alert sense of thosetangible pecuniary values which they are byhabit and temperament in a position to

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distasteful, to men whose habitual occupationis with the acquisition of property. By force ofthe same businesslike bias the boardsunavoidably incline to apportion the fundsassigned for current expenses in such a wayas to favour those "practical" or quasi-practical lines of instruction and academicpropaganda that are presumed to heightenthe business acumen of the students or toyield immediate returns in the way of acreditable publicity.

But it is more to the point to note thatthe academic head commonly holds office bychoice of the governing board. Where thepower of appointment lies freely in thediscretion of such a board, the board willcreate an academic head in its own image. Inpoint of notorious fact, the academic head ofthe university is selected chiefly on grounds ofhis business qualifications, taking thatexpression in a somewhat special sense.There is at present an increasingly broad andstrenuous insistence on such qualifications inthe men selected as heads of theuniversities; and the common sense of thecommunity at large bears out thepredilections of the businesslike board ofcontrol in this respect. The new incumbentsare selected primarily with a view to give thedirection of academic policy andadministration more of a businesslikecharacter. The choice may not always fall on acompetent business man, but that is not dueto its inclining too far to the side ofscholarship. It is not an easy matter even forthe most astute body of businessmen toselect a candidate who shall measure up totheir standard of businesslike efficiency in afield of activity that has substantially nothingin common with that business traffic in which

As to the delegation of powers to theacademic head. There is always thereservation to be kept in mind, that theacademic head is limited in his discretion bythe specifications of the budget. Thepermissible deviations in that respect arecommonly neither wide nor of a substantialcharacter; though the instances of auniversity president exercising large powersare also not extremely rare. But in commonpractice, it is to be noted, the academic headis vested with somewhat autocratic powers,within the lines effectually laid down in thebudget; he is in effect responsible to thegoverning board alone, and his responsibilityin that direction chiefly touches hisobservance of the pecuniary specifications ofthe budget.

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their preconceptions of efficiency have beenformed.

universities, is in commendation of hisbusiness capacity, "commercial sense,"executive ability, financiering tact; and theeffectual canvass of his qualifications doesnot commonly range much outside of theseprime requisites. The modicum of scholarshipand scholarly ideals and insight concessivelydeemed indispensable in such a case issomewhat of the nature of a perquisite, andis easily found. It is not required that theincumbent meet the prepossessions of thecontingent of learned men in the community inthis respect; the choice does not rest withthat element, nor does its ratification, butrather at the other end of the scale, with thatextreme wing of the laity that is taken up with"practical," that is to say pecuniary, affairs.

In many cases the alumni have much tosay in the choice of a new academic head,whether by courtesy or by express provision;and the results under these circumstancesare not substantially different. It follows as aninevitable consequence of the current state ofpopular sentiment that the successfulbusinessmen among the alumni will have thedeciding voice, in so far as the matter restswith the alumni; for the successful men ofaffairs assert themselves with easyconfidence, and they are looked up to, in anycommunity whose standards of esteem arebusiness standards, so that their word carriesweight beyond that of any other class ororder of men. The community at large, or atleast that portion of the community thathabitually makes itself heard, speaks to thesame effect and on the same ground, -- viz., asentimental conviction that pecuniary successis the final test of manhood. Businessprinciples are the sacred articles of thesecular creed, and business methods makeup the ritual of the secular cult. The one clearnote of acclaim that goes up, from theavowed adepts of culture and from thosewithout the pale, when a new head has, asrecently been called to one of the greater

As to the requirements of scholarly orscientific competency, a plausible speakerwith a large gift of assurance, a businesslike"educator" or clergyman, some urbane pillarof society, some astute veteran of thescientific demi-monde, will meet all reasonablerequirements. Scholarship is not barred, ofcourse, though it is commonly the quasi-scholarship of the popular raconteur thatcomes in evidence in these premises; and thefact that these incumbents of executive officeshow so much of scholarly animus andattainments as they do is in great measure a

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fortuitous circumstance. It is, indeed, a safegeneralization that in point of fact theaverage of university presidents fall short ofthe average of their academic staff inscholarly or scientific attainments, even whenall persons employed as instructors arecounted as members of the staff. It may alsobe remarked by the way that when, as mayhappen, a scholar or scientist takes office asdirective head of a university, he is commonlylost to the republic of learning; he has ineffect passed from the ranks of learning tothose of business enterprise.

NOTES:

1. An instance showing something of themeasure and incidence of fiscal servicerendered by such a businesslike board maybe suggestive, even though it is scarcely tobe taken as faithfully illustrating currentpractice, in that the particular board inquestion has exercised an uncommonmeasure of surveillance over its university'specuniary concerns.

A university corporation endowed with alarge estate (appraised at something over$30,000,000) has been governed by a boardof the usual form, with plenary discretion,established on a basis of co-optation. In pointof practical effect, the board, or rather thatfraction of the board which takes an activeinterest in the university's affairs, has beenmade up of a group of local business menengaged in divers enterprises of the kindfamiliar to men of relatively large means, withsomewhat extensive interests of the natureof banking and underwriting, where largeextensions of credit and the temporary use oflarge funds are of substantial consequence.By terms of the corporate charter the boardwas required to render to the governor of thestate a yearly report of all the pecuniaryaffairs of the university; but no penalty was

The upshot of it all should be that whenand in so far as a businesslike governingboard delegates powers to the university'sacademic head, it delegates these powers toone of their own kind, who is somewhatperemptorily expected to live up to theaspirations that animate the board. Whatsuch a man, so placed, will do with thepowers and opportunities that so devolve onhim is a difficult question that can beanswered only in terms of the compulsion ofthe circumstances in which he is placed and ofthe moral wear and tear that comes ofarbitrary powers exercised in a tangle ofambiguities.(7*)

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attached to their eventual failure to rendersuch report, though some legal remedy coulddoubtless have been had on due applicationby the parties in interest, as e. g., by theacademic head of the university. No suchreport has been rendered, however, and nosteps appear to have been taken to procuresuch a report, or any equivalent accounting.But on persistent urging from the side of hisfaculty, and after some courteous delay, theacademic head pushed an inquiry into thecorporation's finances so far as to bring outfacts somewhat to the following effect: --

of the university establishment. Just whatdisposal was made of the remainder is notaltogether clear; though it is looselypresumed to have been kept in hand with aneventual view to the erection and repair ofbuildings. Something like one-half of what somade up the currently disposable income wasfurther set aside in the character of a sinkingfund, to accumulate for future use and tomeet contingencies; so that what effectuallyaccrued to the university establishment forcurrent use to meet necessary academicexpenditures would amount to something likeone per cent (or less) on the total investment.But of this finally disposable fraction of theincome, again, an appreciable sum was setaside as a special sinking fund to accumulatefor the eventual use of the university library,-- which, it may be remarked, was in themeantime seriously handicapped for want offunds with which to provide for current needs.So also the academic establishment at largewas perforce managed on a basis ofpenurious economy, to the presentinefficiency and the lasting damage of theuniversity.

The board, or the group of local businessmen who constituted the habitual workingmajority of the board, appear to have kept afairly close and active oversight of thecorporate funds entrusted to them, and tohave seen to their investment and disposalsomewhat in detail -- and, it has beensuggested, somewhat to their own pecuniaryadvantage. With the result that theinvestments were found to yield a currentincome of some three per cent. (rather underthan over), -- in a state where investment ongood security in the open market commonlyyielded from six per cent to eight per cent. Ofthis income approximately one-half(apparently some forty-five per cent)practically accrued to the possible current use

The figures and percentages givenabove are not claimed to be exact; it is knownthat a more accurate specification of detailswould result in a less favourable showing.

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At the time when these matters weredisclosed (to a small number of the uneasypersons interested) there was an uglysuggestion afloat touching the pecuniaryintegrity of the board's management, but thisis doubtless to be dismissed as being merelya loose expression of ill-will; and the like isalso doubtless to be said as regards thesuggestion that there may have been aninterested collusion between the academichead and the active members of the board.These were "all honourable men," of greatrepute in the community and well known assagacious and successful men in their privatebusiness ventures.

motives of vanity, and it is at the same time aconvenient means of conciliating the good willof the wealthy incumbent. It may be addedthat now and again the discretionary controlof large funds which so falls to the membersof the board may come to be pecuniarilyprofitable to them, so that the office maycome to be attractive as a businessproposition as well as in point of prestige.Instances of the kind are not whollyunknown, though presumably exceptional.

4. Cf., e. g.. R. T. Crane. The Futility of AllKinds of Higher Schooling, especially part I,ch. iv.

5. Cf. R.T. Crane, as above, especiallypart I, ch. ii. iii, and vi. Cf. also H.P. Judson,The Higher Education as a Training forBusiness, where the case is argued in atypically commonplace and matter-of-factspirit, but where "The Higher Education" istaken to mean the undergraduate curriculumsimply; also "A Symposium on the value ofhumanistic, particularly classical, studies as atraining for men of affairs," Proceedings of theClassical Conference at Ann Arbor, Michigan,April 3, 1909.

2. Cf. The Instinct of Workmanship, ch.vii, pp. 343-352.

3. A subsidiary reason of some weightshould not be overlooked in seeking thecause of this secularization of the boards, andof the peculiar colour which the secularizationhas given them. In any community wherewealth and business enterprise are held insuch high esteem, men of wealth and ofaffairs are not only deferred to, but theircountenance is sought from one motive andanother. At the same time election to one ofthese boards has come to have a high valueas an honourable distinction. Such election orappointment therefore is often sought from

6. Cf. Bacon, Essays -- "Of Cunning", and"Of Wisdom for a Man's Self."

7. Cf. ch. viii, especially pp. 242-269.

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an establishment for the conservation andadvancement of the higher learning, devotedto a disinterested pursuit of knowledge. Assuch, it consists of a body of scholars andscientists, each and several of whomnecessarily goes to his work on his owninitiative and pursues it in his own way. Thiswork necessarily follows an orderly sequenceand procedure, and so takes on a systematicform, of an organic kind. But the system andorder that so govern the work, and that comeinto view in its procedure and results, are thelogical system and order of intellectualenterprise, not the mechanical or statisticalsystematization that goes into effect in themanagement of an industrial plant or thefinanciering of a business corporation.

CHAPTER IIIThe Academic Administration and Policy

Men dilate on the high necessity of abusinesslike organization and control of theuniversity, its equipment, personnel androutine. What is had in mind in this insistenceon an efficient system is that thesecorporations of learning shall set their affairsin order after the pattern of a well-conductedbusiness concern. In this view the universityis conceived as a business house dealing inmerchantable knowledge, placed under thegoverning hand of a captain of erudition,whose office it is to turn the means in hand toaccount in the largest feasible output. It is acorporation with large funds, and for menbiased by their workday training in businessaffairs it comes as a matter of course to ratethe university in terms of investment andturnover. Hence the insistence on businesscapacity in the executive heads of theuniversities, and hence also the extensiverange of businesslike duties and powers thatdevolve on them.

Those items of human intelligence andinitiative that go to make up the pursuit ofknowledge, and that are embodied insystematic form in its conclusions, do not lendthemselves to quantitative statement, andcan not be made to appear on a balance-sheet. Neither can that intellectual initiativeand proclivity that goes in as theindispensable motive force in the pursuit oflearning be reduced to any known terms ofsubordination, obedience, or authoritativedirection. No scholar or scientist can becomean employee in respect of his scholarly or

Yet when all these sophistications ofpractical wisdom are duly allowed for, the factremains that the university is, in usage,precedent, and common sense preconception,

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scientific work. Mechanical systematizationand authoritative control can in thesepremises not reach beyond the materialcircumstances that condition the work inhand, nor can it in these external matterswith good effect go farther than is necessaryto supply the material ways and meansrequisite to the work, and to adapt them tothe peculiar needs of any given line of inquiryor group of scholars. In order to their bestefficiency, and indeed in the degree in whichefficiency in this field of activity is to beattained at all, the executive officers of theuniversity must stand in the relation ofassistants serving the needs and catering tothe idiosyncrasies of the body of scholars andscientists that make up the university;(1*) inthe degree in which the converse relation isallowed to take effect, the unavoidableconsequence is wasteful defeat. A free handis the first and abiding requisite of scholarlyand scientific work.

and command. By usage and precedent it isincumbent on him to govern the academicpersonnel and equipment with an eye singleto the pursuit of knowledge, and so toconduct its affairs as will most effectuallycompass that end. That is to say he must soadminister his office as best to serve thescholarly needs of the academic staff, dueregard being scrupulously had to theidiosyncrasies, and even to the vagaries, ofthe men whose work he is called on tofurther. But by patent understanding, if not byexplicit stipulation, from the side of thegoverning board, fortified by thepreconceptions of the laity at large to thesame effect, he is held to such aconspicuously efficient employment of themeans in hand as will gratify those who lookfor a voluminous turnover. To this end hemust keep the academic administration andits activity constantly in the public eye, withsuch "pomp and circumstance" of untiringurgency and expedition as will carry theconviction abroad that the university underhis management is a highly successful goingconcern, and he must be able to show byitemized accounts that the volume of outputis such as to warrant the investment. So theequipment and personnel must be organizedinto a facile and orderly working force, held

Now, in accepting office as executivehead of a university, the incumbentnecessarily accepts all the conditions thatattach to the administration of his office,whether by usage and common senseexpectation, by express arrangement, or bypatent understanding with the board to whichhe owes his elevation to this post of dignity

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under the directive control of the captain oferudition at every point, and so articulatedand standardized that its rate of speed andthe volume of its current output can beexhibited to full statistical effect as it runs.

run is of little use; so it can wait, and it readilybecomes a habit with the busy executive tolet it wait.

It should be kept in mind also that theincumbent of executive office is presumably aman of businesslike qualifications, rather thanof scholarly insight, -- the method of selectingthe executive heads under the presentregime makes that nearly a matter of course.As such he will in his own right more readilyappreciate those results of his ownmanagement that show up with something ofthe glare of publicity, as contrasted with theslow-moving and often obscure working ofinquiry that lies (commonly) somewhatbeyond his intellectual horizon. So that withslight misgivings, if any, he takes to themethods of organization and control thathave commended themselves in that currentbusiness enterprise to which it is his ambitionto assimilate the corporation of learning.

The university is to make good both as acorporation of learning and as a businessconcern dealing in standardized erudition,and the executive head necessarily assumesthe responsibility of making it count whollyand unreservedly in each of these divergent,if not incompatible lines.(2*) Humanlyspeaking, it follows by necessaryconsequence that he will first and alwaystake care of those duties that are mostjealously insisted on by the powers to whomhe is accountable, and the due performanceof which will at the same time yield somesufficiently tangible evidence of his efficiency.That other, more recondite side of theuniversity's work that has substantially to dowith the higher learning is not readily set outin the form of statistical exhibits, at the best,and can ordinarily come to appraisal andpopular appreciation only in the long run. Theneed of a businesslike showing is instant andimperative, particularly in a business era oflarge turnover and quick returns, and to meetthis need the uneventful scholastic life thatcounts toward the higher learning in the long

These precedents of business practicethat are to afford guidance to the captain oferudition are, of course, the precedents ofcompetitive business. It is one of theunwritten, and commonly unspoken,commonplaces lying at the root of modernacademic policy that the various universitiesare competitors for the traffic in merchantableinstruction, in much the same fashion as rival

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establishments in the retail trade compete forcustom. Indeed, the modern departmentstore offers a felicitous analogy, that hasalready been found serviceable in illustrationof the American university's position in thisrespect, by those who speak for the presentregime as well as by its critics. The fact thatthe universities are assumed to beirreconcilable competitors, both in the popularapprehension and as evidenced by themanoeuvres of their several directors, is toonotorious to be denied by any but theinterested parties. Now and again it isformally denied by one and another amongthe competing captains of erudition, but thereason for such denial is the need of it.(3*)

the details of his administration, so long as heshows gratifying results. He must be a strongman; that is to say, a capable man of affairs,tenacious and resourceful in turning themeans at hand to account for this purpose,and easily content to let the end justify themeans. He must be a man of scrupulousintegrity, so far as may conduce to hissuccess, but with a shrewd eye to the limitswithin which honesty is the best policy, forthe purpose in hand. He must have fullcommand of the means entrusted to him andfull control of the force of employees andsubordinates who are to work under hisdirection, and he must be able to rely on theinstant and unwavering loyalty of his staff inany line of policy on which he may decide toenter. He must therefore have free power toappoint and dismiss, and to reward andpunish, limited only by the formal ratificationof his decisions by the board of directors whowill be careful not to interfere or inquireunduly in these matters, -- so long as theirstrong man shows results.

Now, the duties of the executive head ofa competitive business concern are of astrategic nature, the object of hismanagement being to get the better of rivalconcerns and to engross the trade. To thisend it is indispensable that he should be a"strong man" and should have a free hand, --though perhaps under the general andtolerant surveillance of his board of directors.Any wise board of directors, and in thedegree in which they are endowed with therequisite wisdom, will be careful to give theirgeneral manager full discretion, and not tohamper him with too close an accounting of

The details and objective of his strategyneed not be known to the members of thestaff; indeed, all that does not concern themexcept in the most general way. They are hiscreatures, and are responsible only to himand only for the due performance of the tasks

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assigned them; and they need know only somuch as will enable them to give ready andintelligent support to the moves made bytheir chief from day to day. The members ofthe staff are his employees, and their firstduty is a loyal obedience; and for thecompetitive good of the concern they mustutter no expression of criticism orunfavourable comment on the policy, actionsor personal characteristics of their chief, solong as they are in his employ. They haveeaten his bread, and it is for them to do hisbidding.

render certain services and turn out certainscheduled vendible results.

The chief may take advice; and, as iscommonly the practice in analogouscircumstances in commercial business, he willbe likely to draw about him from among thefaculty a conveniently small number ofadvisers who are in sympathy with his ownambitions, and who will in this way form anunofficial council, or cabinet, or "junta," towhom he can turn for informal, anonymousand irresponsible, advice and moral supportat any juncture. He will also, in compliancewith charter stipulations and parliamentaryusage, have certain officially recognizedadvisers, -- the various deans, advisorycommittees, Academic Council, UniversitySenate, and the like, -- with whom he sharesresponsibility, particularly for measures ofdoubtful popularity, and whose advice heformally takes coram publico; but he can notwell share discretion with these, except onadministrative matters of inconsequentialdetail. For reasons of practical efficiency,discretion must be undivided in anycompetitive enterprise. There is much fine-spun strategy to be taken care of under coverof night and cloud.

Such is the object-lesson afforded bybusiness practice as it bears on the dutiesincumbent on the academic head and on thepowers of office delegated to him. It isneedless to remark on what is a fact ofcommon notoriety, that this rule drawn fromthe conduct of competitive business iscommonly applied without substantialabatement in the conduct of academicaffairs.(4*)

Under this rule the academic staffbecomes a body of graded subalterns, whoshare confidence of the chief in varyingdegrees, but who no decisive voice in thepolicy or the conduct of affairs of the concernin whose pay they are held. The faculty isconceived as a body of employees, hired to

But the academic tradition, which stilldrags on the hands of the captains of

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erudition, has not left the ground preparedfor such a clean-cut businesslike organizationand such a campaign of competitive strategy.By tradition the faculty is the keeper of theacademic interests of the university andmakes up a body of loosely-boundnoncompetitive co-partners, with no view tostrategic team play and no collective ulteriorambition, least of all with a view toengrossing the trade. By tradition, and indeedcommonly by explicit proviso, the conduct ofthe university's academic affairs vests formallyin the president, with the advice and consentof the faculty, or of the general body of seniormembers of the faculty. In due observance ofthese traditions, and of the scholasticpurposes notoriously underlying all universitylife, certain forms of disinterested zeal mustbe adhered to in all official pronouncements ofthe executive, as well as certain punctilios ofconference and advisement between thedirective head and the academic staff.

formal professions of disinterested zeal forthe cause of learning that he is by traditionrequired to make from time to time. All thatmay reasonably be counted on under thesetrying circumstances is that he should do thebest he can, -- to save the formalities andsecure the substance. To compass thesedifficult incongruities, he will, as alreadyremarked above, necessarily gather abouthim, within the general body of the academicpersonnel, a corps of trusted advisors andagents, whose qualifications for their peculiarwork is an intelligent sympathy with theirchief's ideals and methods and an unreservedsubservience to his aims, -- unless it shouldcome to pass, as may happen in case itsmembers are men of force and ingenuity, thatthis unofficial cabinet should take over thedirection of affairs and work out their ownaims and purposes under cover of the chief'sostensibly autocratic rule.

Among these aids and advisers will befound at least a proportion of the higheradministrative officials, and among thenumber it is fairly indispensable to include oneor more adroit parliamentarians, competent toprocure the necessary modicum of sanctionfor all arbitrary acts of the executive, from adistrustful faculty convened as a deliberativebody. These men must be at least partially in

All of which makes the work of theexecutive head less easy and ingenuous thanit might be. The substantial demands of hisposition as chief of a competitive business aresomewhat widely out of touch with theseforms of divided responsibility that must(formally) be observed in administering hisduties, and equally out of touch with the

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the confidence of the executive head. Fromthe circumstances of the case it also followsthat they will commonly occupy an advancedacademic rank, and so will take a high(putative) rank as scholars and scientists.High academic rank comes of necessity tothese men who serve as coadjutors andvehicles of the executive policy, as does alsothe relatively high pay that goes with highrank; both are required as a reward of meritand an incitement to a zealous serviceabilityon the one hand, and to keep theadministration in countenance on the otherhand by giving the requisite dignity to itsagents. They will be selected on the samegeneral grounds of fitness as their chief, --administrative facility, plausibility, proficiencyas public speakers and parliamentarians,ready versatility of convictions, and a staunchloyalty to their bread. Experience teachesthat scholarly or scientific capacity does notenter in any appreciable measure among thequalifications so required for responsibleacademic office, beyond what may thriftilyserve to mask the conventional decencies ofthe case.

of his staff, to reward the good and faithfulservant and to abase the recalcitrant.Otherwise discipline would be a difficultmatter, and the formally requisite "advice andconsent" could be procured only tardily andgrudgingly.

Admitting such reservations andabatement as may be due, it is to be saidthat the existing organization of academiccontrol under business principles falls more orless nearly into the form outlined above. Theperfected type, as sketched in the lastparagraphs, has doubtless not been fullyachieved in practice hitherto, unless it be inone or another of the newer establishmentswith large ambitions and endowment, andwith few traditions to hamper the working outof the system. The incursion of businessprinciples into the academic community is alsoof relatively recent date, and should not yethave had time to pervade the organizationthroughout and with full effect; so that theregime of competitive strategy should as yetbe neither so far advanced nor so secure amatter of course as may fairly be expected inthe near future. Yet the rate of advance alongthis line, and the measure of presentachievement, are more considerable thaneven a very sanguine advocate of business

It is, further, of the essence of thisscheme of academic control that the captainof erudition should freely exercise the powerof academic life and death over the members

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principles could have dared to look for acouple of decades ago.

the current regime and on the question ofpossible relief and remedy for what areconsidered to be its iniquities. Under theshadow of this controversy, it is nearlyunavoidable that any expression or citation offact that will bear a partisan construction willhabitually be so construed. The vehiclenecessarily employed must almostunavoidably infuse the analysis with anunintended colour of bias, to one side or theother of the presumed merits of the case. Adegree of patient attention is therefore dueat points where the facts cited, and thecharacterization of these facts and theirbearing, would seem, on a superficial view, tobear construction as controversial matter.

In so far as these matters are still inprocess of growth, rather than at their fullfruition, it follows that any analysis of theeffects of this regime must be in some degreespeculative, and must at times deal with thedrift of things as much as with accomplishedfact. Yet such an inquiry must approach itssubject as an episode of history, and mustdeal with the personal figures and theincidents of this growth objectively, asphenomena thrown up to view by the play ofcircumstances in the dispassionate give andtake of institutional change. Such animpersonal attitude, it is perhaps needless toremark, is not always easy to maintain indealing with facts of so personal, and often ofso animated, a character. Particularly will anobserver who has seen these incidents fromthe middle and in the making find it difficultuniformly to preserve that aloof perspectivethat will serve the ends of an historicalappreciation. The difficulty is increased andcomplicated by the necessity of employingterms, descriptions and incidents that havebeen habitually employed in currentcontroversy, often with a marked animus. Menhave taken sides on these matters, and soare engaged in controversy on the merits of

In this episode of institutional growth,plainly, the executive head is the centralfigure. The light fails on him rather than onthe forces that move him, and it comes as amatter of course to pass opinions on theresulting incidents and consequences, as theoutcome of his free initiative rather than ofthe circumstances whose creature he is. Nodoubt, his initiative, if any, is a powerful factorin the case, but it is after all a factor oftransmission and commutation rather than ofgenesis and self-direction; for he is chosen forthe style and measure of initiative with whichhe is endowed, and unless he shall be found

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to measure up to expectations in kind anddegree in this matter he will go in the discard,and his personal ideals and initiative willcount as little more than a transientobstruction. He will hold his place, and willcount as a creative force in his world, in muchthe same degree in which he responds withready flexibility to the impact of those forcesof popular sentiment and class conviction thathave called him to be their servant. Only socan he be a "strong man"; only in so far as,by fortunate bent or by its absence, he isenabled to move resistlessly with theparallelogram of forces.

essence of the case in competitive business.It is, also, of no advantage to learning toengross the trade. Tradition and presentnecessity alike demand that the body ofscholars and scientists who make up theuniversity must be vested with full powers ofself-direction, without ulterior consideration. Auniversity can remain a corporation oflearning, de facto, on no other basis.

As has already been remarked, businessmethods of course have their place in thecorporation's fiscal affairs and in the office-work incident to the care of its materialequipment. As regards these items theuniversity is a business concern, and nodiscussion of these topics would be in placehere. These things concern the university onlyin its externals, and they do not properly fallwithin the scope of academic policy oracademic administration. They come intoconsideration here only in so far as a livelyregard for them may, as it sometimes does,divert the forces of the establishment from itsostensible purpose.

The exigencies of a businesslikeadministration demand that there be nodivision of powers between the academicexecutive and the academic staff; but theexigencies of the higher learning require thatthe scholars and scientists must be left quitefree to follow their own bent in conductingtheir own work. In the nature of things thiswork cannot be carried on effectually undercoercive rule. Scientific inquiry can not bepursued under direction of a layman in theperson of a superior officer. Also, learning is,in the nature of things, not a competitivebusiness and can make no use of finesse,diplomatic equivocation and tactful regard forpopular prejudices, such as are of the

Under the rule imposed by thosebusinesslike preconceptions that decide hisselection for office, the first duty of theexecutive head is to see to the organizationof an administrative machinery for thedirection of the university's internal affairs,

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and the establishment of a facile and rigoroussystem of accountancy for the control andexhibition of the academic work. In the samemeasure in which such a system goes intoeffect the principles of competitive businesswill permeate the administration in alldirections; in the personnel of the academicstaff, in the control and intercourse ofteachers and students, in the schedule ofinstruction, in the disposition of the materialequipment, in the public exhibits andceremonial of the university, as well as in itspecuniary concerns.

bureaucratic system is greater the morecentralized and coercive the control to whichthe academic work is to be subject; and thedegree of control to be exercised will begreater the more urgent the felt need of astrict and large accountancy may be. All ofwhich resolves itself into a question as to thepurposes sought by the installation of such asystem.

For the everyday work of the higherlearning, as such, little of a hierarchicalgradation, and less of bureaucraticsubordination, is needful or serviceable; andvery little of statistical uniformity, standardunits of erudition, or detail accountancy, is atall feasible. This work is not of a mechanicalcharacter and does not lend itself, either in itsmethods or its results, to any mechanicallystandardized scheme of measurements or toa system of accounting per cent per time unit.This range of instruction consists substantiallyin the facilitation of scholarly and scientifichabits of thought, and the imposition of anyappreciable measure of such standardizationand accounting must unavoidably weakenand vitiate the work of instruction, in just thedegree in which the imposed system iseffective.

Within the range of academic interestsproper, these business principles primarilyaffect the personnel and the routine ofinstruction. Here their application immediatelyresults in an administrative system of bureauxor departments, a hierarchical gradation ofthe members of the staff, and a rigorousparcelment and standardization of theinstruction offered. Some such system isindispensable to any effective control of thework from above, such as is aimed at in theappointment of a discretionary head of theuniversity, -- particularly in a large school; andthe measure of control desired will decide thedegree of thoroughness with which thisbureaucratic organization is to be carriedthrough. The need of a well-devised

It is not within the purpose of this inquiryto go into the bearing of all this on the

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collegiate (undergraduate) departments or onthe professional and technical schoolsassociated with the university proper inAmerican practice. But something of a detaileddiscussion of the system and principles ofcontrol applied in these schools is necessarybecause of its incidental bearing on graduatework.

While it is the work of science andscholarship, roughly what is known inAmerican usage as graduate work, that givesthe university its rank as a seat of learningand keeps it in countenance as such withlaymen and scholars, it is the undergraduateschool, or college, that still continues to bethe larger fact, and that still engages thegreater and more immediate attention inuniversity management. This is due in part toreceived American usage, in part to its morereadily serving the ends of competitiveambition; and it is a fact in the currentacademic situation which must be counted inas a chronic discrepancy, not to be got clearof or to be appreciably mitigated so long asbusiness principles continue to rule.

It is plain beyond need of specificationthat in the practical view of the public atlarge, and of the governing boards, theuniversity is primarily an undergraduateschool, with graduate and professionaldepartments added to it. And it is similarlyplain that the captains of erudition chosen asexecutive heads share the samepreconceptions, and go to their work with aview primarily to the needs of theirundergraduate departments. The businesslikeorder and system introduced into theuniversities, therefore, are designed primarilyto meet the needs and exploit thepossibilities of the undergraduate school; but,by force of habit, by a desire of uniformity, bya desire to control and exhibit the personneland their work, by heedless imitation, or whatnot, it invariably happens that the samescheme of order and system is extended tocover the graduate work also.

What counts toward the advancement oflearning and the scholarly character of theuniversity is the graduate work, but whatgives statistically formidable results in theway of a numerous enrolment, many degreesconferred, public exhibitions, courses ofinstruction -- in short what rolls up a largeshowing of turnover and output -- is theperfunctory work of the undergraduatedepartment, as well as the array of vocationalschools latterly subjoined as auxiliaries to thisend. Hence the needs and possibilities of theundergraduate and vocational schools are

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primarily, perhaps rather solely, had in view inthe bureaucratic organization of the coursesof instruction, in the selection of thepersonnel, in the divisions of the school year,as well as in the various accessory attractionsoffered, such as the athletic equipment,facilities for fraternity and other club life,debates, exhibitions and festivities, and thecustomary routine of devotional amenitiesunder official sanction.

the due term of residence at some reputableuniversity, with the collegiate degreecertifying honourable discharge -- has becomea requisite of gentility. So considerable is theresulting genteel contingent among thestudents, and so desirable is their enrolmentand the countenance of their presence, in theapprehension of the university directorate,that the academic organization is in greatpart, and of strategic necessity, adaptedprimarily to their needs.The undergraduate or collegiate schools,

that now bulk so large in point of numbers aswell as in the attention devoted to theirwelfare in academic management, haveundergone certain notable changes in otherrespects than size, since the period of thatshifting from clerical control to a businessadministration that marks the beginning ofthe current regime. Concomitant with theirgrowth in numbers they have taken over anincreasing volume of other functions thansuch as bear directly on matters of learning.At the same time the increase in numbers hasbrought a change in the scholastic complexionof this enlarged student body, of such anature that a very appreciable proportion ofthese students no longer seek residence atthe universities with a view to the pursuit ofknowledge, even ostensibly. By force ofconventional propriety a "college course" --

This contingent, and the general body ofstudents in so far as this contingent from theleisure class has leavened the lump, are notso seriously interested in their studies thatthey can in any degree be counted on to seekknowledge on their own initiative. At thesame time they have other interests thatmust be taken care of by the school, on painof losing their custom and their good will, tothe detriment of the university's standing ingenteel circles and to the serious decline inenrolment which their withdrawal wouldoccasion. Hence college sports come in for anever increasing attention and take anincreasingly prominent and voluminous placein the university's life; as do also otherpolitely blameless ways and means ofdissipation, such as fraternities, clubs,exhibitions, and the extensive range of extra-

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scholastic traffic known as "studentactivities."

competitive concern, a close-cut mechanicalstandardization, uniformity, surveillance andaccountancy are indispensable. As regardsthe schedule of instruction, bona fidestudents will require but little exactingsurveillance in their work, and little in the wayof an apparatus of control. But the collegiateschool has to deal with a large body ofstudents, many of whom have little abidinginterest in their academic work, beyond theacademic credits necessary to be accumulatedfor honourable discharge, -- indeed theirscholastic interest may fairly be said to centrein unearned credits.

At the same time the usual and averageage of the college students has been slowlyfalling farther back into the period ofadolescence; and the irregularities anduncertain temper of that uneasy periodconsequently are calling for more detailedsurveillance and a more circumspectadministration of college discipline. With abody of students whose everyday interest, asmay be said without exaggeration, lies in themain elsewhere than in the pursuit ofknowledge, and with an imperative traditionstill standing over that requires the college tobe (ostensibly at least) an establishment forthe instruction of the youth, it becomesnecessary to organize this instruction on acoercive plan, and hence to itemize thescholastic tasks of the inmates with greatnicety of subdivision and with a meticulousregard to an exact equivalence as betweenthe various courses and items of instructionto which they are to be subjected. Likewiseas regards the limits of permissibleirregularities of conduct and excursions intothe field of sports and social amenities.

For this reason, and also because of thedifficulty of controlling a large volume ofperfunctory labour, such as is involved inundergraduate instruction, the instructionoffered must be reduced to standard units oftime, grade and volume. Each unit of workrequired, or rather of credit allowed, in thismechanically drawn scheme of tasks must bethe equivalent of all the other units;otherwise a comprehensive system ofscholastic accountancy will not be practicable,and injustice and irritation will result bothamong the pupils and the schoolmasters. Forthe greater facility and accuracy in conductingthis scholastic accountancy, as well as with aview to the greater impressiveness of the

To meet the necessities of this difficultcontrol, and to meet them always withoutjeopardizing the interests of the school as a

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published schedule of courses offered, thesemechanical units of academic bullion areincreased in number and decreased in weightand volume; until the parcelment andmechanical balance of units reaches a pointnot easily credible to any outsider who mightnaively consider the requirements ofscholarship to be an imperative factor inacademic administration. There is a well-considered preference for semi-annual orquarterly periods of instruction, with acorresponding time limit on the coursesoffered; and the parcelment of credits iscarried somewhat beyond the point which thissegmentation of the school year wouldindicate. So also there prevails a system ofgrading the credits allowed for theperformance of these units of task-work, bypercentages (often carried out to decimals) orby some equivalent scheme of notation; andin the more solicitously perfected schemes ofcontrol of this task-work, the percentages soturned in will then be further digested andweighed by expert accountants, who reviseand correct these returns by the help ofstatistically ascertained index numbers thatexpress the mean average margin of error tobe allowed for each individual student orinstructor.

In point of formal protestation, thestandards set up in this scholasticaccountancy are high and rigorous; inapplication, the exactions of the credit systemmust not be enforced in so inflexible a spiritas to estrange that much-desired contingentof genteel students whose need of anhonourable discharge is greater than theirlove of knowledge. Neither must its demandson the student's time and energy be allowedseriously to interfere with those sports and"student activities" that make up the chiefattraction of college life for a large proportionof the university's young men, and that are, inthe apprehension of many, so essential a partin the training of the modern gentleman.

Such a system of accountancy acts tobreak the continuity and consistency of thework of instruction and to divert the interestof the students from the work in hand to themaking of a passable record in terms of theacademic "miner's inch." Typically, this miner'sinch is measured in terms of standard text pertime unit, and the immediate objective ofteacher and student so becomes thecompassing of a given volume of prescribedtext, in print or lecture form, -- leading up tothe broad principle: "Nichts als was im Buchesteht." Which puts a premium on mediocrityand perfunctory work, and brings academic

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life to revolve about the office of the Keeperof the Tape and Sealing Wax. Evidently thisorganization of departments, schedules ofinstruction, and scheme of scholasticaccountancy, is a matter that calls for insightand sobriety on the part of the executive; andin point of fact there is much deliberation andsolicitude spent on this behalf.

for such prestige as may procure custom, andthese potential customers on whom it isdesirable to produce an impression, especiallyas regards the undergraduate school, arecommonly laymen who are expected to go oncurrent rumour and the outward appearanceof things academic.

The exigencies of competitive business,particularly of such retail trade as seemschiefly to have contributed to the principles ofbusinesslike management in the competingschools, throw the stress on appearances. Insuch business, the "good will" of the concernhas come to be (ordinarily) its most valuedand most valuable asset. The visible successof the concern, or rather the sentiments ofconfidence and dependence inspired inpotential customers by this visible success, iscapitalized as the chief and most substantialelement of the concern's intangible assets.And the accumulation of such intangibleassets, to be gained by convincingappearances and well-devisedpronouncements, has become the chief objectof persistent endeavour on the part ofsagacious business men engaged in suchlines of traffic. This, that the substance mustnot be allowed to stand in the way of theshadow, is one of the fundamental principlesof management which the universities, under

The installation of a rounded system ofscholastic accountancy brings with it, if it doesnot presume, a painstaking distribution of thepersonnel and the courses of instruction intoa series of bureaux or departments. Such anorganization of the forces of theestablishment facilitates the oversight andcontrol of the work, at the same time that itallows the array of scheduled means,appliances and personnel at its disposal to bestatistically displayed to better effect. Underexisting circumstances of rivalry among theseinstitutions of learning, there is need of muchshrewd management to make all the availableforces of the establishment count toward thecompetitive end; and in this composition it isthe part of worldly wisdom to see thatappearances may often be of graverconsequence than achievement, -- as is truein all competitive business that addresses itsappeal to a large and scattered body ofcustomers. The competition is for custom, and

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the guidance of business ideals, have takenover from the wisdom of the businesscommunity.

with the laity rather than with the scholarlyclasses. And it is safe to say that a somewhatmore meretricious showing of magnitude anderudition will pass scrutiny, for the time being,with the laity than with the scholars. Whichsuggests the expediency for the university, asa going concern competing for the traffic, totake recourse to a somewhat more tawdryexhibition of quasi-scholarly feats, and asomewhat livelier parade of academicsplendour and magnitude, than mightotherwise be to the taste of such a body ofscholars and scientists. As a businessproposition, the meretricious quality inherentin any given line of publicity should notconsign it to neglect, so long as it is foundeffectual for the end in view.

Accepting the point of view of thecaptains of erudition, and so looking on theuniversities as competitive business concerns,and speaking in terms applicable to businessconcerns generally, the assets of theseseminaries of learning are in an exceptionaldegree intangible assets. There is, of course,the large item of the good-will or prestige ofthe university as a whole, considered as agoing concern. But this collective body of"immaterial capital" that pertains to theuniversity at large is made up in great part ofthe prestige of divers eminent personsincluded among its personnel andincorporated in the fabric of its bureaucraticdepartments, and not least the prestige of itsexecutive head; in very much the same wayas the like will hold true, e. g., for anycompany of public amusement, itinerant orsedentary, such as a circus, a theatrical oroperatic enterprise, which all compete for theacclamation and custom of those to whomthese matters appeal.

Competitive business concerns that findit needful to commend themselves to a largeand credulous body of customers, as, e. g.,newspapers or department stores, also find itexpedient somewhat to overstate theirfacilities for meeting all needs, as also tooverstate the measure of success which theyactually enjoy. Indeed, much talent andingenuity is spent in that behalf, as well as avery appreciable outlay of funds. So also astouches the case of the competitiveseminaries of learning. And even apart fromthe exigencies of intercollegiate rivalry, taken

For the purposes of such competition theeffectual prestige of the university as awhole, as well as the detail prestige of itspersonnel, is largely the prestige which it has

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simply as a question of sentiment it isgratifying to any university directorate toknow and to make known that the stock ofmerchantable knowledge on hand isabundant and comprehensive, and that theregistration and graduation lists make abrave numerical showing, particularly in casethe directive head is duly imbued with abusinesslike penchant for tests ofaccountancy and large figures. It followsdirectly that many and divers bureaux ordepartments are to be erected, which willthen announce courses of instruction coveringall accessible ramifications of the field oflearning, including subjects which the corps ofinstructors may not in any particular degreebe fit to undertake. A further and unavoidableconsequence of this policy, therefore, isperfunctory work.

competitive business principles, the collegiatedivision is held to be of greater importance,and requires the greater share of attention; itcomes about that the college in greatmeasure sets the pace for the whole, andthat the undergraduate scheme of credits,detailed accountancy, and mechanicalsegmentation of the work, is carried over intothe university work proper. Such a resultfollows more consistently and decisively, ofcourse, in those establishments where theline of demarkation between undergraduateand graduate instruction is advisedly blurredor disregarded. It is not altogether unusuallatterly, advisedly to efface the distinctionbetween the undergraduate and thegraduate division and endeavour to make agradual transition from the one to theother.(5*) This is done in the lessconspicuous fashion of scheduling certaincourses as Graduate and Senior, and allowingscholastic credits acquired in certain coursesof the upper-class undergraduate curriculumto count toward the complement of graduatecredits required of candidates for advanceddegrees. More conspicuously and with fullereffect the same end is sought at otheruniversities by classifying the two later yearsof the undergraduate curriculum as "SeniorCollege"; with the avowed intention that

For establishments that are substantiallyof secondary school character, includingcolleges and undergraduate departments,such a result may not be of extremely seriousconsequence; since much of the instruction inthese schools is of a perfunctory kind anyway.But since the university and the college are, inpoint of formal status and of administrativemachinery, divisions of the sameestablishment and subject to the sameexecutive control; and since, under

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these two concluding years of the usual fourare scholastically to lie between the stricterundergraduate domain, now reduced to thefreshman and sophomore years, on the onehand, and the graduate division as such onthe other hand. This "Senior College" divisionso comes to be accounted in some sort ahalfway graduate school; with the result thatit is assimilated to the graduate work in thefashion of its accountancy and control; orrather, the essentially undergraduatemethods that still continue to rule unabatedin the machinery and management of this"senior college" are carried over by easysophistication of expediency into thegraduate work; which so takes on the usual,conventionally perfunctory, character thatbelongs by tradition and necessity to theundergraduate division; whereby in effect theinstruction scheduled as "graduate" is, in sofar, taken out of the domain of the higherlearning and thrown back into the hands ofthe schoolmasters. The rest of the currentundergraduate standards and discipline tendsstrongly to follow the lead so given and towork over by insensible precession into thegraduate school; until in the consummate endthe free pursuit of learning should no longerfind a standing-place in the university exceptby subreption and dissimulation; much after

the fashion in which, in the days ofecclesiastical control and scholastic lore, thepursuit of disinterested knowledge wasconstrained to a shifty simulation of interestin theological speculations and adisingenuous formal conformity to thestandards and methods that were approvedfor indoctrination in divinity.

Perfunctory work and mechanicalaccountancy may be sufficiently detrimental inthe undergraduate curriculum, but it seemsaltogether and increasingly a matter of coursein that section; but it is in the graduatedivision that it has its gravest consequences.Yet even in undergraduate work it remainstrue, as it does in all education in a degree,that the instruction can be carried on withbest effect only on the ground of anabsorbing interest on the part of theinstructor; and he can do the work of ateacher as it should be done only so long ashe continues to take an investigator's interestin the subject in which he is called on toteach. He must be actively engaged in anendeavour to extend the bounds ofknowledge at the point where his work asteacher falls. He must be a specialist offeringinstruction in the specialty with which he isoccupied; and the instruction offered canreach its best efficiency only in so far as it is

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incidental to an aggressive campaign ofinquiry on the teacher's part.

better than superficial attention if the timeand energy of the instructors are dissipatedover a scattering variety of courses. Goodwork, that is to say sufficiently good work tobe worth while, requires a free hand and afree margin of time and energy. If the numberof distinct lines of instruction is relativelylarge, and if, as happens, they are distributedscatteringly among the members of the staff,with a relatively large assignment of hours toeach man, so as to admit no assured andpersistent concentration on any point, the runof instruction offered will necessarily be of thisperfunctory character, and will therefore be ofsuch amateurish and pedantic quality. Suchan outcome is by no means unusual whereregard is had primarily to covering a giveninclusive range of subjects, rather than to thespecial aptitudes of the departmental corps;as indeed commonly happens, and ashappens particularly where the school or thedepartment in question is sufficiently imbuedwith a businesslike spirit of academic rivalry.It follows necessarily and in due measure onthe introduction of the principles, methods,and tests of competitive business into thework of instruction.(6*)

But no one is a competent specialist inmany lines; nor is any one competent to carryon an assorted parcel of special inquiries, cutto a standard unit of time and volume. Oneline, somewhat narrowly bounded as aspecialty, measures the capacity of thecommon run of talented scientists andscholars for first-class work, whatever side-lines of subsidiary interest they may have inhand and may carry out with passablycreditable results. The alternative isschoolmaster's task-work; or if the pretenseof advanced learning must be kept up, thealternative which not unusually goes intoeffect is amateurish pedantry, with thecharlatan ever in the near background. Byand large, if the number of distinct lines ofinstruction offered by a given departmentalcorps appreciably exceeds the number of menon the staff, some of these lines or courseswill of necessity be carried in a perfunctoryfashion and can only give mediocre results, atthe best. What practically happens at theworst is better left under the cover of adecent reticence.

Even those preferred lines of instructionwhich in their own right engage the seriousinterest of the instructors can get nothing

Under these principles of accountancyand hierarchical control, each of the severalbureaux of erudition -- commonly called

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departments -- is a competitor with all itsfellow bureaux in the (thrifty) apportionmentof funds and equipment, -- for thebusinesslike university managementhabitually harbours a larger number ofdepartments than its disposable means willadequately provide for. So also eachdepartment competes with its fellowdepartments, as well as with similardepartments in rival universities, for aclientele in the way of student registrations.These two lines of competition are closelyinterdependent. An adverse statisticalshowing in the number of students, or in therange, variety and volume of courses ofinstruction offered by any given department;is rated by the businesslike generaldirectorate as a shortcoming, and it is therefore likely to bring a reduction of allowances.At the same time, of course, such an adverseshowing reflects discredit on the chief ofbureau, while it also wounds his self-respect.The final test of competency in such a chief,under business principles, is the statisticaltest; in part because numerical tests have aseductive air of businesslike accountancy, andalso because statistical exhibits have a readyuse as advertising material to be employed inappeals to the potential donors and the

unlearned patrons of the university, as wellas to the public at large.

So the chief of bureau, with the aid andconcurrence of his loyal staff, will aim to offeras extensive and varied a range of instructionas the field assigned his department willadmit. Out of this competitive aggrandizementof departments there may even arise adiplomatic contention between heads ofdepartments, as to the precise frontiersbetween their respective domains; eachbeing ambitious to magnify his office andacquire merit by including much of the fieldand many of the students under his owndominion.(7*) Such a conflict of jurisdiction isparticularly apt to arise in case, as mayhappen, the number of scholasticdepartments exceeds the number of patentlydistinguishable provinces of knowledge; andcompetitive business principles constantlyafford provocation to such a discrepancy, atthe hands of an executive pushed by theneed of a show of magnitude and large traffic.It follows, further, from these circumstances,that wherever contiguous academicdepartments are occupied with such closelyrelated subject matter as would place them ina position to supplement one another's work,the negotiations involved in jealouslyguarding their respective frontiers may even

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take on an acrimonious tone, and may involvemore or less of diplomatic mischief-making; sothat, under this rule of competitivemanagement, opportunities for mutualcomfort and aid will not infrequently becomeoccasion for mutual distrust and hindrance.

businesslike demands of a rounded andextensive schedule of courses traverse thelines of special aptitude and training, therequirements of the schedule must rule thecase; whereas, of course, the interests ofscience and scholarship, and of the bestefficiency in the instruction given, woulddecide that no demands of the schedule beallowed to interfere with each man's doingthe work which he can do best, and nothingelse.

The broader the province and the moreexuberant the range of instructionappropriated to a given department and itscorps of teachers, the more creditable will bethe statistical showing, and the more meagreand threadbare are likely to be the scientificresults. The corps of instructors will be themore consistently organized and controlledwith a view to their dispensing accumulatedknowledge, rather than to pursue furtherinquiry in the direction of their scholarlyinclination or capacity; and frequently, indeed,to dispense a larger volume and a widerrange of knowledge than they are in anyintimate sense possessed of.

A schedule of instruction drawn on suchlines of efficiency would avoid duplication ofcourse, and would curtail the number ofcourses offered by any given department tosuch a modicum as the special fitness of themembers of the staff would allow them tocarry to the best effect. It would also proceedon the obvious assumption that co-ordinatedepartments in the several universitiesshould supplement one another's work, -- anassumption obvious to the meanest academiccommon sense. But amicable workingarrangements of this kind betweendepartments of different universities, orbetween the several universities as a whole,are of course virtually barred out under thecurrent policy of competitive duplication. It isout of the question, in the same manner anddegree as the like co-operation between rival

It is by no means that no regard is hadto the special tastes, aptitudes, andattainments of the members of the staff, in soapportioning the work; these things are,commonly, given such consideration as theexigencies of academic competition willpermit; but these exigencies decide that thecriterion of special fitness becomes asecondary consideration. Wherever the

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department stores is out of the question. Yetso urgently right and good is such a policy ofmutual supplement and support, except as abusiness proposition, that some exchange ofacademic civilities paraded under its cloak isconstantly offered to view in the manoeuvresof the competing captains of erudition. Thewell-published and nugatory(8*) periodicconferences of presidents commonly havesuch an ostensible purpose.

university. Into these divers and sundrychannels of sand the pressure of competitiveexpansion is continually pushing additionalhalf-equipped, under-fed and over-workedramifications of the academic body. And then,too, sane competitive business practiceinsists on economy of cost as well as a largeoutput of goods. It is "bad business" to offera better grade of goods than the marketdemands, particularly to customers who donot know the difference, or to turn out goodsat a higher cost than other competingconcerns. So business exigencies, thoseexigencies of economy to which thebusinesslike governing boards are very muchalive, preclude any department confining itselfto the work which it can do best, and at thesame stroke they preclude the authoritiesfrom dealing with any department accordingto such a measure of liberality as wouldenable it to carry on the required volume ofwork in a competent manner.

Competitive enterprise, reinforced with asentimental penchant for large figures,demands a full schedule of instruction. But tocarry such a schedule and do the work wellwould require a larger staff of instructors ineach department, and a larger allowance offunds and equipment, than businessprinciples will countenance. There is always adearth of funds, and there is always urgentuse for more than can be had; for theenterprising directorate is always eager toexpand and project the business of theconcern into new provinces of schoolwork,secondary, primary, elementary, normal,professional, technical, manual-training, artschools, schools of music, elocution, book-keeping, housekeeping, and a further varietythat will more readily occur to those who havebeen occupied with devising ways and meansof extending the competitive traffic of the

In the businesslike view of the captainsof erudition, taken from the standpoint of thecounting-house, learning and universityinstruction are a species of skilled labour, tobe hired at competitive wages and to turn outthe largest merchantable output that can beobtained by shrewd bargaining with theiremployees; whereas, of course, in point of

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fact and of its place in the economic system,the pursuit of learning is a species of leisure,and the work of instruction is one of themodes of a life so spent in "the increase anddiffusion of knowledge among men." It is tobe classed as "leisure" only in such a sense ofthat term as may apply to other forms ofactivity that have no economic, and moreparticularly no pecuniary, end or equivalence.It is by no means hereby intended to implythat such pursuit of knowledge is an aimlessor indolent manner of life; nothing likedissipation has a legitimate place in it, nor is it"idle" in any other sense than that it is extra-economic, not without derogation to beclassed as a gainful pursuit. Its aim is not theincrease or utilization of the material meansof life; nor can its spirit and employment bebought with a price. Any salary, perquisites,or similar emoluments assigned the scholarsand scientists in the service of civilization,within the university or without, are (shouldbe) in the nature of a stipend, designed tofurther the free use of their talent in theprosecution of this work, the value of which isnot of a pecuniary kind. But under the stressof businesslike management in theuniversities the drift of things sets towardletting the work of science and scholarship tothe lowest bidder, on a roughly applicable

piece-wage plan. The result is about such adegree of inefficiency, waste and stultificationas might fairly be expected; whereof thereare abundantly many examples, that humblethe pride of the scholars and rejoice the heartof the captains of erudition.

The piece-wage plan never goes intoeffect in set form, or has not hitherto done so,-- although there are schools of nominallyuniversity grade in which there is arecognized and avowed endeavour so toapportion the weekly hours of class-roomexercises to the pay of the teachers as tobring the pay per class-hour per semester toa passably uniform level for the general bodyof the staff. That the piece-wage plan has solittle avowed vogue in the academic wagescheme may at first sight seem strange; thebody of academic employees are asdefenceless and unorganized as any class ofthe wage-earning population, and it is amongthe unorganized and helpless that the piece-wage plan is commonly applied with the besteffect; at the same time the system ofscholastic accountancy, worked out for otherpurposes and already applied both toinstructors, to courses of instruction, and todivisions of the school year, has alreadyreduced all the relevant items to suchstandard units and thorough equivalence as

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should make a system of piece-wages almosta matter of course. That it has not formallybeen put in practice appears to be due totradition, and to that long-term commonsense appreciation of the nature of learningthat will always balk at rating this work as afrankly materialistic and pecuniary occupation.The academic personnel, e. g., are unable torid themselves of a fastidious -- perhapssqueamish -persuasion that they areengaged in this work not wholly for pecuniaryreturns; and the community at large areobscurely, but irretrievably and irresponsibly,in the same suspicious frame of mind on thathead. The same unadvised and unformulatedpersuasion that academic salaries are after allnot honestly to be rated as wages, isdoubtless accountable for certain otherfeatures of academic management touchingthe pay-roll; notably the failure of theemployees to organize anything like a trades-union, or to fall into line on any workablebasis of solidarity on such an issue as awage-bargain, as also the equivocal footingon which the matter of appointments andremovals is still allowed to stand; hence alsothe unsettled ethics of the trade in thisrespect.

themselves, again, in the main into reasons ofexpedient publicity, it is desired that theenrolment should be very large and shouldalways and unremittingly increase, -- dueregard being always had, of course, to theeminent desirability of drawing into theenrolment many students from the higherlevels of gentility and pecuniary merit. To thisend it is well, as has already been remarkedabove, to announce a very full schedule ofinstruction and a free range of electivealternatives, and also to promote a completeand varied line of scholastic accessories, inthe way of athletics, clubs, fraternities,"student activities," and similar devices ofpolitely blameless dissipation.

These accessories of college life havebeen strongly on the increase since thebusiness regime has come in. They are heldto be indispensable, or unavoidable; not forscholarly work, of course, but chiefly toencourage the attendance of that decorativecontingent who take more kindly to sports,invidious intrigue and social amenities than toscholarly pursuits. Notoriously, this contingentis, on the whole, a serious drawback to thecause of learning, but it adds appreciably, andadds a highly valued contribution, to thenumber enrolled; and it gives also a certain,highly appreciated, loud tone ("college spirit")

For divers reasons, but mainly reasons ofcompetitive statistics, which resolve

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to the student body; and so it is felt tobenefit the corporation of learning by drawingpublic attention. Corporate means expendedin provision for these academic accessories --"side shows," as certain ill-disposed criticshave sometimes called them -- are commonlyfelt to be well spent. Persons who are notintimately familiar with American college lifehave little appreciation of the grave solicitudegiven to these matters.

of the graces of gentility and a suitable placeof residence for young men of spendthrifthabits. The improvement sought in theseendeavours is not so much the increase andacceleration of scholarly pursuits, as afurthering of "social" proficiency. A"gentleman's college" is an establishment inwhich scholarship is advisedly madesubordinate to genteel dissipation, to agrounding in those methods of conspicuousconsumption that should engage the thoughtand energies of a well-to-do man of theworld. Such an ideal, more or less overtly,appears to be gaining ground among thelarger universities; and, needless to say, it istherefore also gaining, by force of precedentand imitation, among the younger schoolsengaged in more of a struggle to achieve asecure footing of respectability.

During some considerable number ofyears past, while the undergraduateenrolment at the universities has beenincreasing rapidly, the attitude of theauthorities has progressively beenundergoing a notable change touching thesematters of extra-scholastic amenity. It is ingreat measure a continuation of changes thathave visibly been going forward in the olderuniversities of the country for a longer period,and it is organically bound up with thegeneral shifting of ground that marks theincursion of business principles.

Its bearing on the higher learning is, ofcourse, sufficiently plain; and its intimateconnection with business principles at largeshould be equally plain. The scheme ofreputability in the pecuniary culture comprisesnot only the imperative duty of acquiringsomething more than an equitable share ofthe community's wealth, but also the dutifulprivilege of spending this acquired wealth,and the leisure that goes with it, in areputably conspicuous way, according to the

While the authorities have turned theirattention primarily to the undergraduatedivision and its numerical increase, they haveat the same time, and largely with the sameend in view, endeavoured to give it more ofthe character of a "gentleman's college", thatis to say, an establishment for the cultivation

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ritual of decorum in force for the time being.So that proficiency in the decorouslyconspicuous waste of time and means is noless essential in the end than proficiency inthe gainful conduct of business. The ways andmeans of reputably consuming time andsubstance, therefore, is by prescriptivenecessity to be included in the trainingoffered at any well-appointed undergraduateestablishment that aims in anycomprehensive sense to do its whole duty bythe well-to-do young men under itstutelage.(9*) It is, further and by compulsionof the same ideals, incumbent on such anestablishment to afford these young men aprecinct dedicate to cultured leisure, andconventionally sheltered from theimportunities of the municipal police, wherean adequate but guarded indulgence may behad for those extravagances of adolescencethat count for so much in shaping the canonsof genteel intercourse.

to be desired than proficiency in genteeldissipation. It is only that the higher learningand the life of fashion and affairs are twowidely distinct and divergent lines, both lyingwithin the current scheme of civilization; andthat it is the university's particular office inthis scheme to conserve and extend thedomain of knowledge. There need be noquestion that it is a work of great social meritand consequence to train adepts in the ritualof decorum, and it is doubtless a creditablework for any school adapted to that purposeto equip men for a decorative place in politesociety, and imbue them with a discriminatingtaste in the reputable waste of time andmeans. And all that may perhaps fall, not onlylegitimately, but meritoriously, within theprovince of the undergraduate school; atleast it is not here intended to argue thecontrary. At the same time a securereputation for efficiency and adequatefacilities along this line of aspirations on thepart of any such school will serve a goodbusiness purpose in duly attracting students-- or residents -from the better classes ofsociety, and from those classes that aspire tobe "better."

There is, of course, no intention here tofind fault with this gentlemanly ideal ofundergraduate indoctrination, or with thesolicitude shown in this behalf by the captainsof erudition, in endeavouring to afford time,place and circumstance for its due inculcationamong college men. It is by no means hereassumed that learning is substantially more

But this is essentially not universitywork. In the nature of the case it devolves onthe college, the undergraduate school; and it

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can not be carried through with duesingleness of purpose in an establishmentbound by tradition to make much of thathigher learning that is substantially alien tothe spirit of this thing. If, then, as indicationsrun, the large undergraduate schools are indue course to develop somewhatunreservedly into gentlemen's colleges, thatis an additional reason why, in the interest ofboth parties, the divorce of the universityfrom the collegiate division should be madeabsolute. Neither does the worldly spirit thatpervades the gentlemen's college further theuniversity's interest in scholarship, nor do theuniversity's scholarly interests further thecollege work in gentility. Well to the frontamong these undergraduate appurtenancesof gentlemanship are the factional clubsknown as Greek-letter fraternities. Thesetouch the province of learning in theuniversities only incidentally and superficially,as they do not in practice enter the graduatedivision except by way of a thin aftermath offactional animus, which may occasionallyinfect such of the staff as are gifted with aparticularly puerile temperament. They are, ineffect, competitive organizations for theelaboration of the puerile irregularities ofadolescence, and as such they find littlescope among the graduate students or

among the adult personnel at large. But aspart of the apparatus of the undergraduatedivision they require a strict surveillance tokeep them within the (somewhat wide) limitsof tolerance; and so their presence affectsthe necessary discipline of the school at large,entailing a more elaborate and rigoroussurveillance and more meddling with personalhabits than would otherwise be required, andentailing also some slight corporate expense.

Much the same is true for the othersocial clubs, not of an advisedly factionalcharacter, that are latterly being installed byauthority under university patronage andguaranteed by the university funds; as, also,and in a more pronounced degree, for collegeathletics, except that the item of expense inconnection with these things is much moreserious and the resulting diversion of interestfrom all matters of learning is proportionallygreater. Among these means of dissipatingenergy and attention, college athletics isperhaps still the most effective; and it is alsothe one most earnestly pushed by thebusinesslike authorities, at the same timethat it is the most widely out of touch with alllearning, whether it be the pursuit ofknowledge or the perfunctory taskwork of thecollegiate division. So notorious, indeed, isthe discrepancy between college athletics and

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scholarly work that few college authoritieslatterly venture to avow as cordial a supportof this training in sportsmanship as theyactually give. Yet so efficient a means ofattracting a certain class of young men is thisacademic enterprise in sports that, in practicaleffect, few schools fail to give it all thesupport that the limits of decorum will admit.There is probably no point at which speciouspractices and habitual prevarication arecarried so far as here. Little need be said ofthe threadbare subterfuges by which(ostensibly surreptitious) pecuniaryinducements are extended to students andprospective students who promise well ascollege athletes;(10*) or of the equallythreadbare expedients by which thesemembers of the gild of sportsmen are enabledto meet the formal requirements ofscholarship imposed by shamefacedintercollegiate bargaining.(11*)

masquerading under the caption of "physicalculture," whose chief duty is to put the teamsin form for the various contests. One may finda football or baseball coach retained officiallyas a member of the faculty and carried on theacademic pay-roll, in a university thatpractices a penurious economy in theequipment and current supply of materialsand services necessary to the work of itsscientific laboratories, and whose library is ina shameful state of neglect for want ofadequate provision for current purchases andattendance. The qualifications of such a"professor" are those of a coach, while inpoint of scholarly capacity and attainments itwould be a stretch of charity to say that he isof quite a neutral composition. Still, under thepressure of intercollegiate competition for theservices of such expert lanistae, he may haveto be vested with the highest academic rankand conceded the highest scholastic honours,with commensurate salary. Expediency mayso decide, partly to cloak the shamefulness ofthe transaction, partly to meet the exactingdemands of a coach whose professionalservices have a high commercial rating in thesporting community, and who is presumed tobe indispensable to the university's duesuccess in intercollegiate athletics.

But apart from such petty expedients,however abundant and commonplace, thereis the more significant practice of retainingtrainers and helpers at the university'sexpense and with academic countenance.There is the corps of workmen and assistantsto take care of the grounds, buildings andapparatus, and there is the corps of trainersand coaches, masseurs and surgeons,

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The manifest aim, and indeed theavowed purpose, of these many expedientsof management and concessions to fashionand frailty is the continued numerical growthof the undergraduate school, -- the increaseof the enrolment and the obtaining of fundsby use of which to achieve a further increase.To bring this assiduous endeavour into itsproper light, it is to be added that most ofthese undergraduate departments arealready too large for the best work of theirkind. Since these undergraduate schools havegrown large enough to afford a securecontrast as against the smaller colleges thatare engaged in the same general field, it iscoming to be plain to university men whohave to do with the advanced instructionthat, for the advanced work in science andscholarship, the training given by a college ofmoderate size commonly affords a betterpreparation than is had in the very largeundergraduate schools of the greatuniversities. This holds true, in a general way,in spite of the fact that the smaller schoolsare handicapped by an inadequateequipment, are working against the side-draftof a religious bias, with a corps of under-paidand over-worked teachers in great partselected on denominational grounds, and areunder-rated by all concerned. The proposition,

however, taken in a general way and allowingfor exceptions, is too manifestly true to admitof much question; particularly in respect ofpreparation for the sciences proper, ascontrasted with the professions.

The causes of this relative inefficiencythat seems to attach unavoidably to theexcessively large undergraduateestablishments can not be gone into here; inpart they are obvious, in part quite obscure.But in any case the matter can not be goneinto here, except so far as it has animmediate bearing on the advanced work ofthe university, through the inclusion of thesecollegiate schools in the university corporationand under the same government. As hasalready been remarked, by force of thecompetitive need of a large statisticalshowing and a wide sweep of popularprestige and notoriety, and by reason ofother incentives of a nature more intimate tothe person of the executive, it is in effect amatter of course that the undergraduateschool and its growth becomes the chiefobject of solicitude and management with abusinesslike executive; and that so itsshaping of the foundations of theestablishment as a whole acts irresistibly tofashion the rest of the universityadministration and instruction in the image of

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the undergraduate policy. Under the samecompulsion it follows also that whateverelements in the advanced work of theuniversity will not lend themselves to thescheme of accountancy, statistics,standardization and coercive control enforcedin and through the undergraduate division,will tend to be lost by disuse and neglect, asbeing selectively unfit to survive under thatsystem.

to be attended to, if at all, in the scantinterstitial intervals allowed by a strictlydrawn accountancy. The effect of it all on theiranimus, and on the effective prosecution ofthe higher learnings by the instructors, shouldbe sufficiently plain; but in case of doubt anycurious person may easily assure himself of itby looking over the current state of things asthey run in any one of the universities thatgrant degrees.

The advanced work falls under the samestress of competition in magnitude and visiblesuccess; and the same scheme of enforcedstatistical credits will gradually insinuate itselfinto the work for the advanced degrees; sothat these as well as the lower degrees willcome to be conferred on the piece-work plan.Throughout the American universities there isapparent such a movement in the direction ofa closer and more mechanical specification ofthe terms on which the higher degrees are tobe conferred, -- a specification in terms ofstipulated courses of class-room work andaggregate quantity of standard credits andlength of residence. So that his need ofconformity to the standard creditrequirements will therefore constrain thecandidate for an advanced degree to makethe substantial pursuit of knowledgesubordinate to the present pursuit of credits,

Nothing but continued workdayfamiliarity with this system of academicgrading and credit, as it takes effect in theconduct and control of instruction, and as itsfurther elaboration continues to employ thetalents and deliberation of college men, canenable any observer to appreciate theextraordinary lengths to which this matter iscarried in practice, and the pervasive way inwhich it resistlessly bends more and more ofcurrent instruction to its mechanical tests andprogressively sterilizes all personal initiativeand ambition that comes within its sweep.And nothing but the same continued contactwith the relevant facts could persuade anyoutsider that all this skilfully devised death ofthe spirit is brought about by well-advisedefforts of improvement on the part of menwho are intimately conversant with the facts,and who are moved by a disinterested

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solicitude for the best academic good of thestudents under their charge. Yet such,unmistakably, are the facts of the case.

sought in all such conjunctures is to bring infurther specifications and definitions, with theeffect of continually making two specificationsgrow where one grew before, each of whichin its turn will necessarily have to be hedgedabout on both sides by like specifications,with like effect;(12*) with the consequencethat the grading and credit system is subjectto a ceaseless proliferation of ever moremeticulous detail. The underlying difficultyappears to be not that the collective wisdomof the faculty is bent on its own stultification,as an unsympathetic outsider might hastilyconclude, but that there is in all thedeliberations of such a body a total disregardof common sense. It is, presumably, not thatthe constituent members are quite devoid ofthat quality, but rather that no point in theirelaboration of apparatus can feasibly bereached, beyond which a working majoritycan be brought conscientiously to agree thatdependence may safely be placed on commonsense rather than on further and moremeticulous and rigorous specification.

While the initial move in this sterilizationof the academic intellect is necessarily takenby the statistically-minded superior officers ofthe corporation of learning, the detail ofschedules and administrative routine involvedis largely left in the discretion of the faculty.Indeed, it is work of this character thatoccupies nearly the whole of the attention ofthe faculty as a deliberative body, as well asof its many and various committees. In thesematters of administrative routine and punctiliothe faculty, collectively and severally, canexercise a degree of initiative and discretion.And these duties are taken as seriously aswell may be, and the matters that so comewithin the faculty's discretion are handled inthe most unambiguous spirit of responsibledeliberation. Each added move of elaborationis taken only after the deliberative body hasassured itself that it embodies a neededenhancement of the efficiency of the systemof control. But each improvement andamplification also unavoidably brings the needof further specification and apparatus, desiredto take care of further refinements of doubtand detail that arise out of the last previousextensions of the mechanism. The remedy

It is at this point that the Americansystem of fellowships falls into the scheme ofuniversity policy; and here again the effect ofbusiness principles and undergraduatemachinery is to be seen at work. At itsinception the purpose of these fellowships

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was to encourage the best talent among thestudents to pursue disinterested advancedstudy farther and with greater singleness ofpurpose and it is quite plain that at thatstage of its growth the system was conceivedto have no bearing on intercollegiatecompetition or the statistics of registration.This was something over thirty years ago. Afellowship was an honourable distinction; atthe same time it was designed to afford sucha stipend as would enable the incumbent todevote his undivided energies to scholasticwork of a kind that would yield no pecuniaryreturn. Ostensibly, such is still the solepurpose of the fellowships; the traditionaldecencies require (voluble and reiterated)professions to that effect. But in point ofpractical effect, and progressively,concomitant with the incursion of businessprinciples into university policy, the exigenciesof competitive academic enterprise haveturned the fellowships to account in their ownemploy. So that, in effect, today the rivaluniversities use the fellowships to bid againstone another for fellows to come intoresidence, to swell the statistics of graduateregistration and increase the number ofcandidates for advanced degrees. And theeligible students have learned so to regard

the matter, and are quite callously exploitingthe system in that sense.

Not that the fellowships have altogetherlost that character of a scholarly stipendiarywith which they started out; but they have,under businesslike management, acquired ause not originally intended; and the new,competitive use of them is unequivocally theirmain use today. It would be hazardous toguess just how far the directorates of therival universities consciously turn thefellowships to account in this enterprisingway, or how far, on the other hand, they areable to let self-deception cover the policy ofcompetitive bargaining in which they areengaged; but it would be difficult to believethat their right hand is altogether ignorant ofwhat their left hand is doing. It woulddoubtless also be found that both thepractice and the animus back of it differappreciably from one school to another. Butthere is no element of hazard in thegeneralization that, by and large, suchcompetitive use of the fellowships is todaytheir chief use; and that such is the fact isquite openly avowed among the academicstaff of some universities at least.

As a sequel and symptom of this use ofthe fellowship stipends in bargaining for anenlarged enrolment of advanced students, it

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has become a moot question in academicpolicy whether a larger number of fellowshipswith smaller stipends will give a moreadvantageous net statistical result than asmaller number of more adequate stipends.An administration that looks chiefly to theshort-term returns -- as is commonly thepractice in latterday business enterprise -- willsensibly incline to make the stipends smalland numerous; while the converse will betrue where regard is had primarily to theenrolment of carefully selected men who mayreflect credit on the institution in the long run.Up-to-date business policy will apparentlycommend the former rather than the lattercourse; for business practice, in its laterphases, is eminently guided by considerationof short-term gains. It is also true that theaverage stipend attached to the fellowshipsoffered today is very appreciably lower thanwas the practice some two or three decadesago; at the same time that the cost of living --which these stipends were originally designedto cover -- has increased by something likeone hundred per cent. As final evidence of thedecay of scholarly purpose in the matter offellowships, and as a climax of stultification, itis to be added that stipends originallyestablished as an encouragement todisinterested scholarship are latterly being

used to induce enrolment in the professionalschools attached to the universities.(13*)

One further point of contact andcontamination is necessary to be brought intothis account of the undergraduateadministration and its bearing on advancedwork. The scholastic accessories spoken ofabove -- clubs, fraternities, devotionalorganizations, class organizations, spectaclesand social functions, athletics, and "studentactivities" generally -- do not in anyappreciable degree bear directly on theadvanced work, in as much as they find noready lodgement among the universitystudents proper. But they count, indirectlyand effectually, toward lowering the scholarlyideals and keeping down the number ofadvanced students, chiefly by diverting theinterest and energies of the undergraduatemen from scholarly pursuits and throwingthem into various lines of business andsportsmanship.

The subsidized clubs work, in thesepremises, to much the same effect as thefraternities; both are, in effect, designed tocultivate expensive habits of life. The same istrue in a higher degree of athletic sports. Thefull round of sportsmanlike events, as well asthe round schedule of social amenities forwhich the polite side of undergraduate life

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(partly subsidized) is designed to give a tasteand training, are beyond the compass of mendevoted to scholarship. In effect these thingscome in as alternatives to the pursuit ofknowledge. These things call for a largeexpenditure of time and means, neither ofwhich can be adequately met by the scientistor scholar. So that men who have beentrained to the round of things that so go tomake up the conventional scheme ofundergraduate interests can not well look toa career in the higher learning as a possibleoutcome of their residence in college. On theother hand, young men habitually, and nodoubt rightly, expect a business career toyield an income somewhat above the averageof incomes in the community, and moreparticularly in excess of the commonplaceincomes of academic men; such an income,indeed, as may afford the means to cover theconventional routine of such politeexpenditures. So that, in the absence of anindependent income, some sort of a businesscareer that promises well in the pecuniaryrespect becomes the necessary recourse ofthe men to whom these amenities ofexpenditure have become habitual throughtheir undergraduate training. With like effectthe mental discipline exercised by thesesports and polite events greatly favours the

growth of tactful equivocation and a guardedhabit of mind, such as makes for worldlywisdom and success in business, but which isworse than useless in the scholar or scientist.And further and perhaps more decisively, anundergraduate who does his whole duty inthe way of sports, fraternities, clubs, andreputable dissipation at large, commonlycomes through his undergraduate course witha scanty and superficial preparation forscholarly or scientific pursuits, if any. So thateven in case he should still chance to harboura penchant for the pursuit of learning he willbe unfit by lack of training.

NOTES:

1. Cf. George T. Ladd, "The Need ofAdministrative Changes in the AmericanUniversity," reprinted in University Control, byJ. McKeen Cattell; especially pp. 352-353.

2. Cf. George T. Ladd, as above, pp. 351-352.

3. Apart from the executive's need ofsatisfying the prejudices of the laity in thismatter, there is no ground for this competitionbetween the universities, either in the

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pecuniary circumstances of the severalestablishments or in the work they are totake care of. So much is admitted on allhands. But the fact remains that no other onemotive has as much to do with shapingacademic policy as this same competition fortraffic. The cause of it appears to be very littleif anything else than that the habits ofthought induced by experience in businessare uncritically carried over into academicaffairs.

under the orders of its president, and as suchthey are bound to avoid all criticism of himand his administration so long as theycontinue on the pay-roll; and that if anymember of the staff has any fault to find withthe conduct of affairs he must first sever hisconnection with the university, beforespeaking his mind. These expressions wereoccasioned by the underhand dismissal of ascholar of high standing and long service,who had incurred the displeasure of thepresident then in charge, by overt criticism ofthe administration. As to its general featuresthe case might well have been the onereferred to by Professor Ladd (UniversityControl, as above, p. 359), though thecircumstances of the dismissal offer severaldetails of a more discreditable character thanProfessor Ladd appears to have been awareof.

Critics of the present regime are inclinedto admit that the colleges of the land are ingreat part so placed as to be thrown intocompetition by force of circumstances, both asto the acquisition of funds and as to theenrolment of students. The point may beconceded, though with doubt andreservation, as applies to the colleges; for theuniversities there is no visible ground of suchrivalry, apart from unreflecting prejudice onthe part of the laity, and an ambition forpopular acclaim on the part of the universitydirectorate.

5. The strategic reason for this is thedesire to retain for graduate registration anystudent who might otherwise prefer to lookfor graduate instruction elsewhere. The planhas not been found to work well, and it is stillon trial.

4. An incumbent of executive office,recently appointed, in one of the greateruniversities was at pains a few years ago tospeak his mind on this head, to the effect thatthe members of the academic staff areemployees in the pay of the university and

6. At least one such businesslike chief ofbureau has seriously endeavoured so tostandardize and control the work of his staffas to have all courses of lectures professed in

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the department reduced to symmetrical andpermanent shape under the form of certifiedsyllabi, which could then be taken over by anymember of the staff, at the discretion of thechief, and driven home in the lecture roomwith the accredited pedagogical circumstanceand apparatus. The scheme has found its wayinto academic anecdote, on the lighter side,as being a project to supply standarderudition in uniform packages, "guaranteedunder the pure food law, fully sterilized. andsealed without solder or acids"; to which it isonly necessary to "add hot air and serve."

inter-executive, blacklist, and similar reconditematters of presidential courtesy and prestige,necessary to be attended to though notnecessary to be spread abroad.

9. The English pattern of boys' schoolsand gentlemanly university residence hasdoubtless afforded notable guidance to the"Educators" who have laboured for thegreater gentility of American college life; atthe same time that the grave authenticity ofthese English customs has at many a difficultpassage sewed opportunely to take the edgeoff the gentlemen-educators' sense of shame.

7. So, e. g., it is known to have, onoccasion, became a difficult question of inter-bureaucratic comity, whether commercialgeography belongs of right to the departmentof geology or to that of economics; whethergiven courses in Hebrew are equitably to beassigned to the department of Semitics or tothat of Religions; whether Church History is infairness to be classed with profane History orwith Divinity, etc., -- questions which, exceptin point of departmental rivalry, have nonebut a meretricious significance.

10. Illustrative instances have little valueas anecdotes and not much more ascircumstantial evidence; their abundance andoutrance are such as to have depreciatedtheir value in both respects. Yet to any whomay not know of this traffic by familiar contactone or two commonplace instances mayperhaps not seem too much. So, a few yearsago, in one of the greater of the newuniversities, a valued member of one of theathletic teams was retained at an allowanceof $40 a month as bookkeeper to the janitorof one of the boys' dormitories on thecampus. At the same university and about thesame time two other athletes were carried onuniversity pay as assistants to the editor ofthe weekly bulletin announcing the

8. Nugatory, that is, for the ostensiblepurpose of reducing inter-academic rivalry andduplication. However, there are other mattersof joint interest to the gild of universityexecutives, as, e.g., the inter-academic, or

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programme of academic events for the week;though in this case, to the relief of the editorin question, only one of the two assistantsreported at his office, and that only once,during the year of their incumbency. These, asalready remarked, are commonplaceoccurrences. The more spectacular instancesof shrewd management in these premises cannot well be dealt with otherwise than by acanny silence; that being also the courseapproved by current practice.

since equally ingenious expedients have beenin use elsewhere.

12. "And then there came another locustand carried off another grain of wheat, andthen there came another locust," etc., etc.

13. More than one instance might becited where a student whose privatelyavowed and known aim was the study andpractice of Law has deliberately been inducedby the offer of a fellowship stipend toregister, for the time being, as an academicgraduate student and as candidate for theacademic doctor's degree. In the instancesthat come to mind the students in questionhave since completed their law studies andentered practice, without further troublingabout the academic degree for which theyonce were ostensible candidates.

11. A single instance may tolerantly beadmitted here. Among the formalrequirements that would admit students to afree pursuit of sportsmanship, at the sameuniversity as above mentioned, withoutimputation of professionalism, was specifiedthe ability to read at sight such a passage ina given foreign language as would satisfy theinstructor in charge that the candidate wascompetent in the language in question. Theinstructor responsible in this case, a man ofhigh academic rank and gifted with asympathetic good-will toward the "boys,"submitted in fulfilment of the test a copy ofthe Lord's Prayer in this foreign tongue, andpassed the (several) candidates on findingthem able passably to repeat the same inEnglish. It would scarcely be fair to distinguishthis episode by giving names and places,

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CHAPTER IV business enterprise as has to do with manyimpressionable customers, are thesalesmanlike virtues of effrontery and tact.These are high qualities in all business,because their due exercise is believed tobring a net return above the cost of thegoods to the seller, and, indeed, above theirvalue to the buyer. Unless the man incompetitive business is able, by force of thesebusinesslike aptitudes, to get somethingmore than he gives, it is felt that he has fallenshort of the highest efficiency. So the efficientsalesman, and similarly the efficientlymanaged business concern, are enabled toadd to their marketable goods an immaterialincrement of "prestige value," as some of theeconomists are calling it. A margin ofprepossessions or illusions as to theirsuperior, but intangible and inexpensive,utility attaches to a given line of goodsbecause of the advertiser's or salesman'swork, -- work spent not so much on thegoods as on the customer's sensibilities.

Academic Prestige and the MaterialEquipment

In the course of the preceding chapter ithas appeared that the introduction ofbusiness principles into university policy hashad the immediate and ubiquitous effect ofgreatly heightening the directorate'ssolicitude for a due and creditable publicity, aconvincing visible success, a tactful andeffectual showing of efficiency reflected in anuninterrupted growth in size and othertangible quantitative features. This is goodpolicy as seen from the point of view ofcompetitive business enterprise. Incompetitive business it is of the gravestimportance to keep up the concern's prestige,or "good will." A business concern so placedmust be possessed of such prestige as willdraw and hold a profitable traffic; otherwisethe enterprise is in a precarious case. For theobjective end and aim of business enterpriseis profitable sales, or the equivalent of suchsales if the concern is not occupied with whatwould strictly be called sales. The end soughtis a net gain over costs; in effect, to buycheap and sell dear. The qualities that countas of prime consequence in businessenterprise, therefore, particularly in such

In case these illusions of superior worthare of an enduring character, they will add anincrement of such intangible utility also togoods or other marketable itemssubsequently to be offered by the sameconcern; and they can be added up as apresumptive aggregate and capitalized as

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intangible assets of the business concern inquestion. Such a body of accumulated andmarketable illusions constitute what is knownas "good-will," in the stricter sense of theterm. The illusions in question need, ofcourse, not be delusions; they may be well orill founded; for the purpose in hand that is anidle question.

to take a foremost place in the solicitude ofthe academic directorate. Not that thisnotoriety and prestige, or the efforts that goto their cultivation, conduce in anyappreciable degree to any ostensible purposeavowed, or avowable, by any university.These things, that is to say, rather hinderthan help the cause of learning, in that theydivert attention and effort from scholarlyworkmanship to statistics and salesmanship.All that is beyond cavil. The gain which soaccrues to any university from such anaccession of popular illusions is a differentialgain in competition with rival seats oflearning, not a gain to the republic of learningor to the academic community at large; and itis a gain in marketable illusions, not inserviceability for the ends of learning or forany other avowed or avowable end sought bythe universities. But as competitors for thegood-will of the unlettered patrons of learningthe university directorates are constrained tokeep this need of a reputable notorietyconstantly in mind, however little it may allappeal to their own scholarly tastes.

The most familiar and convincingillustrations of such good will are probablythose afforded by the sales of patentmedicines, and similar proprietary articles ofhousehold consumption; but intangible valuesof a similar nature are involved in nearly allcompetitive business. They are the product ofsalesmanship, not of workmanship; and theyare useful to the seller, not to the buyer. Theyare useful for purposes of competitive gain tothe businessman, not for serviceability to thecommunity at large, and their value to theirpossessor lies in the differential advantagewhich they give to one seller as againstanother. They have, on the whole, noaggregate value or utility. From the point ofview of the common good, work andexpenditure so incurred for these competitivepurposes are bootless waste.

It is in very large part, if not chiefly, astouches the acquirement of prestige, that theacademic work and equipment are amenableto business principles, -- not overlooking thepervasive system of standardization and

Under compulsion of such precedents,drawn from the conduct of competitivebusiness, publicity and "goodwill" have come

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accountancy that affects both the work andthe equipment, and that serves otherpurposes as well as those of publicity; so that"business principles" in academic policy comesto mean, chiefly, the principles of reputablepublicity. It means this more frequently andmore consistently than anything else, so faras regards the academic administration, asdistinguished from the fiscal management ofthe corporation.

and effort centers, and to which themanagement of the concern constantly looks.Such concerns have to meet their competitorsin buying, selling, and effecting contracts of allkinds, from which their gains are to come. Auniversity, on the other hand, can look to nosuch gains in the work which is its soleostensible interest and occupation; and thepecuniary transactions and arrangementswhich it enters into on the basis of itsaccumulated prestige are a relatively verytrivial matter. There is, in short, noappreciable pecuniary gain to be looked forfrom any traffic resting on the acquiredprestige, and therefore there is no relation ofequivalence or discrepancy between anyoutlay incurred in this behalf and the volumeof gainful business to be transacted on thestrength of it; with the result that theacademic directorate applies itself to thispursuit without arriËre pensee. So far as theacquired prestige is designed to serve apecuniary end it can only be useful in the wayof impressing potential donors, a highlyspeculative line of enterprise, offering asuggestive parallel to the drawings of alottery.

Of course, the standards, ideals,principles and procedure of business trafficenter into the scheme of university policy inother relations also, as has already appearedand as will be shown more at large presently;but after all due qualification is had, it remainstrue that this business of publicity necessarily,or at least commonly, accounts for adisproportionately large share of the businessto be taken care of in conducting a university,as contrasted with such an enterprise, e.g.,as a bank, a steel works, or a railwaycompany, on a capital of about the samevolume. This follows from the nature of thecase. The common run of business concernsare occupied with industrial enterprise ofsome kind, and with transactions in credit, --with a running sequence of bargains fromwhich the gains of the concern are to accrue,-- and it is upon these gains that attention

Outlay for the purpose of publicity is notconfined to the employment of field-agentsand the circulation of creditable gossip and

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reassuring printed matter. The greater shareof it comes in as incidental to the installationof plant and equipment and the routine ofacademic life and ceremony. As regards thematerial equipment, the demands of acreditable appearance are pervading andrigorous; and their consequences in the wayof elaborate and premeditated incidentalsare, perhaps, here seen at their best. To thelaity a "university" has come to mean, in thefirst place and indispensably, an aggregationof buildings and other improved real-estate.This material equipment strikes the layattention directly and convincingly; while thepursuit of learning is a relatively obscurematter, the motions of which can not well befollowed by the unlettered, even with thehelp of the newspapers and the circularliterature that issues from the university'spublicity bureau. The academic work is, afterall, unseen, and it stays in the background.Current expenditure for the prosecution ofthis work, therefore, offers the enterprise inadvertisement a less advantageous field forthe convincing use of funds than the materialequipment, especially the larger items, --laboratory and library buildings, assemblyhalls, curious museum exhibits, grounds forathletic contests, and the like. There isconsequently a steady drift of provocation

towards expenditure on conspicuousextensions of the "plant," and a correlativeconstant temptation to parsimony in the moreobscure matter of necessary supplies andservice, and similar running-expenses withoutwhich the plant can not effectually be turnedto account for its ostensible use; with theresult, not infrequently, that the usefulness ofan imposing plant is seriously impaired forwant of what may be called "workingcapital."(1*)

Indeed, instances might be cited wherefunds that were much needed to help out inmeeting running expenses have been turnedto use for conspicuous extensions of the plantin the way of buildings, in excess not only ofwhat was needed for their alleged purposebut in excess of what could conveniently bemade use of. More particularly is there amarked proclivity to extend the plant and theschool organization into new fields ofscholastic enterprise, often irrelevant or quiteforeign to the province of the university as aseminary of learning; and to push these alienramifications, to the neglect of the urgentneeds of the academic work already in hand,in the way of equipment, maintenance,supplies, service and instruction.

The running-expenses are always themost urgent items of the budget, as seen

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from the standpoint of the academic work;and they are ordinarily the item that is mostparsimoniously provided for. A scantyprovision at this point unequivocally means adisproportionate curtailment of the usefulnessof the equipment as well as of the personnel,-- as, e.g., the extremely common andextremely unfortunate practice of keeping theallowance for maintenance and service in theuniversity libraries so low as seriously toimpair their serviceability. But the exigenciesof prestige will easily make it seem more tothe point, in the eyes of a businesslikeexecutive, to project a new extension of theplant; which will then be half-employed, on ascanty allowance, in work which lies on theouter fringe or beyond the university'slegitimate province.(2*)

libraries, laboratories, and lecture rooms. Thelast of these is the least exacting, and it isthe one most commonly well supplied. It isalso, on the whole, the more conspicuous inproportion to the outlay. But all these arematters chiefly of interior arrangement,appliances and materials, and they are all of arelatively inconspicuous character. Except asdetailed in printed statistics they do notordinarily lend themselves with appreciableeffect to the art of advertising. In meeting allthese material requirements of the work inhand a very large expenditure of funds mightadvantageously be made -- advantageouslyto the academic use which they are to serve-without much visible effect as seen inperspective from the outside. And so far asbears on this academic use, the exterior ofthe buildings is a matter of altogether minorconsequence, as are also the decorativeappointments of the interior.

In so discriminating against the workingcapacity of the university, and in favour of itsreal-estate, this pursuit of reputable publicityfurther decides that the exterior of thebuildings and the grounds should have thefirst and largest attention. It is true, the initialpurpose of this material equipment, it isostensibly believed, is to serve as housingand appliances for the work of inquiry andinstruction. Such, of course, continues to beavowed its main purpose, in a perfunctorilyostensible way. This means a provision of

In practice, under compulsion of thebusiness principles of publicity, it will befound, however, that the exterior and thedecorative appointments are the chief objectof the designer's attention; the interiorarrangement and working appointments willnot infrequently become a matter of rudeapproximation to the requirements of thework, care being first taken that these

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arrangements shall not interfere with thedecorative or spectacular intent of theoutside. But even with the best-advisedmanagement of its publicity value, it is alwaysappreciably more difficult to secureappropriations for the material equipment of alaboratory or library than for the shell of theedifice, and still more so for the maintenanceof an adequate corps of caretakers andattendants. As will be found true of otherlines of this university enterprise in publicity,so also as to this presentation of a reputableexterior; it is designed to impress not theacademic personnel, or the scholarly elementat large, but the laity. The academic folk andscholars are commonly less susceptible to theappeal of curious facades and perplexingfeats of architecture; and then, such anappeal would have no particular motive intheir case; it is not necessary to impressthem. It is in the eyes of the unlettered,particularly the business community, that it isdesirable for the university to present animposing front; that being the feature ofacademic installation which they will readilyappreciate. To carry instant conviction of ahigh academic worth to this large element ofthe populace, the university buildings shouldbulk large in the landscape, should bewastefully expensive, and should conform to

the architectural mannerisms in presentvogue. In a few years the style ofarchitectural affectations will change, ofcourse, as fashions necessarily change in anycommunity whose tastes are governed bypecuniary standards; and any particulararchitectural contrivance will thereforepresently lose much of its prestige value; butby the time it so is overtaken byobsolescence, the structures which embodythe particular affectation in question will havemade the appeal for which they weredesigned, and so will have served theirpurpose of publicity. And then, too, edificescreated with a thrifty view to a largespectacular effect at a low cost are also liableto so rapid a physical decay as to be ready forremoval and replacement before they havegreatly outlived their usefulness in thisrespect.

In recent scholastic edifices one is notsurprised to find lecture rooms acoustically illdesigned, and with an annoying distributionof light, due to the requirements of exteriorsymmetry and the decorative distribution ofwindows; and the like holds true even in ahigher degree for libraries and laboratories,since for these uses the demands in theserespects are even more exacting. Nor is itunusual to find waste of space and weakness

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of structure, due, e.g., to a fictitious windingstair, thrown into the design to permit such afacade as will simulate the defensive detailsof a mediaeval keep, to be surmounted withembrasured battlements and a (make-believe) loopholed turret. So, again, spacewill, on the same ground, be wasted inheavy-ceiled, ill-lighted lobbies; which mightonce have served as a mustering place for abody of unruly men-at-arms, but which meannothing more to the point today, and in thesepremises, than so many inconvenientflagstones to be crossed in coming and going.

comes an ingrained predilection for the moresprightly and exuberant effects of decorationand magnificence to which the modernconcert-hall, the more expensive cafes andclubrooms, and the Pullman coaches havegiven a degree of authentication. Any onegiven to curious inquiry might find congenialemployment in tracing out the manner andproportion in which these, and the like,strains of aesthetic indoctrination are blendedin the edifices and grounds of a well-advisedmodern university.

It is not necessary here to offer manyspeculations on the enduring artistic merit ofthese costly stage properties of the seats oflearning, since their permanent value in thatrespect is scarcely to be rated as asubstantial motive in their construction. Butthere is, e. g., no obvious reason why, withthe next change in the tide of mannerism, thedisjointed grotesqueries of an eclectic andmodified Gothic should not presently pass intothe same category of apologetic neglect, withthe architectural evils wrought by the mid-Victorian generation. But there is another sideto this architecture of notoriety, that meritssome slight further remark. It is consistentlyand unavoidably meretricious. Just at presentthe enjoined vogue is some form of bastardantique. The archaic forms which it ostensibly

These principles of spectacular publicitydemand a nice adjustment of the conspicuousfeatures of the plant to the current vagariesin decorative art and magnificence,that is tosay, conformity to the sophistications currenton that level of culture on which theseunlettered men of substance live and moveand have their being. As touches the case ofthe seats of learning, these current laysophistications draw on several more or lessdiverse, and not altogether congruous, linesof conventionally approved manifestation ofthe ability to pay. Out of the past comes theconventional preconception that thesescholastic edifices should show something ofthe revered traits of ecclesiastical andmonastic real-estate; while out of the present

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preserves are structurally out of date, illadapted to the modern materials and themodern builder's use of materials. Modernbuilding, on a large scale and designed fordurable results, is framework building. Themodern requirements of light, heating,ventilation and access require it to be such;and the materials used lend themselves tothat manner of construction. The strainsinvolved in modern structures are frame-workstrains; whereas the forms which theseedifices are required to simulate are masonryforms. The outward conformation andostensible structure of the buildings,therefore, are commonly meaningless, exceptas an architectural prevarication. They haveto be adapted, simulated, deranged, becausein modern use they are impracticable in theshape, proportion and combination that ofright belonged to them under thecircumstances of materials and uses underwhich they were once worked out. So thereresults a meaningless juxtaposition of details,that prove nothing in detail and contradictone another in assemblage. All of which maysuggest reflections on the fitness of housingthe quest of truth in an edifice of falsepretences.

lesson they conduce, in their measure, toinculcate in the students a spirit ofdisingenuousness. But they spread abroadthe prestige of the university as an ornateand spendthrift establishment; which isbelieved to bring increased enrolment ofstudents and, what is even more to the point,to conciliate the good-will of the opulentpatrons of learning. That these edifices aregood for this purpose, and that this policy ofarchitectural mise en scene is wise, appearsfrom the greater readiness with which fundsare procured for such ornate constructionsthan for any other academic use. It appearsthat the successful men of affairs to whomthe appeal for funds is directed, find thesewasteful, ornate and meretricious edifices acompetent expression of their cultural hopesand ambitions.

NOTES:

1. A single illustrative instance may serveto show how the land lies in this respect,even though it may seem to the uninitiated tobe an extreme if not an exaggerated case;while it may perhaps strike those familiar withthese matters as a tedious commonplace. Afew years ago, in one of the larger, youngerand more enterprising universities, a

These architectural vagaries serve nouseful end in academic life. As an object

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commodious laboratory, well appointed andadequately decorated, was dedicated to oneof the branches of biological science. To meetthe needs of scientific work such a laboratoryrequires the services of a corps ofexperienced and intelligent assistants andcaretakers, particularly where theestablishment is equipped with modernappliances for heating, ventilation and thelike, as was the case in this instance. In thislaboratory the necessary warmth wassupplied by what is sometimes called themethod of indirect steam heat; that is to say,the provision for heat and for ventilation werecombined in one set of appliances, by bringingthe needed air from the open through anoutdoor "intake," passing it over steam-heated coils (in the basement of the building),and so distributing the air necessary forventilation, at the proper temperature,throughout the building by means of asuitable arrangement of air-shafts. Such wasthe design. But intelligent service comes high,and ignorant janitors are willing to undertakewhat may be asked of them. And sufficientwarmth can be had in an inclement climateand through a long winter season only at anappreciable expense. So, with a view toeconomy, and without the knowledge of thescientific staff who made use of the

laboratory, the expedient was hit upon by theacademic executive, in consultation with asuitable janitor, that the outdoor intake beboarded up tightly. so that the air whichpassed over the heating coils and throughthe air-shafts to the laboratory rooms wasthenceforth drawn not from the extremelycold atmosphere of outdoors but from themore temperate supply that filled thebasement and had already had the benefit ofcirculating over the steam coils and throughthe ventilating shafts. By this means anobvious saving in fuel would be effected,corresponding to the heat differentialbetween the outdoor air, at some 0° to-20°and that already confined in the building,at some 60°. How long this fuel-savingexpedient was in force can not well beascertained, but it is known to have lasted atleast for more than one season.

The members of the scientific staffmeantime mysteriously but persistently fellsick after a few weeks of work in thelaboratory, recurrently after each return fromenforced vacations. Until, in the end, movedby persistent suspicions of sewer-gas --which, by the way, had in the meantime costsome futile inconvenience and expenseoccasioned by unnecessary overhauling of theplumbing -- one of the staff pried into the

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janitor's domain in the basement; where hefound near the chamber of the steam coils aloosely closed man-hole leading into thesewers, from which apparently such air wasdrawn as would necessarily go to offset thecurrent leakage from this closed system ofventilation.

2. This is a nearly universal infirmity ofAmerican university policy, but it is doubtlessnot to be set down solely to the account ofthe penchant for a large publicity on the partof the several academic executives. It is in alllikelihood due as much to the equallyubiquitous inability of the governing boards toappreciate or to perceive what the currentneeds of the academic work are, or evenwhat they are like. Men trained in the conductof business enterprise, as the governingboards are, will have great difficulty inpersuading themselves that expenditureswhich yield neither increased dividends norsuch a durable physical product as can beinvoiced and added to the capitalization, canbe other than a frivolous waste of goodmoney; so that what is withheld from currentacademic expenditure is felt to be saved,while that expenditure which leaves atangible residue of (perhaps useless) realestate is, by force of ingrained habit, rated asnew investment.

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CHAPTER V efficiency within the lines of its own interests,and slower to see fitness in those lines thatlie outside of its horizon, where it mustnecessarily act on outside solicitation andhearsay evidence.

The Academic Personnel

As regards the personnel of theacademic staff the control enforced by theprinciples of competitive business is moresubtle, complex and far-reaching, and shouldmerit more particular attention. The staff isthe university, or it should so be if theuniversity is to deserve the place assigned itin the scheme of civilization. Therefore thecentral and gravest question touching currentacademic policy is the question of its bearingon the personnel and the work which there isfor them to do. In the apprehension of manycritics the whole question of university controlis comprised in the dealings of the executivewith the staff.

The selective effect of such a bias,guided as one might say, by a "consciousnessof kind," may be seen in those establishmentsthat have remained under clerical tutelage;where, notoriously, the first qualificationlooked to in an applicant for work as ateacher is his religious bias. But the bias ofthese governing boards and executives thatare under clerical control has after all beenable to effect only a partial, though far-reaching, conformity to clerical ideals offitness in the faculties so selected; moreespecially in the larger and modernizedschools of this class. In practice it is foundnecessary somewhat to wink at devotionalshortcomings among their teachers; clerical,or pronouncedly devout, scientists that arepassably competent in their science, are ofvery rare occurrence; and yet somethingpresentable in the way of modern science isconventionally required by these schools, inorder to live, and so to effect any part of theirpurpose. Half a loaf is better than no bread.None but the precarious class of schoolsmade up of the lower grade and smaller of

Whether the power of appointmentvests formally in one man or in a board, inAmerican practice it commonly vests, in effect,in the academic executive. In practice, thepower of removal, as well as that ofadvancement, rests in the same hands. Thebusinesslike requirements of the case bring itto this outcome de facto, whatever formalitiesof procedure may intervene de jure.

It lies in the nature of the case that thisappointing power will tend to create a facultyafter its own kind. It will be quick to recognize

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these colleges, such as are content to savetheir souls alive without exerting any effecton the current of civilization, are able to getalong with faculties made up exclusively ofGod-fearing men.

a compromise; whereby a goodly number ofthe faculty will be selected on grounds ofbusinesslike fitness, more or less pronounced,while a working minority must continue to bemade up of men without much businessproficiency and without pronounced loyalty tocommercial principles.

Something of the same kind, and insomewhat the same degree, is true for theschools under the tutelage of businessmen.While the businesslike ideal may be a facultywholly made up of men highly gifted withbusiness sense, it is not practicable toassemble such a faculty which shall at thesame time be plausibly competent in scienceand scholarship. Scientists and scholars givenover to the pursuit of knowledge areconventionally indispensable to a university,and such are commonly not largely gifted withbusiness sense, either by habit or by nativegift. The two lines of interest -- business andscience -- do not pull together; a competentscientist or scholar well endowed withbusiness sense is as rare as a devoutscientist -- almost as rare as a whiteblackbird. Yet the inclusion of men of scientificgifts and attainments among its faculty isindispensable to the university, if it is to avoidinstant and palpable stultification.

This fluctuating margin of limitation hasapparently not yet been reached, perhapsnot even in the most enterprising of ouruniversities. Such should be the meaning ofthe fact that a continued commercialization ofthe academic staff appears still to be inprogress, in the sense that businesslikefitness counts progressively for more inappointments and promotions. Thesebusinesslike qualifications do not comprisemerely facility in the conduct of pecuniaryaffairs, even if such facility be conceived toinclude the special aptitudes and proficiencythat go to the making of a successfuladvertiser. In academic circles as elsewherebusinesslike fitness includes solvency as wellas commercial genius. Both of thesequalifications are useful in the competitivemanoeuvres in which the academic body isengaged. But while the two are apparentlygiven increasing weight in the selection andgrading of the academic personnel, theprecedents and specifications for a standard

So that the most that can practically beaccomplished by a businesslike selection andsurveillance of the academic personnel will be

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rating of merit in this bearing have hithertonot been worked out to such a nicety as toallow much more than a more or less closeapproach to a consistent application of theprinciple in the average case. And there liesalways the infirmity in the background of thesystem that if the staff were selectedconsistently with an eye single to businesscapacity and business animus the universitywould presently be functa officio, and thecaptain of erudition would find his occupationgone.

business value are those portions of theirwork that serve other ends than the higherlearning; as, e.g., the prestige and pecuniarygain of the institution at large, the pecuniaryadvantage of a given clique or faction withinthe university, or the profit and renown of thedirective head. Gains that accrue for servicesof this general character are not, properlyspeaking, salary or stipend payable toward"the increase and diffusion of knowledgeamong men," even if they are currently sodesignated, in the absence of suitabledistinctions. Instances of such a diversion ofcorporate funds to private ends have in thepast occurred in certain monastic and priestlyorders, as well as in some modern politicalorganizations. Organized malversation of thischaracter has latterly been called "graft." Thelong-term common sense of the communitywould presently disavow any corporation oflearning overtly pursuing such a course, asbeing faithless to its trust, and theconservation of learning would so pass intoother hands. Indeed, there are facts currentwhich broadly suggest that the keeping of thehigher learning is beginning to pass intoother, and presumptively more disinterested,hands.

A university is an endowed institution ofculture; whether the endowment take theform of assigned income, as in the stateestablishments, or of funded wealth, as withmost other universities. Such fraction of theincome as is assigned to the salary roll, andwhich therefore comes in question here, isapportioned among the staff for work whichhas no determinate market value. It is not amatter of quid pro quo; since one member ofthe exchange, the stipend or salary, ismeasurable in pecuniary terms and the otheris not. This work has no business value, in sofar as it is work properly included among theduties of the academic men. Indeed, it is afairly safe test; work that has a commercialvalue does not belong in the university. Suchservices of the academic staff as have a

The permeation of academic policy bybusiness principles is a matter of more or

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less, not of absolute, dominance. It appearsto be a question of how wide a deviation fromscholarly singleness of purpose the long-termcommon sense of the community will tolerate.The cult of the idle curiosity sticks too deep inthe instinctive endowment of the race, and ithas in modern civilization been too thoroughlyground into the shape of a quest of matter-of-fact knowledge, to allow this pursuit to bedefinitively set aside or to fall into abeyance.It is by too much an integral constituent ofthe habits of thought induced by the disciplineof workday life. The faith in and aspirationafter matter-of-fact knowledge is tooprofoundly ingrained in the moderncommunity, and too consonant with itsworkday habit of mind, to admit of itssupersession by any objective end alien to it,-- at least for the present and until somestronger force than the technologicaldiscipline of modern life shall take over theprimacy among the factors of civilization, andso give us a culture of a different characterfrom that which has brought on this modernscience and placed it at the centre of thingshuman.

unreservedly placing a businesslikeexploitation of office above a faithfuldischarge of trust. The current popular animusmay not, in this matter, approach that whichanimates the business community, specificallyso-called, but it is sufficiently "practical" toapprove practical sagacity and gainful trafficwherever it is found; yet the furtherance ofknowledge is after all an ideal which engagesthe modern community's affections in a stillmore profound way, and, in the long run, witha still more unqualified insistence. For good orill, in the apprehension of the civilizedpeoples, matter-of-fact knowledge is an endto be sought; while gainful enterprise is, afterall, a means to an end. There is, therefore,always this massive hedge of slow butindefeasible popular sentiment that stands inthe way of making the seats of learning overinto something definitively foreign to thepurpose which they are popularly believed toserve.(1*)

Perhaps the most naive way in which apredilection for men of substantial businessvalue expresses itself in university policy isthe unobtrusive, and in part unformulated,preference shown for teachers with soundpecuniary connections, whether byinheritance or by marriage. With no suchuniformity as to give evidence of an advised

The popular approval of businessprinciples and businesslike thrift is profound,disinterested, alert and insistent; but it doesnot, at least not yet, go the length of

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rule of precedence or a standarized scheduleof correlation, but with sufficient consistencyto merit, and indeed to claim, the thoughtfulattention of the members of the craft, ascholar who is in a position to plead personalwealth or a wealthy connection has aperceptibly better chance of appointment onthe academic staff, and on a moreadvantageous scale of remuneration, thanmen without pecuniary antecedents. Duepreferment also appears to follow more as amatter of course where the candidate has oracquires a tangible standing of this nature.

such of its personnel as occupy a conspicuousplace in the academic hierarchy; that is tosay, it should be represented with becomingexpensiveness in all its social contact withthose classes from whose munificence largedonations may flow into the corporate funds.Large gifts of this kind are creditable both tohim that gives and him that takes, and it isthe part of wise foresight so to arrange thatthose to whom it falls to represent theuniversity, as potential beneficiary, at thisjuncture should do so with propitiouslycreditable circumstance. To meet and convincethe opulent patrons of learning, as well asthe parents and guardians of possibleopulent students, it is, by and large,necessary to meet them on their own ground,and to bring into view such evidence ofculture and intelligence as will readily beappreciated by them. To this end a large andwell appointed domestic establishment ismore fortunate than a smaller one; abundant,well-chosen and well-served viands,beverages and narcotics will also felicitouslytouch the sensibilities of these men who arefortunate enough to have learned theirvirtue; the better, that is to say, on thewhole, the more costly, achievements in dressand equipage will "carry farther" in thesepremises than a penurious economy. In short,

This preference for well-to-do scholarsneed by no means be an altogether blind orimpulsive predilection for commercial solvencyon the part of the appointing power; thoughsuch a predilection is no doubt ordinarilypresent and operative in a degree. But thereis substantial ground for a wise discriminationin this respect. As a measure of expediency,particularly the expediency of publicity, it isdesirable that the incumbents of the higherstations on the staff should be able to live onsuch a scale of conspicuous expensiveness asto make a favourable impression on thosemen of pecuniary refinement and expensivetastes with whom they are designed to comein contact. The university should be worthilyrepresented in its personnel, particularly in

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it is well that those who may be called tostand spokesmen for the seat of learning inits contact with men and women ofsubstantial means, should be accustomed to,and should be pecuniarily competent for, ascale of living somewhat above that which theordinary remuneration for academic work willsupport. An independent income, therefore, isa meritorious quality in an official scholar.

circles where such prestige might come tohave a commercial value, in the way ofdonations, and it might at the same timedeter possible customers of the samedesirable class from sending their young mento the university as students.

The American university is not aneleemosynary institution; it does not pleadindigence, except in that Pickwickian sense inwhich indigence may without shame beavowed in polite circles; nor does it put itstrust in donations of that sparseness andmodesty which the gifts of charity commonlyhave. Its recourse necessarily is thatsubstantial and dignified class of gifts that arenot given thriftily on compunction of charity,but out of the fulness of the purse. Thesedignified gifts commonly aim to promote themost reputable interests of humanity, ratherthan the sordid needs of creature comfort, atthe same time that they serve to fortify thedonor' s good name in good company.Donations to university funds have somethingof the character of an investment in goodfame; they are made by gentlemen andgentlewomen, to gentlemen, and thetransactions begin and end within the circle ofpecuniary respectability. An impeccablerespectability, authentic in the pecuniaryrespect, therefore, affords the only ground on

The introduction of these delegates fromthe well-to-do among the academic personnelhas a further, secondary effect that is worthnoting. Their ability freely to meet anyrequired pecuniary strain, coupled with thatdegree of social ambition that commonlycomes with the ability to pay, will have asalutary effect in raising the standard of livingamong the rest of the staff, -salutary as seenfrom the point of view of the bureau ofpublicity. In the absence of outside resources,the livelihood of academic men is somewhatscant and precarious. This places them underan insidious temptation to a moreparsimonious manner of life than the best(prestige) interests of the seat of learningwould dictate. By undue saving out of theircurrent wages they may easily give theacademic establishment an untoward air ofindigence, such as would be likely todepreciate its prestige in those well-to-do

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which such a seminary of learning canreasonably claim the sympathetic attention ofthe only class whose attentions are seriouslyworth engaging in these premises; andrespectability is inseparable from anexpensive scale of living, in any communitywhose scheme of life is conventionallyregulated by pecuniary standards.

solvent minority among the academicpersonnel, it has also been found expedientthat the directorate take thought andinstitute something in the way of an authenticcurriculum of academic festivities andexhibitions of social proficiency. A degree ofexpensive gentility is in this way propagatedby authority, to be paid for in part out of thesalaries of the faculty.It is accordingly expedient, for its

collective good repute, that the members ofthe academic staff should conspicuouslyconsume all their current income in currentexpenses of living. Hence also the moralobligation incumbent on all members of thestaff -- and their households -- to take handsand help in an endless chain of conspicuouslyexpensive social amenities, where their socialproficiency and their ostensible ability to paymay effectually be placed on view. Aneffectual furtherance to this desirable end isthe active presence among the staff of anappreciable number who are ready to takethe lead at a pace slightly above thecompetency of the common run of universitymen. Their presence insures that the generalbody will live up to their limit; for in this, as inother games of emulation, the pace-maker isinvaluable.

Something in this way of ceremonialfunctions and public pageants has long beenincluded in the ordinary routine of theacademic year among the higher Americanschools. It dates back to the time when theywere boys' schools under the tutelage of theclergy, and it appears to have had a ritualisticorigin, such as would comport with what isfound expedient in the service of the church.By remoter derivation it should probably befound to rest on a very ancient and archaicfaith in the sacramental or magical efficacy ofceremonial observances. But the presentstate of the case can by no means be setdown to the account of aimless survival alone.Instead of being allowed in any degree to fallinto abeyance by neglect, the range andmagnitude of such observances haveprogressively grown appreciably greater sincethe principles of competitive business havecome to rule the counsels of the universities.

Besides the incentive so given to politeexpenditure by the presence of a highly

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The growth, in the number of suchobservances, in their pecuniary magnitude, intheir ritualistic circumstance, and in theimportance attached to them, is greater in theimmediate present than at any period in thepast; and it is, significantly, greater in thoselarger new establishments that have startedout with few restraints of tradition. But themove so made by these younger, freer, moreenterprising seats of learning falls closely inwith that spirit of competitive enterprise thatanimates all alike though unequally. 1

no requirement of the academic routineshould be allowed to stand in the way of anavailable occasion for a scholastic pageant.

These genteel solemnities, of course,have a cultural significance, probably of a highorder, both as occasions of rehearsal in allmatters of polite conformity and as a stimulusto greater refinement and proficiency inexpenditure on seemly dress and equipage.They may also be believed to have someremote, but presumably salutary, bearing onthe higher learning. This latter is an obscurepoint, on which it would be impossible atpresent to offer anything better thanabstruse speculative considerations; sincethe relation of these genteel exhibitions toscientific inquiry or instruction is of a peculiarlyintangible nature. But it is none of thesecultural bearings of any such round of politesolemnities and stately pageants that comesin question here. It is their expediency inpoint of businesslike enterprise, or perhapsrather their businesslike motive, on the onehand, and their effect Upon the animus andefficiency of the academic personnel, on theother hand.

That it does so, that this efflorescence ofritual and pageantry intimately belongs in thecurrent trend of things academic, is shown bythe visible proclivity of the older institutions tofollow the lead given in this matter by theyounger ones, so far as the younger oneshave taken the lead. In the mere number ofauthorized events, as contrasted with theaverage of some twenty-five or thirty yearsback, the present average appears, on asomewhat deliberate review of the availabledata, to compare as three or four to one. Forcertain of the younger and more exuberantseats of learning today, as compared withwhat may be most nearly comparable in theacademic situation of the eighties, theproportion is perhaps twice as large as thelarger figure named above. Broadly speaking,

In so far as their motive should not (byunseemly imputation) be set down to mereboyish exuberance of make-believe, it mustbe sought among considerations germane to

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that business enterprise that rules academicpolicy. However attractive such a derivationmight seem, this whole traffic in pageantryand ceremonial amenities can not be tracedback to ecclesiastical ground, except in pointof remote pedigree; it has grown greatersince the businessmen took over academicpolicy out of the hands of the clergy. Nor canit be placed to the account of courtly,diplomatic, or military antecedents orguidance; these fields of activity, while theyare good breeding ground for pomp andcircumstance, do not overlap, or evenseriously touch, the frontiers of the republic oflearning. On the other hand, in seekinggrounds or motives for it all, it is also not easyto find any close analogy in the field ofbusiness enterprise of the larger sort, thathas to do with the conduct of industry. Thereis little of this manner of expensive publicceremonial and solemn festivities to be seen,e.g., among business concerns occupied withrailroading or banking, in cottonspinning, orsugar-refining, or in farming, shipping, coal,steel, or oil. In this field phenomena of thisgeneral class are of rare occurrence, sporadicat the best; and when they occur they willcommonly come in connection withcompetitive sales of products, services orsecurities, particularly the latter. Nearer

business analogues will be found in retailmerchandising, and in enterprises of popularamusement, such as concert halls, beergardens, or itinerant shows. The streetparades of the latter, e.g., show a seductive,though, it is believed, misleading analogy tothe ceremonial pageants that round off theacademic year.

Phenomena that come into view in thelater and maturer growth of the retail trade,as seen, e. g., in the larger and morereputable department stores, are perhapsnearer the point. There are formal "openings"to inaugurate the special trade of each of thefour seasons, desired to put the patrons ofthe house on a footing of good-humouredfamiliarity with the plant and its resources,with the customs of the house, the personneland the stock of wares in hand, and before allto arrest the attention and enlist the interestof those classes that may be induced to buy.There are also occasional gatherings of amore ceremonial character, by specialinvitation of select customers to a promisedexhibition of peculiarly rare and curiousarticles of trade. This will then be illuminatedwith shrewdly conceived harangues settingforth the alleged history, adventures andmerits, past and future, of the particularbranch of the trade, and of the particular

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house at whose expense the event isachieved. In addition to these seasonal andoccasional set pieces of mercantile ceremony,there will also run along in the day' s work anunremitting display of meritorious acts ofcommission and omission. Like theiranalogues in academic life these ceremonialsof trade are expensive, edifying, enticing, andsurrounded with a solicitous regard forpublicity; and it will be seen that they are, alland several, expedients of advertising.

scale of pay is likely to be publicly divulged, itis, perhaps, adequate to the averagedemands made on university incomes bypolite usage; but the large majority ofuniversity men belong on the lower levels ofgrade and pay; and on these lower levels thepay is, perhaps, lower than any outsiderappreciates.(3*)

With men circumstanced as the commonrun of university men are, the temptation toparsimony is ever present, while on the otherhand, as has already been noted, theprestige of the university -- and of theacademic head -- demands of all its membersa conspicuously expensive manner of living.Both of these needs may, of course, be met insome poor measure by saving in the obscureritems of domestic expense, such as food,clothing, heating, lighting, floor-space, books,and the like; and making all available fundscount toward the collective end of reputablepublicity, by throwing the stress on suchexpenditures as come under the public eye,as dress and equipage, bric-a-brac,amusements, public entertainments, etc. Itmay seem that it should also be possible tocut down the proportion of obscureexpenditures for creature comforts by limitingthe number of births in the family, or byforegoing marriage. But, by and large, there is

To return to the academic personnel andtheir implication in these recurrent spectaclesand amenities of university life. As wasremarked above, apart from outsideresources the livelihood that comes to auniversity man is, commonly, somewhatmeagre. The tenure is uncertain and thesalaries, at an average, are not large.Indeed, they are notably low in comparisonwith the high conventional standard of livingwhich is by custom incumbent on universitymen. University men are conventionallyrequired to live on a scale of expenditurecomparable with that in vogue among thewell-to-do businessmen, while their universityincomes compare more nearly with the lowergrades of clerks and salesmen. The rate ofpay varies quite materially, as is well known.For the higher grades of the staff, whose

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reason to believe that this expedient hasbeen exhausted. As men have latterly beenat pains to show, the current average ofchildren in academic households is not high;whereas the percentage of celibates is. Thereappears, indeed, to be little room foradditional economy on this head, or in thematter of household thrift, beyond what isembodied in the family budgets already inforce in academic circles.

conspicuously parsimonious manner of life, orby too pronounced an addiction to scientific orscholarly pursuits, to the neglect of thosepolite exhibitions of decorum that conduce tothe maintenance of the university's prestigein the eyes of the (pecuniarily) cultured laity.

A variety of other untowardcircumstances, of a similarly extra-scholasticbearing, may affect the fortunes of academicmen to a like effect; as, e.g., unearnednewspaper notoriety that may be turned toaccount in ridicule; unconventional religious,or irreligious convictions -- so far as theybecome known; an undesirable politicalaffiliation; an impecunious marriage, or suchdomestic infelicities as might become subjectof remark. None of these untowardcircumstances need touch the serviceability ofthe incumbent for any of the avowed, oravowable, purposes of the seminary oflearning; and where action has to be takenby the directorate on provocation of suchcircumstances it is commonly done with the(unofficial) admission that such action is takennot on the substantial merits of the case buton compulsion of appearances and theexigencies of advertising. That some sucheffect should be had follows from the natureof things, so far as business principles rule.

So also, the tenure of office is somewhatprecarious; more so than the documentswould seem to indicate. This applies withgreater force to the lower grades than to thehigher. Latterly, under the rule of businessprinciples, since the prestige value of aconspicuous consumption has come to agreater currency in academic policy, a memberof the staff may render his tenure moresecure, and may perhaps assure his duepreferment, by a sedulous attention to theacademic social amenities, and to the moreconspicuous items of his expense account;and he will then do well in the sameconnection also to turn his best attention inthe day's work to administrative duties andschoolmasterly discipline, rather than to theincrease of knowledge. Whereas he maymake his chance of preferment less assured,and may even jeopardize his tenure, by a

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In the degree, then, in which these andthe like motives of expediency are decisive,there results a husbanding of time, energyand means in the less conspicuousexpenditures and duties, in order to a freerapplication to more conspicuous uses, and ameticulous cultivation of the bourgeoisvirtues. The workday duties of instruction,and more particularly of inquiry, are, in thenature of the case, less conspicuously inevidence than the duties of the drawing-room, the ceremonial procession, the formaldinner, or the grandstand on some red-letterday of intercollegiate athletics.(4*) For thepurposes of a reputable notoriety theeveryday work of the classroom andlaboratory is also not so effective as lecturesto popular audiences outside; especially,perhaps, addresses before an audience ofdevout and well-to-do women. Indeed, all thisis well approved by experience. In many anddevious ways, therefore, a university manmay be able to serve the collective enterpriseof his university to better effect than by anexclusive attention to the scholastic work onwhich alone he is ostensibly engaged.

the public eye; but a further incentive to gointo this outside and non-academic work, aswell as to take on supernumerary work withinthe academic schedule, lies in the fact thatsuch outside or supernumerary work isspecially paid, and so may help to eke out asensibly scant livelihood. So far as touchesthe more scantily paid grades of universitymen, and so far as no alien considerationscome in to trouble the working-out ofbusiness principles, the outcome may beschematized somewhat as follows. Thesemen have, at the outset, gone into theuniversity presumably from an inclination toscholarly or scientific pursuits; it is notprobable that they have been led into thiscalling by the pecuniary inducements, whichare slight as compared with the ruling rates ofpay in the open market for other work thatdemands an equally arduous preparation andan equally close application. They have thenbeen apportioned rather more work asinstructors than they can take care of in themost efficient manner, at a rate of pay whichis sensibly scant for the standard of(conspicuous) living conventionally imposedon them. They are, by authority, expected toexpend time and means in such politeobservances, spectacles and quasi-learnedexhibitions as are presumed to enhance the

Among the consequences that follow is aconstant temptation for the members of thestaff to take on work outside of that for whichthe salary is nominally paid. Such work takes

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prestige of the university. They are soinduced to divert their time and energy tospreading abroad the university's goodrepute by creditable exhibitions of a quasi-scholarly character, which have no substantialbearing on a university man's legitimateinterests; as well as in seekingsupplementary work outside of theirmandatory schedule, from which to derive anadequate livelihood and to fill up thecomplement of politely wasteful expendituresexpected of them. The academic instructionnecessarily suffers by this diversion of forcesto extra-scholastic objects; and the work ofinquiry, which may have primarily engagedtheir interest and which is indispensable totheir continued efficiency as teachers, is, inthe common run of cases, crowded to oneside and presently drops out of mind. Likeother workmen, under pressure ofcompetition the members of the academicstaff will endeavour to keep up theirnecessary income by cheapening theirproduct and increasing their marketableoutput. And by consequence of this pressureof bread-winning and genteel expenditure,these university men are so barred out fromthe serious pursuit of those scientific andscholarly inquiries which alone can,academically speaking, justify their retention

on the university faculty, and for the sake ofwhich, in great part at least, they havechosen this vocation. No infirmity morecommonly besets university men than thisgoing to seed in routine work and extra-scholastic duties. They have entered on theacademic career to find time, place, facilitiesand congenial environment for the pursuit ofknowledge, and under pressure theypresently settle down to a round ofperfunctory labour by means of which tosimulate the life of gentlemen.(5*)

Before leaving the topic it should furtherbe remarked that the dissipation incident tothese polite amenities, that so are incumbenton the academic personnel, apparently alsohas something of a deteriorative effect ontheir working capacity, whether for scholarlyor for worldly uses. Prima facie evidence tothis effect might be adduced, but it is noteasy to say how far the evidence would bearcloser scrutiny. There is an appreciableamount of dissipation, in its several sorts,carried forward in university circles in aninconspicuous manner, and not designed forpublicity. How far this is induced by a loss ofinterest in scholarly work, due to the habitualdiversion of the scholars' energies to otherand more exacting duties, would be hard tosay; as also how far it may be due to the lead

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given by men-of-the-world retained on thefaculties for other than scholarly reasons. Atthe same time there is the difficulty that manyof those men who bear a large part in theceremonial dissipation incident to theenterprise in publicity are retained,apparently, for their proficiency in this line asmuch as for their scholarly attainments, or atleast so one might infer; and these men mustbe accepted with the defects of theirqualities.

for all that, it also remains true that withoutthe initiative and countenance of theexecutive head these boyish movements ofsentimental spectacularity on the part of thepersonnel would come to little, by comparisonwith what actually takes place. It is after all amatter for executive discretion, and, fromwhatever motives, this diversion of effort toextra-scholastic ends has the executivesanction;(7*) with the result that an intimatefamiliarity with current academic life iscalculated to raise the question whethermake-believe does not, after all, occupy alarger and more urgent place in the life ofthese thoughtful adult male citizens than inthe life of their children.

As bearing on this whole matter of pompand circumstance, social amenities and ritualdissipation, quasi-learned demonstrationsand meretricious publicity, in academic life, itis difficult beyond hope of a final answer todetermine how much of it is due directly tothe masterful initiative of the strong man whodirects the enterprise, and how much is to beset down to an innate proclivity for all thatsort of thing on the part of the academicpersonnel. A near view of these phenomenaleaves the impression that there is, on thewhole, less objection felt than expressedamong the academic men with regard to thisroutine of demonstration; that the reluctancewith which they pass under the ceremonialyoke is not altogether ingenuous; all of whichwould perhaps hold true even more decidedlyas applied to the faculty households.(6*) But

NOTES:

1. It was a very wise and adroit politicianwho found out that "You can not fool all thepeople all the time."

2. La gloria di colui che tutto muove,Per l'universo penetra e risplendeIn una parte pi’ e meno altr’ ove.3. In a certain large and enterprising

university, e.g., the pay of the lowest, andnumerous, rank regularly employed to do fullwork as teachers, is proportioned to that ofthe highest -- much less numerous -- rank

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about as one to twelve at the most, perhapseven as low as one to twenty. And it may notbe out of place to enter the caution that thenominal rank of a given member of the staff isno secure index of his income, even wherethe salary "normally" attached to the givenacademic rank is known. Not unusually a"normal" scale of salaries is formally adoptedby the governing board and spread upontheir records, and such a scale will then besurreptitiously made public. But departuresfrom the scale habitually occur, whereby thesalaries actually paid come to fall short of the"normal" perhaps as frequently as theyconform to it.

nominal rank is made to serve in place of anadvance in salary, the former being the lesscostly commodity for the time being. Indeed,so frequent are such departures from thenormal scale as to have given rise to the (nodoubt ill-advised) suggestion that this may beone of the chief uses of the adopted scheduleof normal salaries. So an employee of theuniversity may not infrequently find himselfconstrained to accept, as part payment, anexpensive increment of dignity attaching to ahigher rank than his salary account wouldindicate. Such an outcome of individualbargaining is all the more likely in theacademic community, since there is no settledcode of professional ethics governing theconduct of business enterprise in academicmanagement, as contrasted with the traffic ofordinary competitive business.

There is no trades-union amonguniversity teachers, and no collectivebargaining. There appears to be a feelingprevalent among them that their salaries arenot of the nature of wages, and that therewould be a species of moral obliquity impliedin overtly so dealing with the matter. And inthe individual bargaining by which the rate ofpay is determined the directorate may easilybe tempted to seek an economical way out,by offering a low rate of pay coupled with ahigher academic rank. The plea is alwaysready to hand that the university is in want ofthe necessary funds and is constrained toeconomize where it can. So an advance in

4. So, e.g., the well-known president of awell and favourably known university was atpains a few years ago to distinguish one ofhis faculty as being his "ideal of a universityman"; the grounds of this invidious distinctionbeing a lifelike imitation of a countrygentleman and a fair degree of attention tocommittee work in connection with theacademic administration; the incumbent hadno distinguishing marks either as a teacher oras a scholar, and neither science nor letters

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will be found in his debt. It is perhapsneedless to add that for reasons of invidiousdistinction, no names can be mentioned inthis connection. It should be added inillumination of the instance cited, that in thesame university, by consistent selection anddiscipline of the personnel, it had come aboutthat, in the apprehension of the staff as wellas of the executive, the accepted test ofefficiency was the work done on theadministrative committees -- rather than thatof the class rooms or laboratories.

sedulous attention on his own part to allother qualifications than the main fact, thathis faculty at the time of speaking was in themain an aggregation of slack-twistedschoolmasters and men about town. Such acharacterization, however, does not carry anygravely invidious discrimination, nor will itpresumably serve in any degree to identifythe seat of learning to which it refers.

6. The share and value of the "facultywives" in all this routine of resoluteconviviality is a large topic, an intelligent andveracious account of which could only be awork of naive brutality:

5. Within the past few years an academicexecutive of great note has been heardrepeatedly to express himself in facetiousdoubt of this penchant for scholarly inquiry onthe part of university men, whether as"rese·rch" or as "research"; and there isdoubtless ground for scepticism as to itspermeating the academic body with that stingof ubiquity that is implied in many expressionson this head. And it should also be said,perhaps in extenuation of the expressioncited above, that the president wasaddressing delegations of his own faculty,and presumably directing his remarks to theirspecial benefit; and that while he professed(no doubt ingenuously) a profound zeal forthe cause of science at large, it had comeabout, selectively, through a long course of

"But the grim, grim Ladies, Oh, mybrothers!

They are ladling bitterly.They are ladling in the work-time of the

others,In the country of the free."(Mrs. Elizabret Harte Browning, in The

Cry of the HeathenChinee.)7. What takes place without executive

sanction need trouble no one.

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CHAPTER VI scholarly proficiency and propagandistintrigue.The Portion of the Scientist

If these business principles were quitefree to work out their logical consequences,untroubled by any disturbing factors of anunbusinesslike nature, the outcome should beto put the pursuit of knowledge definitively inabeyance within the university, and tosubstitute for that objective something forwhich the language hitherto lacks adesignation.

The principles of business enterprisetouch the life and work of the academic staffat divers points and with various effect. Undertheir rule, and in so far as they rule, theremuneration shifts from the basis of astipend designed to further the pursuit ofknowledge, to that of a wage bargain,partaking of the nature of a piece-workscheme, designed to procure class-roominstruction at the lowest practicable cost. Abusinesslike system of accountancystandardizes and measures this instruction bymechanically gauged units of duration andnumber, amplitude and frequency, and sodiscountenances work that rises above astaple grade of mediocrity. Usage and theurgent need of a reputable notoriety imposeon university men an extraneous andexcessively high standard of living expenses,which constrains them to take onsupernumerary work in excess of what theycan carry in an efficient manner. The need ofuniversity prestige enforces this high scale ofexpenses, and also pushes the members ofthe staff into a routine of polite dissipation,ceremonial display, exhibitions of quasi-

For divers reasons of an unbusinesslikekind, such a consummate ("sweat-shop")scheme has never fully been achieved,particularly not in establishments that are,properly speaking, of anything like universitygrade. This perfect scheme of low-costperfunctory instruction, high-cost stageproperties and press-agents, public song anddance, expensive banquets, speech-makingand processions, is never fully rounded out.This amounts to admitting a partial defeat forthe gild of businesslike "educators." While, asa matter of speculative predilection, they maynot aim to leave the higher learning out of theuniversity, the rule of competitive businessprinciples consistently pushes theiradministration toward that end; which theyare continually prevented from attaining, by

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the necessary conditions under which theircompetitive enterprise is carried on.

But even from day to day this scholarlypurpose is never quite lost sight of. The habitof counting it in, as a matter of course, affectsall concerned, in some degree; andcomplacent professions of faith to that effectcross one another from all quarters. It mayfrequently happen that the enterprising menin whom academic discretion centres will haveno clear conception of what is implied in thisscholarly purpose to which they give aperfunctory matter-of-course endorsement,and much of their professions on that headmay be ad captandum; but that it need be amatter of course argues that it must becounted with.

For better or worse, there are alwaysand necessarily present among the academiccorps a certain number of men whose senseof the genteel properties is too vague andmeagre, whose grasp of the principles ofofficial preferment is too weak andinconsequential, whose addiction to thepursuit of knowledge is too ingrained, topermit their conforming wholly to thecompetitive exigencies of the case. By force ofthe exigencies of competitive prestige thereis, of course, a limit of tolerance that setsdecent bounds both to the number of suchsupererogatory scholars harboured by theuniversity, and the latitude allowed them intheir intemperate pursuit of knowledge; buttheir presence in the academic body is, afterall, neither an irrelevant accident nor atransient embarrassment. It is, in one senseof the expression, for the use of such men,and for the use which such men find for it,that the university exists at all; in some suchsense, indeed, as a government, a politicalmachine, a railway corporation or a toll-road,may be said to exist for the use of thecommunity from which they get their living. Itis true in the sense that this ostensible usecan not be left out of account in the long run.

Still, in the degree in which businessprinciples rule the case the outcome will be ofmuch the same complexion as it might be inthe absence of any such prepossession,intelligent or otherwise, in favour of thehigher learning on the part of the directorate;for competition has the same effect here aselsewhere, in that it permits none of thecompetitors to forego any expedient that hasbeen found advantageous by any one ofthem. So that, whatever course might bedictated by the sentiments of the directorate,the course enjoined by the principles ofcompetitive business sets toward thesuppression or elimination of all such scholarly

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or scientific work from the university as doesnot contribute immediately to its prestige,-except so far as the conditions alluded tomake such a course impracticable.

not become personal and touch their ownpreferment. In great part the academic corpsstill understands and appreciates thescholarly animus, and looks, on the whole,kindly and sympathetically -- indeed, with atouch of envy -- on those among them whoare so driven to follow their own scientificbent, to the neglect of expedient gentility andpublicity.

It is not an easy or a graceful matter fora businesslike executive to get rid of anyundecorative or indecorous scientist, whoseonly fault is an unduly pertinacious pursuit ofthe work for which alone the university claimsto exist, whose failure consists in living up tothe professions of the executive instead ofprofessing to live up to them. Academictradition gives a broad, though perhapsuncertain, sanction to the scientific spirit thatmoves this obscure element in the academicbody. And then, their more happily gifted,more worldly-wise colleagues have also adegree of respect for such a single-mindedpursuit of knowledge, even while they mayview these naive children of impulse withsomething of an amused compassion; for thegeneral body of the academic staff is stillmade up largely of men who have started outwith scholarly ideals, even though theseideals may have somewhat fallen away fromthem under the rub of expediency. At least ina genial, speculative sense of the phrase,scholarship still outranks official preferment inthe esteem of the generality of academicmen, particularly so long as the question does

The like can, of course, not be so freelysaid of that body of businessmen in whom isvested the final control; yet this sentiment ofgenial approval that pervades the academicbody finds some vague response even amongthese; and in any event it is always to bereckoned with and is not to be outraged,unless for a good and valuable consideration.It can not altogether be set aside, although,it is true, the conduct of certain executiveheads, grown old in autocratic rule and self-complacency, may at times appear to arguethe contrary. So that, by and large, thereresults an unstable compromise between therequirements of scholarly fitness and those ofcompetitive enterprise, with a doubtful andshifting issue. Just at present, under the firmhand of an enterprising and autocraticexecutive, the principles of competitivebusiness are apparently gaining ground in thegreater universities, where the volume of

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traffic helps to cloud the details ofsuppression, and the cult of learning isgradually falling into a more precariousposition.

learning; the competitive manoeuvres of theacademic executive must be carried onsurreptitiously, in a sense, cloaked as a non-competitive campaign for the increase ofknowledge without fear or favour.In a curious way, too, the full swing of

business principles in academic life is hinderedby the necessary ways and means throughwhich these principles are worked out; somuch so, indeed, as to throw a serious doubton their ultimately achieving an undivideddominion. Taken as a business concern, theuniversity is in a very singular position. Thereason for its being, at all, is the educationalaspiration that besets modern mankind. Itsonly ostensible reason for being, and so forits being governed and managed,competitively or otherwise, is theadvancement of learning. And thisadvancement of learning is in no degree abusiness proposition; and yet it must, for thepresent at least, remain the sole ostensiblepurpose of the businesslike university. In themain, therefore, all the competitiveendeavours and manoeuvres of the captainsof erudition in charge must be made undercover of an ostensible endeavour to furtherthis non-competitive advancement of learning,at all costs. Since learning is not a competitivematter; since, indeed, competition in anyguise or bearing in this field is detrimental to

All this places the executive in a verydelicate position. On the one hand theprinciples of competitive business, embodiedin a plenary board of control and in a criticalscrutiny from the side of the businesscommunity at large, demand that allappointments, promotions, dismissals,ceremonials, pronouncements andexpenditures, must be made with a constantview to their highest advertising effect;whereas the notions current as to what isfitting in a seminary of the higher learning, onthe other hand, somewhat incongruouslydemand that all these deeds of commissionand omission be done with an eye single tothe increase of knowledge, regardless ofappearances. And this double responsibilityfalls, of necessity, on the executive head ofthe university, under the present regime ofcentralized autocratic rule. Any ethical codethat shall permit the executive head toaccomplish what is expected of him in the wayof a competitive enterprise under thesecircumstances, will necessarily be vague andshifty, not to and men who have tried to do

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say tenuous and shadowy; their whole dutyin these premises are ready to admit thatthey have been called on to face manydistasteful situations, where honesty wouldnot approve itself as the best policy.(1*)

animus, and he is likely to have fallen into thehabit of rating the triumphs of science abovethose of the market place. Such a person willalmost unavoidably affect the spirit of anyacademic corps into which he is intruded. Hewill also, in a measure, bend the forces of theestablishment to a long-term efficiency in thepursuit of knowledge, rather than to thepursuit of a reputable notoriety from day today. To the enterprising captain of eruditionhe is likely to prove costly and inconvenient,but he is unavoidable.

Whatever expedients of decorative real-estate, spectacular pageantry, bureaucraticmagnificence, elusive statistics, vocationaltraining, genteel solemnities and sweat-shopinstruction, may be imposed by the exigenciesof a competitive business policy, theuniversity is after all a seat of learning,devoted to the cult of the idle curiosity, --otherwise called the scientific spirit. Andstultification, broad and final, waits on anyuniversity directorate that shall dare to avowany other end as its objective. So theappearance of an unwavering devotion to thepursuit of knowledge must be kept up. Hencethe presence of scholars and scientists ofaccepted standing is indispensable to theuniversity, as a means of keeping up itsprestige. The need of them may be a need oftheir countenance rather than of their work,but they are indispensable, and they bringwith them the defects of their qualities. Whena man achieves such notoriety for scientificattainments as to give him a high value as anarticle of parade, the chances are that he isendowed with some share of the scientific

This will hold true in a general way, andwith due exceptions, for men prominent inthose material sciences that have to do withdata of such a tangible character, and givetheir results in such terms of mechanical fact,as to permit a passably close appreciation oftheir worth by the laity. It applies only moreloosely, with larger exceptions and a widermargin of error, in the humanities and the so-called moral and social sciences. In this latterfield a clamorous conformity to currentprepossessions, particularly the conventionalprepossessions of respectability, or anedifying and incisive rehearsal ofcommonplaces, will commonly pass in popularesteem for scholarly and scientific merit. Atruculent quietism is often accepted as a markof scientific maturity. The reason for this will

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appear presently. But so far as popularesteem is a truthful index of scientificachievement. the proposition holds, thatscientists who have done great things have abusiness value to the captain of erudition asa means of advancing the university'sprestige; and so far the indicatedconsequences follow. In some measure thescientific men so intruded into the academicbody are in a position to give a direction toaffairs within their field and within theframework of the general policy. They areable to claim rank and discretion, and theirchoice, or at least their assent, must beconsulted in the selection of their subalterns,and in a degree also in the organization ofthe department's work. It is true, men whosetalent, interest and experience run chieflywithin the lines of scientific inquiry, arecommonly neither skilled nor shrewdmanagers in that give and take of subtletiesand ambiguities by which the internalmachinery of the university is kept in line andrunning under a businesslike administration;but even so, their aims and prepossessionswill in a measure affect the animus and shapethe work of the academic body. All this appliesparticularly on the higher levels of research,as contrasted with the commonplace(undergraduate) work of instruction. But at

this point, therefore, the principles ofcompetitive publicity carry with them a partialneutralization of their own tendency.

This necessity of employing scientists ofa commanding force and rank raises a point ofsome delicacy in the administration of thecompetitive university. It is necessary toassign these men a relatively high rank in theacademic hierarchy; both because they willaccept no subordinate place and because theadvertising value of their prestige will becurtailed by reducing them to aninconspicuous position. And with high rank isnecessarily associated a relatively largediscretion and a wide influence in academicaffairs, at least on the face of things. Suchmen, so placed, are apt to be exacting inmatters which they conceive to bear on thework in their own sciences, and theirexactions may not be guided chiefly by theconspicuousness of the equipment which theyrequire or of the results at which they aim.They are also not commonly adroit men ofaffairs, in the business sense of the term; notgiven to conciliatory compromises and anexhibition of complaisant statistics. Theframing of shrewd lines of competitivestrategy, and the bureaucratic punctilios ofuniversity administration, do not commonly

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engage their best interest, even if it does notstir them to an indecorous impatience.(2*)

even though it all has nothing to do with theman's fitness for university work. Such a step,however, is not to be taken unless the case isurgent; if there is danger of estranging theaffections of potential donors, or if it involvesanything like overt disloyalty to the executivehead.

Should such a man become undulyinsistent in his advocacy of scholarship, so asseriously to traverse the statisticalaspirations of the executive, or in any way toendanger the immediate popular prestige ofthe university, then it may become an openquestion whether his personal prestige hasnot been bought at too high a cost. As abusiness proposition, it may even becomeexpedient to retire him. But his retirementmay not be an easy matter to arrange. Thebusinesslike grounds of it can not well beavowed, since it is involved in the scheme ofacademic decorum, as well as in the schemeof publicity, that motives of notoriety must notbe avowed. Colourable grounds of anotherkind must be found, such as will divert thepopular imagination from the point at issue.By a judicious course of vexation andequivocations, an obnoxious scientist may bemanoeuvred into such a position that hispride will force a "voluntary" resignation.Failing this, it may become necessary,however distasteful, delicately to defame hisdomestic life, or his racial, religious or politicalstatus. In America such an appeal to thebaser sentiments will commonly cloud theissue sufficiently for the purpose in hand,

This is one of the points at which it isnecessary to recall the fact that no settledcode of business ethics has yet been workedout for the guidance of competitive universitymanagement; nor is it easy to see how sucha code can be worked out, so long as theuniversity remains ostensibly a seat oflearning, unable to avow any other ground ofaction than a single-minded pursuit ofknowledge. It has been alleged -- indeed it isfast becoming a tradition -- that theexecutives of the great competitiveuniversities habitually allow some peculiarlatitude as touches the canons of truth andfair dealing. If this describes the facts, itshould not be counted against these discreetmen who so have to tax their ingenuity, butagainst the situation in which they are placed,which makes it impracticable to observe a nicediscrimination in matters of veracity.Statements of fact, under such conditions, willin great part be controlled by the end to beaccomplished, rather than by antecedent

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circumstances; such statements arenecessarily of a teleological order. As in othercompetitive business, facts have in thisconnection only a strategic value; but theexigencies of strategy here are peculiarlyexacting, and often rigorous.

unlearned element, whose good opinion thecompetitive university must conciliate. But inthe nature of the case, within the range ofsciences named, the estimate of theunlearned is necessarily in the wrong.

With the exception of archaeologicalinquiries and the study of law, as commonlypursued, these moral or social sciences areoccupied with inquiry into the nature of theconventions under which men live, theinstitutions of society -- customs, usages,traditions, conventions, canons of conduct,standards of life, of taste, of morality andreligion, law and order. No faithful inquiry intothese matters can avoid an air of scepticismas to the stability or finality of some one orother among the received articles ofinstitutional furniture. An inquiry into thenature and causes, the working and theoutcome, of this institutional apparatus, willdisturb the habitual convictions andpreconceptions on which they rest, even if theoutcome of the inquiry should bear no colourof iconoclasm; unless, indeed, the inquirerwere so fortunate as to start with aninalienable presumption that the receivedconvictions on these matters need no inquiryand are eternally right and good; in whichcase he does best to rest content at his pointof departure. Scepticism is the beginning of

Academic tradition and current commonsense unite in imposing on the universitiesthe employment of prominent scholars andscientists, in that men of note in this classhave a high prestige value for purposes ofpublicity; and it was suggested above that areservation of some breadth must be madeon this head. Common notoriety is the duetest of eminence which the competitiveuniversity must apply in the selection of itsnotables. But in the sciences that deal withthe less tangible and measureable data, theso-called moral or social sciences, commonnotoriety is not even an approximatelyaccurate index of scientific capacity orattainments; and still it is, of course, thestanding of the incumbents in point ofcommon notoriety that must chiefly be had inview in any strict valuation of them forpurposes of academic prestige. They areneeded for the advertising value which theybring, and for this purpose they are valuablesomewhat in proportion to the rank awardedthem by common report among that

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science. Herein lies the difference betweenhomiletical exposition and scientific inquiry.

disputes the scheme of things into which itinquires. And so, at the best, it falls into thesame class with the fabled Alexandrine booksthat either agreed with the Koran ordisagreed with it, and were therefore eitheridle or sacrilegious.

Now, on these matters of habit andconvention, morality and religion, law andorder -- matters which intimately touch thecommunity's accepted scheme of life -- all menhave convictions; sentimental convictions towhich they adhere with an instinctivetenacity, and any disturbance of which theyresent as a violation of fundamental truth.These institutions of society are made up ofthe habits of thought of the people who liveunder them. The consensus of the unlearned,or unscientific, as regards the scientific validityof inquiries which touch these matters meanslittle else than the collective expressions of ajealous orthodoxy with respect to the articlesof the current social creed. One who purportsto be a scientist in this field can gain popularapproval of his scientific capacity, particularlythe businessmen's approval, only byaccepting and confirming current convictionsregarding those elements of the acceptedscheme of life with which his science isoccupied. Any inquiry which does not lead tocorroboration of the opinions in vogue amongthe unlearned is condemned as beingspurious and dangerously wrong-headed;whereas an unbiassed inquiry into thesethings, of course, neither confirms nor

Within this field, vulgar sentiment willtolerate a sceptical or non-committal attitudetoward vulgar convictions only as regards thedecorative furnishings, not as regards thesubstance of the views arrived at. Some slightplay of hazardous phrases about the fringe ofthe institutional fabric may be tolerated bythe popular taste, as an element of spice, andas indicating a generous and unbiassed mind;but in such cases the conclusive test ofscientific competency and leadership, in thepopular apprehension, is a serene andmagniloquent return to the orthodoxcommonplaces, after all such playfulexcursions. In fact, substantially nothing buthomiletics and woolgathering will passpopular muster as science in this connection.

So it comes about that the men who areby common notoriety held to be the leaders inthis field of learning, and who therefore arelikely to be thrown up by official preferment,are such as enlarge on the commonplace andaphoristic wisdom of the laity. Not that theofficial sanction falls unfailingly on the

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paragons of mediocrity; there are many andillustrious exceptions, a fair proportion ofwhom would be illustrious even without theofficial sanction; and in this connection it is inplace to recall that business principles havenot hitherto held undivided and sovereigndominion in this province, and that there iseven reason to believe that they are not yetcoming fully into their own.

events is particularly full at this juncture;while to outsiders who are not in a position toappreciate either the urgency or the subtletyof the motives of academic expediency in thisbearing, a recital of illustrative instancesmight seem either libellous or farcical. Theexigencies of competitive academicenterprise, especially in its relation to themaintenance and increase of endowment,place the executive in a very delicate positionin this matter and leave little room forsqueamish deliberation.

These putative leaders of sciencereferred to are, in the common run of cases,not men with whom the science will have tocount; but by virtue of their eligibility asacademic spokesmen of the science, they aremen with whom their contemporaries in thescience will have to count. As is shown by theexperience of the past, they are likely to bewell forgotten by the generation that followsthem, but they are, perforce, equally wellremembered by their contemporaries. It is notthe long-term serviceability of these officialscientists that counts toward their availabilityfor academic leadership, but their popularprestige. They may not be such leaders asthe science needs, but they are suchexponents of opinion as are believed tocommend themselves to the tastes of thewell-to-do laity. A citation of instances wouldseem invidious, nor, presumably, is it calledfor. The anecdotal history of contemporary

At the risk of tedium, it is necessary topush the analysis of businesslike motives andtheir bearing a step farther at this point. It isnot simply the vulgar, commonplaceconvictions of the populace that must receiveconsideration in this field of the moral andsocial sciences, -- including such matters asreligion, sociology, economics, and politicalscience, so-called. What is especially to beconciliated by the official scientists is thecurrent range of convictions on all theseheads among those well-to-do classes fromwhom the institution hopes to drawcontributions to its endowment, on the onehand, and the more reputable part of itsundergraduate clientËle, on the other hand.Which comes, broadly, to saying that ajealous eye must be had to the views and

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prepossessions prevalent among therespectable, conservative middle class; with aparticular regard to that more select body ofsubstantial citizens who have the disposal ofaccumulated wealth. This select andsubstantial element are on the whole moreconservative, more old-fashioned in theirviews of what is right, good and true, andhold their views on more archaic grounds ofconviction, than the generality of the vulgar.And within this conservative body, again, it isthe elderly representatives of the old orderthat are chiefly to be considered, -- since it isthe honourable custom among men of largemeans not to give largely to institutions oflearning until late in life.

modesty and continence customarilyassociated with the large donations. But likeother men of force and thoughtfulness, thelarge and elderly businessmen have well-assured convictions and preferences; and asis the case with other men of the passinggeneration, so with the superannuatedbusinessmen, their convictions andpreferences fall out on the side of the oldorder rather than contrariwise. A wiseacademic policy, conducted by an executivelooking to the fiscal interests of the university,will aim not to alienate the affections of thelarge businessmen of a ripe age, byharbouring specialists whose inquires arelikely to traverse these old-settled convictionsin the social, economic, political, or religiousdomain. It is bad business policy to createunnecessary annoyance. So it comes aboutthat the habitual munificence of the captainsof industry who have reached their term willhave grave consequences for that range ofacademic science that is occupied withmatters on which they hold convictions.(3*)

It is to be accounted one of themeritorious customs of the greaterbusinessmen that, one with another, theyeventually convert a share of their takings tothe installation of schools and similarestablishments designed to serve and toconserve the amenities of civilized life. Usuallyit is in later life, or as an act of leave-taking,that this munificence is exercised. Usually,too, the great men who put forth this largemunificence do not hamper their bounty withmany restrictions on the character of theenlightenment which it is to serve. Indeed,there is in this respect a certain large

There results a genial endeavour to keepstep with the moribund captains of industryand the relics of the wealthy dead. Remotelyby force of a worldly-wise appointing power,proximately by force of the good taste andsober sense of well-chosen incumbents,

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something of filial piety comes to pervade theacademic handling of those institutionalphenomena that touch the sentiments of thepassing generation. Hence it comes thatcurrent academic work in the province of thesocial, political, and economic sciences, aswell as in the sciences that touch the religiousinterest, has a larger reputation forassurance and dignity than for an incisivecanvassing of the available material.

order, particularly with respect to religion,ownership, and the distribution of wealth. Butthis need imply no constraint, nor even anypeculiar degree of tact, much less a moralobliquity. It may confidently be asserted,without fear of contradiction from their side,that the official leaders in this province ofacademic research and indoctrination are,commonly, in no way hindered from pushingtheir researches with full freedom and to thelimit of their capacity; and that they arelikewise free to give the fullest expression toany conclusions or convictions to which theirinquiries may carry them. That they are ableto do so is a fortunate circumstance, due tothe fact that their intellectual horizon isbounded by the same limits of commonplaceinsight and preconceptions as are theprevailing opinions of the conservative middleclass. That is to say, a large and aggressivemediocrity is the prime qualification for aleader of science in these lines, if hisleadership is to gain academic authentication.

Critics of the latterday university policieshave from time to time called attention to anapparent reluctance on the part of theseacademic scientists to encounter present-dayfacts hand-to-hand, or to trace out thecauses to which current conditions are due.Distempered critics have even alleged thatthe academic leaders in the social sciencesare held under some constraint, as being, insome sort, in the pay of the well-to-doconservative element; that they are therebyincapacitated from following up any inquiry toits logical conclusion, in case the conclusionmight appear to traverse the interest or theopinions of those on whom these leaders arein this way pecuniarily dependent.

All this may seem too much like loosegenerality. With a view to such precision asthe case admits, it may be remarked that thisprovince of academic science as habituallypursued, is commonly occupied with questionsof what ought to be done, rather than withtheories of the genesis and causation of the

Now, it may be conceded withoutviolence to notorious facts, that these officialleaders of science do commonly reachconclusions innocuous to the existing law and

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present-day state of things, or with questionsas to what the present-day drift of things maybe, as determined by the causes at work. Asit does in popular speculation, so also in thisacademic quasi-science, the interest centreson what ought to be done to improveconditions and to conserve those usages andconventions that have by habit beenimbedded in the received scheme of use andwont, and so have come to be found goodand right. It is of the essence of popularspeculations on this range of topics that theyare focussed on questions of use; that theyare of a teleological order; that they look tothe expediency of the observed facts and totheir exploitation, rather than to a scientificexplanation of them. This attitude, of course,is the attitude of expediency and homiletics,not of scientific inquiry.

and brought back into its normal routine incase of aberration, and to be safeguardedwith apologetic defence at points where it isnot working to the satisfaction of all parties.It is a "science" of complaisantinterpretations, apologies, and projectedremedies.

The academic leaders in such a quasi-science should be gifted with the aspirationsand limitations that so show up in its pursuit.Their fitness in respect of this conformity tothe known middle-class animus andapprehension of truth may, as it expedientlyshould, be considered when their selection foracademic office and rank is under advisement;but, provided the choice be a wise one, thereneed be no shadow of constraint during theirincumbency. The incumbent should beendowed with a large capacity for work,particularly for "administrative" work, with alively and enduring interest in the "practical"questions that fall within his academicjurisdiction, and with a shrewd sense of thefundamental rightness of the existing order ofthings, social, economic, political, andreligious. So, by and large, it will be foundthat these accredited leaders of scientificinquiry are fortunate enough not narrowly toscrutinize, or to seek particular explanationof, those institutional facts which the

A single illustrative instance of theprevalence of this animus in the academicsocial sciences may be in place. It is usualamong economists, e.g., to make much of theproposition that economics is an "art" -- theart of expedient management of the materialmeans of life; and further that the justificationof economic theory lies in its serviceability inthis respect. Such a quasi-science necessarilytakes the current situation for granted as apermanent state of things; to be corrected

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conservative common sense of the elderlybusinessman accepts as good and final; andsince their field of inquiry is precisely thisrange of institutional facts, the consequenceis that their leadership in the scienceconduces more to the stability of opinionsthan to the advancement of knowledge.

scholars, of scientific animus and intellectualgrasp, whose endeavours are given to thisrange of inquiry. Its application, indeed, isintended to reach no farther than may serveto cover the somewhat tactful and quietisticattitude of the moral sciences in theuniversities. As they are cultivated in thegreat seminaries of learning, these sciencesare commonly of a somewhat more archaiccomplexion than the contemporary materialsciences; they are less iconoclastic, have agreater regard for prescriptive authority andauthenticity, are more given to rest theirinquiry on grounds of expediency, ascontrasted with grounds of cause and effect.They are content to conclude that such andsuch events are expedient or inexpedient,quite as often and as easily as that such arethe causes or the genetic sequence of thephenomena under discussion. In short, underthis official leadership these sciences will havean attitude toward their subject of inquiryresembling that taken by the materialsciences something like a century ago.

The result is by no means that nothing isaccomplished in this field of science under thisleadership of forceful mediocrity, but onlythat, in so far as this leadership decides, thework done lies on this level of mediocrity.Indeed, the volume of work done is large andof substantial value, but it runs chiefly oncompilation of details and on the scrutiny andinterpretation of these details with a view totheir conformity with the approvedgeneralizations of the day before yesterday,-generalizations that had time to grow intoaphoristic commonplaces at a date before thepassing generation of businessmen attainedtheir majority.

What has just been said of this academicleadership in the social sciences, of course,applies only with due qualification. It appliesonly in so far as the principles of competitiveenterprise control the selection of thepersonnel, and even then only withexceptions. There is no intention todepreciate the work of those many eminent

To the credit of this academic leadershipin the social sciences, then, it should be saidthat both the leaders and their disciples applythemselves with admirable spirit to theseinquiries into the proper, expedient, andnormal course of events; and that the

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conclusions arrived at also shed muchsalutary light on what is proper, expedient,and normal in these premises. Inquiriescarried on in this spirit in the field of humaninstitutions belong, of course, in the categoryof worldly wisdom rather than of science."Practical" questions occupy these scientistsin great part, and practical, or utilitarian,considerations guide the course of the inquiryand shape the system of generalizations inthese sciences, to a much greater extent thanin the material sciences with which they arehere contrasted. An alert sense of thepractical value of their inquiries and theirteaching is one of the chief requisites forofficial recognition in the scientists whooccupy themselves with these matters, and itis one of the chief characteristics of theirwork. So that, in so far as it all conforms tothe principles of competitive business, the lineof demarcation between worldly wisdom andtheoretical validity becomes peculiarlyindistinct in this province of science. And, itmay be remarked by the way, the influence ofthis academic science, both in its disciplineand in its tenets, appears to be whollysalutary; it conduces, on the whole, to a safeand sane, if not an enthusiastic, acceptanceof things as they are, without undue curiosityas to why they are such.

What has here been said of the placeand use of the scientist under the currentregime of competitive enterprise describeswhat should follow from the unrestraineddominion of business principles in academicpolicy, rather than what has actually beenaccomplished in any concrete case; itpresents an ideal situation rather than arelation of events, though without losingtouch with current facts at any point. The runof the facts is, in effect, a compromisebetween the scholar's ideals and those ofbusiness, in such a way that the ideals ofscholarship are yielding ground, in anuncertain and varying degree, before thepressure of businesslike exigencies.

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NOTES: CHAPTER VIIVocational Training

1. Cf. also J. J. Chapman, paper on"Professional Ethics," in University Control, asabove, for an estimate of the inefficiency ofacademic opinion as a corrective of theexecutive power on his head.

In this latterday academic enterprise,that looks so shrewdly to practicalexpediency, "vocational training" has, quiteas a matter of course, become a conspicuousfeature. The adjective is a new one, installedexpressly to designate this line of endeavour,in the jargon of the educators; and it carries anote of euphemism. "Vocational training" istraining for proficiency in some gainfuloccupation, and it has no connection with thehigher learning, beyond that juxtapositiongiven it by the inclusion of vocational schoolsin the same corporation with the university;and its spokesmen in the universityestablishments accordingly take anapologetically aggressive attitude inadvocating its claims. Educational enterpriseof this kind has, somewhat incontinently,extended the scope of the corporation oflearning by creating, "annexing," or"affiliating" many establishments thatproperly lie outside the academic field anddeal with matters foreign to the academicinterest, -- fitting schools, high-schools,technological, manual and other trainingschools for mechanical, engineering and otherindustrial pursuits, professional schools of

2. "The lambs play always, they know nobetter, They are only one

times one."3. "He was a trusted and efficient

employee of an institution made possible andmaintained by men of great wealth, men whonot only live on the interest of their money,but who expend millions in the endowment ofcolleges and universities in which enthusiasticyoung educators... find lucrative andhonourable employment." -- Editorial on thedismissal of Dr. Nearing, in the MinneapolisJournal, August II, 1915.

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divers kinds, music schools, art schools,summer schools, schools of "domesticscience," "domestic economy," "homeeconomics", (in short, housekeeping), schoolsfor the special training of secondary-schoolteachers, and even schools that are avowedlyof primary grade; while a variety of "universityextension" bureaux have also been installed,to comfort and edify the unlearned withlyceum lectures, to dispense erudition by mail-order, and to maintain some putative contactwith amateur scholars and dilettanti beyondthe pale.

footing by the glamour of the exploits of thetrustmakers. No doubt, the histrionicproclivities of the executive, backed by asimilar sensibility to dramatic effect on thepart of their staff and of the governingboards, must be held accountable for much ofthis headlong propensity to do many otherthings half-way rather than do the work wellthat is already in hand. But this visiblehistrionic sensibility, and the glamour of greatdeeds, will by no means wholly account forcurrent university enterprise along this line;not even when there is added the urgentcompetitive need of a show of magnitude,such as besets all the universities; nor dothese several lines of motivation account forthe particular direction so taken by theseexcursions in partes infidelium. At the sametime, reasons of scholarship or science plainlyhave no part in the movement.

On its face, this enterprise in assortededucation simulates the precedents given bythe larger modern business coalitions, whichfrequently bring under one general businessmanagement a considerable number andvariety of industrial plants. Doubtless a boyishimitation of such business enterprise has hadits share in the propagation of theseeducational excursions. It all has an histrionicair, such as would suggest that its use, atleast in good part, might be to serve as anoutlet for the ambition and energies of anexecutive gifted with a penchant for large anddifficult undertakings, and with scant insightinto the needs and opportunities of acorporation of the higher learning, and whomight therefore be carried off his scholastic

Apart from such executive weakness forspectacular magnitude, and the competitiveneed of formidable statistics, the prime moverin the case is presumably the currentunreflecting propensity to make much of allthings that bear the signature of the"practical." These various projections ofuniversity enterprise uniformly make someplausible claim of that nature. Any extensionof the corporation's activity can be more

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readily effected, is accepted more as anexpedient matter of course, if it promises tohave such a "practical" value. "Practical" inthis connection means useful for private gain;it need imply nothing in the way ofserviceability to the common good.

everyday activity by the principles ofcompetitive business is less visible tooutsiders than the various lines of extraneousenterprise already spoken of, but it touchesthe work within the university proper evenmore radically and insistently; although, it istrue, it affects the collegiate (undergraduate)instruction more immediately than what isfairly to be classed as university work. Theconsequences are plain. Business proficiencyis put in the place of learning. It is said byadvocates of this move that learning ishereby given a more practical bent; which issubstantially a contradiction in terms. It is acase not of assimilation, but of displacementand substitution, garnished withcircumlocution of a more or less ingenuouskind.

The same spirit shows itself also in aceaseless revision of the schedule ofinstruction offered by the collegiate orundergraduate division as such, where itleads to a multiplication of courses desired togive or to lead up to vocational training. Sothat practical instruction, in the senseindicated, is continually thrown more into theforeground in the courses offered, as well asin the solicitude of the various administrativeboards, bureaux and committees that have todo with the organization and management ofthe academic machinery. Historically, in point of derivation and

early growth, this movement for vocationaltraining is closely related to the Americansystem of "electives" in college instruction, if itmay not rather be said to be a directoutgrowth of that pedagogical expedient.(1*)It dates back approximately to the sameperiod for its beginnings, and much of thearguments adduced in its favour aresubstantially the same as have been foundconvincing for the system of electives. Underthe elective system a considerable and

As has already been remarked, thesedirective boards, committees, and chiefs ofbureau are chosen, in great part, for theirbusinesslike efficiency, because they are goodoffice-men, with "executive ability"; and theanimus of these academic businessmen, by somuch, becomes the guiding spirit of thecorporation of learning, and through theircontrol it acts intimately and pervasively toorder the scope and method of academicinstruction. This permeation of the university's

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increasing freedom has been allowed thestudent in the choice of what he will include inhis curriculum; so that the colleges have inthis way come to refer the choice of topics ingood part to the guidance of the student'sown interest. To meet the resulting range anddiversity of demands, an increasing variety ofcourses has been offered, at the same timethat a narrower specialization has also takeneffect in much of the instruction offered.Among the other leadings of interest amongstudents, and affecting their choice ofelectives, has also been the laudable practicalinterest that these young men take in theirown prospective material success.(2*) So thatthis -- academically speaking, extraneous --interest has come to mingle and take rankwith the scholarly interests proper in shapingthe schedule of instruction. A decisive voice inthe ordering of the affairs of the higherlearning has so been given to the novices, orrather to the untutored probationers of theundergraduate schools, whose entrance on acareer of scholarship is yet a matter ofspeculative probability at the best.

traditional college curriculum. In so advocatinga wider range and freedom of choice, theyhave spoken for the new courses ofinstruction as being equally competent withthe old in point of discipline and culturalvalue; and they have commonly not omittedto claim -- somewhat in the way of an obiterdictum, perhaps -- that these newer andmore vital topics, whose claims theyadvocate, have also the peculiar merit ofconducing in a special degree to goodcitizenship and the material welfare of thecommunity. Such a line of argument has foundimmediate response among those pragmaticspirits within whose horizon "value" issynonymous with "pecuniary value," and towhom good citizenship means proficiency incompetitive business. So it has come aboutthat, while the initial purpose of the electivesystem appears to have been the sharpeningof the students' scholarly interests and thecultivation of a more liberal scholarship, it hasby force of circumstances served to propagatea movement at cross purposes with allscholarly aspiration.

Those who have spoken for an extensiverange of electives have in a very appreciablemeasure made use of that expedient as ameans of displacing what they have regardedas obsolete or dispensable items in the

All this advocacy of the practical ineducation has fallen in with the aspirations ofsuch young men as are eager to findgratuitous help toward a gainful career, aswell as with the desires of parents who are

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anxious to see their sons equipped formaterial success; and not least has itappealed to the sensibilities of thosesubstantial citizens who are alreadyestablished in business and feel the need of afree supply of trained subordinates atreasonable wages. The last mentioned is themore substantial of these incentives togratuitous vocational training, coming in, as itdoes, with the endorsement of thecommunity's most respected and mostinfluential men. Whether it is training in any ofthe various lines of engineering, in commerce,in journalism, or in the mechanic and manualtrades, the output of trained men from thesevocational schools goes, in the main, tosupply trained employees for concernsalready profitably established in such lines ofbusiness as find use for this class of men; andthrough the gratuitous, or half gratuitous,opportunities offered by these schools, thisneeded supply of trained employees comes tothe business concerns in question at a rate ofwages lower than what they would have topay in the absence of such gratuitousinstruction.

increased ease in procuring skilled labour foruse in their own pursuit of gain; but theincreased and cheaper supply of such skilledworkmen is "good for business," and, in thecommon sense estimation of theseconservative businessmen, what is good forbusiness is good, without reservation. Whatis good for business is felt to be serviceablefor the common good; and no closer scrutinyis commonly given to that matter. While anycloser scrutiny would doubtless throw seriousdoubt on this general proposition, suchscrutiny can not but be distasteful to thesuccessful businessmen; since it wouldunavoidably also throw a shadow of doubt onthe meritoriousness of that business traffic inwhich they have achieved their success andto which they owe their preferential standingin the community.

In this high rating of things practical thecaptains of industry are also substantially atone with the current common-sense award ofthe vulgar, so that their advocacy of practicaleducation carries the weight of a self-evidentprinciple. It is true, in the long run and onsober reflection the award of civilized commonsense runs to the effect that knowledge ismore to be desired than things of price; butat the same time the superficial and transientworkday sense of daily needs -- the "snap

Not that these substantial citizens,whose word counts for so much incommendation of practical education, need begreatly moved by selfish consideration of this

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judgment" of the vulgar -- driven by the hardusage of competitive bread-winning, saysthat a gainful occupation is the first requisiteof human life; and accepting it without muchquestion as the first requisite, the vulgarallow it uncritically to stand as the chief orsole and that is worth an effort. And in sodoing they are not so far out of theirbearings; for to the common man, under thecompetitive system, there is but a scantmargin of energy or interest left over anddisposable for other ends after the instantneeds of bread-winning have been met.

bought with a price, make haste to play up tothis snap judgment of the vulgar, and so keepthem from calling to mind, on second thought,what it is that they, after all, value morehighly than the means of competitivespending.

Concomitant with this growing insistenceon vocational training in the schools, and withthis restless endeavour of the academicauthorities to gratify the demand, there hasalso come an increasing habitual inclination ofthe same uncritical character among academicmen to value all academic work in terms oflivelihood or of earning capacity.(3*) Thequestion has been asked, more and moreurgently and openly, What is the use of allthis knowledge?(4*) Pushed by this popularprejudice, and themselves also drifting undercompulsion of the same prevalent bias, eventhe seasoned scholars and scientists --Matthew Arnold's "Remnant" -- have taken toheart this question of the use of the higherlearning in the pursuit of gain. Of course ithas no such use, and the many shrewdlydevised solutions of the conundrum havenecessarily run out in a string of sophisticaldialectics. The place of disinterestedknowledge in modern civilization is neitherthat of a means to private gain, nor that of an

Proficiency and single-mindedness in thepursuit of private gain is something that canreadily be appreciated by all men who havehad the usual training given by the modernsystem of competitive gain and competitivespending. Nothing is so instantly recognizedas being of great urgency, always andeverywhere, under this modern, pecuniaryscheme of things. So that, without reflectionand as a matter of course, the first andgravest question of any general bearing inany connection has come to be that classic ofworldly wisdom: What profiteth it a man? andthe answer is, just as uncritically, sought interms of pecuniary gain. And the men towhom has been entrusted the custody of thatcultural heritage of mankind that can not be

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intermediate step in "the roundabout processof the production of goods."

a question with the rejoinder: What is theuse of a baby? To civilized men -- with theequivocal exception of the warlike politicians-- this latter question seems foolish, criminallyfoolish. But there once was a time, in the highdays of barbarism, when thoughtful men wereready to canvass that question with as naivea gravity as this other question, of the use oflearning, is canvassed by the substantialcitizens of the present day. At the periodcovered by that chapter in ancient history, achild was, in a way, an article of equipmentfor the up-keep of the family and its prestige,and more remotely for the support of thesovereign and his prestige. So that a malechild would be rated as indubitably worthwhile if he gave promise of growing into arobust and contentious man. If the infantwere a girl, or if he gave no promise ofbecoming an effective disturber of the peace,the use or expediency of rearing the childwould become a matter for deliberation; andnot infrequently the finding of those old-timeutilitarians was adverse, and the investmentwas cancelled. The habit of so deliberating onthe pragmatic advisability of child-life hasbeen lost, latterly; or at any rate such of thelatterday utilitarians as may still entertain aquestion of this kind in any concrete case areashamed to have it spoken of nakedly.

As a motto for the scholars' craft,Scientia pecuniae ancillans is nowise moreseemly than the Schoolmen's Philosophiatheologiae ancillans.(5*) Yet such inroadshave pecuniary habits of valuation made evenwithin the precincts of the corporation oflearning, that university men, -- and even thescholarly ones among them, -- are no morethan half ashamed of such a parcel of fatuity.And relatively few among universityexecutives have not, within the past fewyears, taken occasion to plead the merits ofacademic training as a business proposition.The man of the world -- that is to say, of thebusiness world puts the question, What is theuse of this learning? and the men who speakfor learning, and even the scholars occupiedwith the "humanities," are at pains to findsome colourable answer that shall satisfy theworldly-wise that this learning for which theyspeak is in some way useful for pecuniarygain.(6*)

If he were not himself infected with thepragmatism of the market-place, the scholar'sanswer would have to be. Get thee behindme!

Benjamin Franklin -- high-bredpragmatist that he was -- once put away such

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Witness the lame but irrepressiblesentimental protest against the Malthusiandoctrine of population.

means, but as an end. At least conventionally,it is no longer a question of pecuniary gain forthe parent but of expediency for the child. Nomother asks herself if her child will pay.It is true, in out-of-the-way corners and

on the lower levels -- and on the higher levelsof imperial politics where men have notlearned to shrink from shameful devices, thequestion of children and of the birth-rate isstill sometimes debated as a question of thepresumptive use of offspring for some ulteriorend. And there may still be found those whoare touched by the reflection that a child bornmay become a valuable asset as a support forthe parents' old age. Such a pecuniary ratingof the parental relation, which values childrenas a speculative means of gain, may still bemet with. But wherever modern civilizationhas made its way at all effectually, such aprovident rating of offspring is not met with ingood company. Latterday common sensedoes not countenance it.

Civilized men shrink from anything likerating children as a contrivance for use in the"round-about process of the production ofgoods." And in much the same spirit, and inthe last analysis on much the same grounds,although in a less secure and more looselyspeculative fashion, men also look to thehigher learning as the ripe fulfilment ofmaterial competency, rather than as a meansto material success. In their thoughtfulintervals, the most businesslike pragmatistswill avow such an ideal. But in workday detail,when the question turns concretely on theadvisability of the higher education, theworkday habit of pecuniary traffic assertsitself, and the matter is then likely to beargued in pecuniary terms. The barbariananimus, habitual to the quest of gain, reverts,and the deliberation turns on the gainfulnessof this education, which has in all sobrietybeen acknowledged the due end of cultureand endeavour. So that, in working out thedetails, this end of living is made a means,and the means is made an end.

Not that a question of expediency is nolonger entertained, touching this matter ofchildren, but it is no longer the patriarchal-barbarian question as to eventual gains thatmay be expected to accrue to the parent orthe family. Except in the view of thosestatesmen of the barbarian line who see thematter of birth-rate from the higher ground ofdynastic politics, a child born is not rated as a

No doubt, what chiefly urges men to thepursuit of knowledge is their native bent of

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curiosity, -- an impulsive proclivity to masterthe logic of facts; just as the chief incentive tothe achievement of children has, no doubt,always been the parental bent. But very muchas the boorish element in the present andrecent generations will let the pecuniary useof children come in as a large subsidiaryground of decision, and as they have evenavowed this to be their chief concern in thematter; so, in a like spirit, men trained to thebusiness system of competitive gain andcompetitive spending will not be content tofind that they can afford the quest of thatknowledge which their human propensityincites them to cultivate, but they must backthis propensity with a shamefaced apology foreducation on the plea of its gainfulness.

and permanence in the drift of thingsacademic, for the present and the calculablefuture. It means a more or less effectualfurther diversion of interest and support fromscience and scholarship to the competitiveacquisition of wealth, and therefore also to itscompetitive consumption. Through such adiversion of energy and attention in theschools, the pecuniary animus at large, andpecuniary standards of worth and value,stand to gain, more or less, at the cost ofthose other virtues that are, by the acceptedtradition of modern Christendom, held to beof graver and more enduring import. It meansan endeavour to substitute the pursuit ofgain and expenditure in place of the pursuit ofknowledge, as the focus of interest and theobjective end in the modern intellectual life.What is here said of the businesslike

spirit of the latterday "educators" is not to betaken as reflecting disparagingly on them ortheir endeavours. They respond to the call ofthe times as best they can. That they do so,and that the call of the times is of thischaracter, is a fact of the current drift ofthings; which one may commend or deprecateaccording as one has the fortune to fall inwith one or the other side of the case; that isto say according to one's habitual bent; but inany event it is to be taken as a fact of thelatterday situation, and a factor of some force

This incursion of pecuniary ideals inacademic policy is seen at its broadest andbaldest in the Schools of Commerce,-"Commerce and Politics," "Business Training,""Commerce and Administration," "Commerceand Finance," or whatever may be the phraseselected to designate the supersession oflearning by worldly wisdom. Facility incompetitive business is to take the place ofscholarship, as the goal of university training,because, it is alleged, the former is the moreuseful. The ruling interest of Christendom, in

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this view, is pecuniary gain. And training forcommercial management stands to this rulinginterest of the modern community in a relationanalogous to that in which theology andhomiletics stood to the ruling interest in thoseearlier times when the salvation of men'ssouls was the prime object of solicitude. Sucha seminary of business has something of asacerdotal dignity. It is the appointed keeperof the higher business animus.(7*)

business principles, and so to make theordinary instruction converge to theadvancement of business enterprise, verymuch as it was once dutifully arranged thatthe higher instruction should be subservientto religious teaching and consonant with thedemands of devout observances and creeds.

It is not that the College of Commercestands alone as the exponent of worldlywisdom in the modern universities; nor is itsposition in this respect singular, except in thedegree of its remoteness from all properlyacademic interests. Other training schools, asin engineering and in the other professions,belong under the same general category ofpractical aims, as contrasted with the aims ofthe higher learning. But the College ofCommerce stands out pre-eminent amongthese various training schools in tworespects: (a) While the great proportion oftraining for the other professions drawslargely on the results of modern science forways and means, and therefore includes orpresumes a degree of familiarity with thework, aims and methods of the sciences, sothat these schools have so much of a bond ofcommunity with the higher learning, theschool of commerce on the other hand needscarcely take cognizance of the achievementsof science, nor need it presume any degree of

Such a school, with its corps ofinstructors and its equipment, stands in theuniversity on a tenure similar to that of thedivinity school. Both schools are equallyextraneous to that "intellectual enterprise" inbehalf of which, ostensibly, the university ismaintained. But while the divinity schoolbelongs to the old order and is losing itspreferential hold on the corporation oflearning, the school of commerce belongs tothe new order and is gaining ground. Theprimacy among pragmatic interests haspassed from religion to business, and theschool of commerce is the exponent andexpositor of this primacy. It is the perfectflower of the secularization of the universities.And as has already been remarked above,there is also a wide-sweeping movementafoot to bend the ordinary curriculum of thehigher schools to the service of this cult of

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acquaintance on the part of its students oradepts with the matter or logic of thesciences;(8*) (b) in varying degrees, theproficiency given by training in the otherprofessional schools, and required for theefficient pursuit of the other professions, maybe serviceable to the community at large;whereas the business proficiency inculcatedby the schools of commerce has no suchserviceability, being directed singly to a facilecommand of the ways and means of privategain.(9*) The training that leads up to theseveral other professions, of course, variesgreatly in respect of its draught on scientificinformation, as well as in the degree of itsserviceability to the community; some of theprofessions, as, e. g., Law, approach veryclose to the character of business training,both in the unscientific and unscholarly natureof the required training and in theiruselessness to the community; while others,as, e. g., Medicine and the various lines ofengineering, differ widely from commercialtraining in both of these respects. With themain exception of Law (and, some would add,of Divinity?) the professional schools trainmen for work that is of some substantial useto the community at large. This is particularlytrue of the technological schools. But whilethe technological schools may be occupied

with work that is of substantial use, and whilethey may draw more or less extensively onthe sciences for their materials and even fortheir methods, they can not, for all that, claimstanding in the university on the ground ofthat disinterested intellectual enterprisewhich is the university's peculiar domain.

The professional knowledge and skill ofphysicians, surgeons, dentists, pharmacists,agriculturists, engineers of all kinds, perhapseven of journalists, is of some use to thecommunity at large, at the same time that itmay be profitable to the bearers of it. Thecommunity has a substantial interest in theadequate training of these men, although it isnot that intellectual interest that attaches toscience and scholarship. But such is not thecase with the training designed to giveproficiency in business. No gain comes to thecommunity at large from increasing thebusiness proficiency of any number of itsyoung men. There are already much too manyof these businessmen, much too astute andproficient in their calling, for the commongood. A higher average business efficiencysimply raises activity and avidity in businessto a higher average pitch of skill and fervour,with very little other material result than aredistribution of ownership; since business isoccupied with the competitive wealth, not

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with its production. It is only by a euphemisticmetaphor that we are accustomed to speakof the businessmen as producers of goods.Gains due to such efficiency are differentialgains only. They are a differential as againstother businessmen on the one hand, and asagainst the rest of the community on theother hand. The work of the College ofCommerce, accordingly, is a peculiarly futileline of endeavour for any public institution, inthat it serves neither the intellectualadvancement nor the material welfare of thecommunity.

proportion of the aggregate wealth of thecommunity; leaving the rest of the communitypoorer by that much,except for that(extremely doubtful) amount by which shrewdbusiness management is likely to increase thematerial wealth-producing capacity of thecommunity. Any such presumed increase ofwealth-producing capacity is an incidentalconcomitant of business traffic, and in thenature of the case it can not equal theaggregate increased gain that goes to thebusinessmen. At the best the question as tothe effect which such an aggregate increasedbusiness efficiency will have on thecommunity's material welfare is a question ofhow large the net loss will be; that it willentail a net loss on the community at large isin fact not an open question.

The greater the number and the higherthe proficiency of the community'sbusinessmen, other things equal, the worsemust the rest of the community come off inthat game of skilled bargaining and shrewdmanagement by which the businessmen gettheir gains. Gratuitous or partly gratuitoustraining for business will presumably increasethe number of highly proficient businessmen.As the old-fashioned economists wouldexpress it, it will increase the number of"middlemen," of men who "live by their wits."At the same time it should presumablyincrease the average efficiency of thisincreased number. The outcome should bethat the resulting body of businessmen will beable, between them, to secure a larger

A college of commerce is designed toserve an emulative purpose only -- individualgain regardless of, or at the cost of, thecommunity at large -- and it is, therefore,peculiarly incompatible with the collectivecultural purpose of the university. It belongsin the corporation of learning no more than adepartment of athletics.(10*) Both alike givetraining that is of no use to thecommunity,except, perhaps, as a sentimentalexcitement. Neither business proficiency norproficiency in athletic contests need be

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decried, of course. They have their value, tothe businessmen and to the athletes,respectively, chiefly as a means of livelihoodat the cost of the rest of the community, andit is to be presumed that they are worth whileto those who go in for that sort of thing. Bothalike are related to the legitimate ends of theuniversity as a drain on its resources and animpairment of its scholarly animus. As relatedto the ostensible purposes of a university,therefore, the support and conduct of suchschools at the expense of the universities isto be construed as a breach of trust.

school's inclusion in the university corporationhas the countenance of ancient tradition, itcomes down as an authentic usage from themediaeval era of European education, andfrom the pre-history of the Americanuniversities. But in point of substantial meritthe law school belongs in the modernuniversity no more than a school of fencing ordancing. This is particularly true of theAmerican law schools, in which the Austinianconception of law is followed, and it is moreparticularly true the more consistently the"case method" is adhered to. These schoolsdevote themselves with great singleness tothe training of practitioners, as distinct fromjurists; and their teachers stand in a relationto their students analogous to that in whichthe "coaches" stand to the athletes. What ishad in view is the exigencies, expedients andstrategy of successful practice; and not somuch a grasp of even those quasi-scientificarticles of metaphysics that lie at the root ofthe legal system. What is required andinculcated in the way of a knowledge of theseelements of law is a familiarity with theirstrategic use.

What has just been said of the schoolsof commerce is, of course, true also of theother training schools comprised in thislatterday university policy, in the degree inwhich these others aim at the like emulativeand unscholarly results. It holds true of thelaw schools, e. g., typically and more largelythan of the generality of professional andtechnical schools. Both in point of the purelycompetitive value of their training and of theunscientific character of their work, the lawschools are in very much the same case asthe schools of commerce; and, no doubt, theaccepted inclusion of law schools in theuniversity corporation has made the intrusionof the schools of commerce much easier thanit otherwise would have been. The law

The profession of the Law is, of course,an honourable profession, and it is doubtlessbelieved by its apologists to be a usefulprofession, on the whole; but a body of

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lawyers somewhat less numerous, and with alower average proficiency in legal subtletiesand expedients, would unquestionably bequite as serviceable to the community at largeas a larger number of such men with a higherefficiency; at the same time they would beless costly, both as to initial cost and as tothe expenses of maintenance that come ofthat excessive volume and retardation oflitigation due to an extreme facility in legaltechnique on the part of the members of thebar.

for going into this field. But even if theinstruction and facilities offered by theseschools are virtually gratuitous, yet the feesand incidental expenses, together with theexpenditure of time and the cost of livingrequired for a residence at the schools, makeup so considerable an item of expense aseffectually to exclude the majority of thoseyoung men who might otherwise be inclinedto avail themselves of these advantages. Ineffect, none can afford the time and expenseof this business training, whether inCommerce, Law, or the other professions,except those who are already possessed ofsomething more than the average wealth oraverage income; and none, presumably, takekindly to this training, in commerce or law,e.g., except those who already havesomething more than the average taste andaptitude for business traffic, or who have apromising "opening" of this character in sight.So that this training that is desired to servethe private advantage of commercial studentsis, for the greater part, extended to a selectbody of young men; only such applicantsbeing eligible, in effect, as do not on anyshowing need this gratuity.

It will also be found true that both theschools of law and those of commerce, and ina less degree the other vocational schools,serve the advantage of one class as againstanother. In the measure in which theseschools accomplish what they aim at, theyincrease the advantage of such men asalready have some advantage over thecommon run. The instruction is half-waygratuitous; that is the purpose of placingthese schools on a foundation or maintainingthem at the public expense. It is presumed tobe worth more than its cost to the students.The fees and other incidental expenses donot nearly cover the cost of the schools;otherwise no foundation or support from thepublic funds would be required, and theuniversities would have no colourable excuse

In proportion to the work which itundertakes, the College of Commerce is -- orit would be if it lived up to its professions --

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the most expensive branch of the universitycorporation. In this connection the case of thelaw school offers a significant object-lesson ofwhat to expect in the further growth of theschools of commerce. The law school is ofolder standing and maturer growth, at thesame time that its aims and circumstances areof much the same general character as thosethat condition the schools of commerce; and itis therefore to be taken as indicatingsomething of what must be looked for in thecollege of commerce if it is to do the work forwhich it is established. The indications, then,are (a) that the instruction in the field ofcommercial training may be expectedgradually to fall into a more rigidly drawncurriculum, which will discard all irrelevanttheoretical excursions and will diverge moreand more widely from the ways of scientificinquiry, in proportion as experience andtactful organization bring the school to amaturer insight into its purposes and a moreconsistent adherence to its chief purpose oftraining expert men for the higher businesspractice; and (b) that the personnel of itsstaff must increasingly be drawn from amongthe successful businessmen, rather than frommen of academic training.

of the law schools, is a relatively high cost.The schedule of salaries in the law schoolsattached to the universities, e. g., runsappreciably higher than in the universityproper. the reason being, of course, that mensuitable efficiently to serve as instructors anddirective officials in a school of law are almostnecessarily men whose services in thepractice of the law would command a highrate of pay. What is needed in the law school(as in the school of commerce) is men whoare practically conversant with the ways andmeans of earning large fees, -- that being thepoint of it all. Indeed, the scale of pay whichtheir services will command in the openmarket is the chief and ordinary test of theirfitness for the work of instruction. Thesalaries paid these men of affairs, who haveso been diverted to the service of theschools, is commonly some multiple of thesalary assigned to men of a comparableability and attainments in the academic workproper. The academic rank assigned them isalso necessarily, and for the like reason,commensurate with their higher scale of pay;all of which throws an undue preponderanceof discretion and authority into the hands ofthese men of affairs, and so introduces adisproportionate bias in favour of unscientificAmong the immediate consequences of

this latter feature, as shown in the example

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and unscholarly aims and ideals in theuniversity at large.

work entrusted to their care. Commonly, it isto be admitted, the men selected for the staffare men of some academic training, ratherthan men of affairs who have shown evidenceof fitness to give counsel and instruction, byeminently gainful success in business. Theyare, indeed, commonly men of moderaterating in the academic community, and arevested with a moderate rank and authority;and the emoluments of these offices are alsosuch as attach to positions of a middlinggrade in academic work, instead of beingcomparable with the gains that come tocapable men engaged in the large businessoutside. Yet it is from among these highergrades of expert businessmen outside thatthe schools of commerce must draw their staffof instructors and their administrative officersif they are to accomplish the task proposed tothem. A movement in this direction is alreadyvisibly setting in.

Judged by the example of the lawschools, then, the college of commerce, if it isto live and thrive, may be counted on to diverta much larger body of funds from legitimateuniversity uses, and to create more of a biashostile to scholarly and scientific work in theacademic body, than the mere numericalshowing of its staff would suggest. It is fairlyto be expected that capable men of affairs,drawn from the traffic of successful businessfor this service, will require even a higher rateof pay, at the same time that they will beeven more cordially out of sympathy with theideals of scholarship, than the personnel ofthe law schools. Such will necessarily be theoutcome, if these schools are at all effectuallyto serve the purpose for which they arecreated.

But for the present, as matters standnow, near the inception of this enterprise intraining masters of gain, such an outcome hasnot been reached. Neither have the schoolsof commerce yet been placed on such afooting of expensiveness and authoritativediscretion as the high sanction of the quest ofgain would seem properly to assign them; norare they, as at present organized andequipped, at all eminently fit to carry out the

It is reasonably to be expected that oneor the other result should follow: either thecollege of commerce must remain, somewhatas in practice it now is, something in the wayof an academic division, with an academicroutine and standards, and with an unfulfilledambition to serve the higher needs ofbusiness training; with a poorly paid staff ofnondescript academic men, not peculiarly

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fitted to lead their students into the straightand narrow way of business success, nor yeteminently equipped for a theoretical inquiryinto the phenomena of business traffic andtheir underlying causes so that the school willcontinue to stand, in effect, as a more or lesspedantic and equivocal adjunct of adepartment of economics; or the schools mustbe endowed and organized with a larger andstricter regard to the needs of the higherbusiness traffic; with a personnel composedof men of the highest business talent andattainments, tempted from such successfulbusiness traffic by the offer of salariescomparable with those paid the responsibleofficials of large corporations engaged inbanking, railroading, and industrialenterprises, -- and they must also be fittedout with an equipment of a correspondingmagnitude and liberality.

the schools would have to meet thoserequirements of training and informationwhich men who today aim to preparethemselves for the larger business willcommonly spend expensive years ofapprenticeship to acquire. It is eminently truein business training, very much as it is inmilitary strategy, that nothing will take theplace of first-hand observation and personalcontact with the processes and procedureinvolved; and such first-hand contact is to behad only at the cost of a more or lessprotracted stay where the various lines ofbusiness are carried on.

The creation and maintenance of such aCollege of Commerce, on such a scale as willmake it anything more than a dubious make-believe, would manifestly appear to bebeyond the powers of any existing university.So that the best that can be compassed inthis way, or that has been achieved, by themeans at the disposal of any universityhitherto, is a cross between a secondaryschool for bank-clerks and travelling salesmenand a subsidiary department of economics.

Apart from a large and costly materialequipment, such a college would also, undercurrent conditions, have to be provided with avirtually unlimited fund for travellingexpenses, to carry its staff and its students tothe several typical seats and centres ofbusiness traffic and maintain them there forthat requisite personal contact with affairsthat alone can contribute to a practicalcomprehension of business strategy. In short,

All this applies with gradually lessenedforce to the other vocational schools,occupied with training for occupations thatare of more substantial use to the communityand less widely out of touch with the higher

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learning. In the light of their professions onthe one side and the degree of their fulfilmenton the other, it would be hazardous to guesshow far the university directorate in any givencase is animated with a spontaneous zeal forthe furtherance of these "practical" aimswhich the universities so pursue, and how faron the other hand it may be a matter of politicmanagement, to bring content to thosecommercially-minded laymen whose good-willis rated as a valuable asset. These men ofsubstance have a high appreciation ofbusiness efficiency -- a species of self-respect,and therefore held as a point of honour -- andare consequently inclined to rate all educationin terms of earning-capacity. Failure to meetthe presumed wishes of the businessmen inthis matter, it is apprehended, would mean aloss of support in endowment and enrolment.And since endowment and enrolment, beingthe chief elements of visible success, are thetwo main ends of current academic policy, it isincumbent on the directorate to shape theirpolicy accordingly.

university's work to ends at variance with itslegitimate purpose; and the effect of such apolicy should presumably be repugnant totheir scholarly tastes, as well as to theirsense of right and honest living. But thecircumstances of their office and tenure leavethem somewhat helpless, for all theirpresumed insight and their aversion to thismalpractice; and these conditions of officerequire them, as it is commonly apprehended,to take active measures for the defeat oflearning, -- hitherto with an equivocaloutcome. The schools of commerce, evenmore than the other vocational schools, havebeen managed somewhat parsimoniously,and the effectual results have habitually fallenfar short of the clever promises held out inthe prospectus. The professed purpose ofthese schools is the training of young men toa high proficiency in the larger and moreresponsible affairs of business, but for thepresent this purpose must apparently remaina speculative, and very temperatelyingenuous, aspiration, rather than apracticable working programme.So the academic authorities face the

choice between scholarly efficiency andvocational training, and hitherto the resulthas been equivocal. The directorate shouldpresumably be in a position to appreciate thedrift of their own action, in so diverting the

NOTES:

1. "Our professors in the Harvard of the'50s were a set of rather eminent scholars

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and highly respectable men. They attended totheir studies with commendable assiduity anddrudged along in a dreary, humdrum sort ofway in a stereotyped method of classroominstruction...

3. So, e.g., in the later eighties, at thetime when the confusion of sentiments in thismatter of electives and practical academicinstruction was reaching its height, one of themost largely endowed of the late-foundeduniversities set out avowedly to bend itsforces singly to such instruction as wouldmake for the material success of its students;and, moreover, to accomplish this end by anuntrammelled system of electives, limited onlyby the general qualification that all instructionoffered was to be of this pragmatic character.The establishment in question, it may beadded, has in the course of years run asomewhat inglorious career, regard being hadto its unexampled opportunities, and has inthe event come to much the same footing ofcompromise between learning and vocationaltraining, routine and electives, as itscontemporaries that have approached theirpresent ambiguous position from the contrarydirection; except that, possibly, scholarship assuch is still held in slightly lower esteemamong the men of this faculty -- selected ongrounds of their practical bias -- than amongthe generality of academic men.

"And that was the Harvard system. Itremains in essence the system still -- the old,outgrown, pedagogic relation of the largeclass-recitation room. The only variation hasbeen through Eliot's effort to replace it by theyet more pernicious system of prematurespecialization. This is a confusion of thecollege and university functions andconstitutes a distinct menace to all truehigher education. The function of the collegeis an all-around development, as a basis foruniversity specializations. Eliot never graspedthat fundamental fact, and so he undertookto turn Harvard college into a Germanuniversity -- specializing the student at 18. Heinstituted a system of one-sided contact inplace of a system based on no contact at all.It is devoutly to be hoped that, some day, aglimmer of true light will effect an entranceinto the professional educator's head. Itcertainly hadn't done so up to 1906."- CharlesFrancis Adams, An Autobiography. 4. "And why the sea is boiling hot, And

whether pigs have wings."2. The college student's interest in hisstudies has shifted from the footing of anavocation to that of a vocation.

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5. Cf. Adam Smith on the "idle curiosity."Moral Sentiments, 1st ed., p. 351 -- , esp.355.

auspices; but it does by no means standalone, and its perfections should not becounted against it.

6. So, a man eminent as a scholar and inthe social sciences has said, not so long ago:"The first question I would ask is, has not thislearning a large part to play in supplementingthose practical powers, instincts andsympathies which can be developed only inaction, only through experience?... Thatbroader training is just what is needed by thehigher and more responsible ranks ofbusiness, both private and public.... Successin large trading has always needed breadthof view."

8. This characterization applies withoutabatement to the schools of commerce ascommonly designed at their foundation andset forth in their public announcements, andto their work in so far as they live up to theirprofessions. At the same time it is to be notedthat few of these schools successfully keeptheir work clear of all entanglement withtheoretical discussions that have only ascientific bearing. And it is also quite feasibleto organize a "school of commerce" on lines ofscientific inquiry with the avowed purpose ofdealing with business enterprise in its variousramifications as subject matter of theoreticalinvestigation; but such is not the avowed aimof the established schools of this class, andsuch is not the actual character of the workcarried on in these schools, except byinadvertence.

7. Cf., e.g., Report of a Conference onCommercial Education and Business Progress;In connection with the dedication of theCommerce Building, at the University ofIllinois, 1913. The somewhat raucous note ofself-complacency that pervades thischaracteristic document should not beallowed to lessen its value as evidence of thespirit for which it speaks. Indeed, whatever itmay show, of effrontery anddisingenuousness, is rather to be taken as ofthe essence of the case. It might provedifficult to find an equally unabashedpronouncement of the like volume andconsistency put forth under the like academic

9. It is doubtless within the mark to saythat the training given by the Americanschools of commerce is detrimental to thecommunity's material interests. In America,even in a more pronounced degree thanelsewhere, business management centres onfinanciering and salesmanship; and Americancommercial schools, even in a more

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pronounced degree than those of othercountries, centre their attention on proficiencyin these matters, because these are thematters which the common sense of theAmerican business community knows how tovalue, and on which it insists as indispensablequalifications in its young men. The besettinginfirmity of the American business community,as witness the many and circumstantialdisclosures of the "efficiency engineers," andof others who have had occasion to speak ofthe matter, is a notable indifference to theeconomical and mechanically efficient use,exploitation and conservation of equipmentand resources, coupled with an equallynotable want of insight into the technologicalneeds and possibilities of the industries whichthey control. The typical Americanbusinessman watches the industrial processfrom ambush, with a view to the seizure ofany item of value that may be left at looseends. Business strategy is a strategy of"watchful waiting," at the centre of a web;very alert and adroit, but remarkablyincompetent in the way of anything that canproperly be called "industrial enterprise."

the hands of men endowed with the spiritualand intellectual traits suitable to suchprehensile enterprise, can not be gone intohere. The fact, however, is patent. It shouldsuffice to call to mind the large fact, asnotorious as it is discreditable, that theAmerican business community has, withunexampled freedom, had at its disposal thelargest and best body of resources that hasyet become available to modern industry, inmen, materials and geographical situation,and that with these means they haveachieved something doubtfully second-rate,as compared with the industrial achievementsof other countries less fortunately placed in allmaterial respects.

What the schools of commerce now offeris further specialization along the same line ofproficiency, to give increased facility infinanciering and salesmanship. Thisspecialization on commerce is like otherspecialization in that it draws off attentionand interest from other lines than those inwhich the specialization falls; therebywidening the candidate's field of ignorancewhile it intensifies his effectiveness within hisspecialty. The effect, as touches thecommunity's interest in the matter, should bean enhancement of the candidate'sproficiency in all the futile ways and means of

The concatenation of circumstances thathas brought American business enterprise tothis inglorious posture, and has virtuallyengrossed the direction of business affairs in

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salesmanship and "conspiracy in restraint oftrade." together with a heightened incapacityand ignorance bearing on such work as is ofmaterial use.

course, much of the training given in athleticsalready does so count.

10. Latterly, it appears, the traininggiven by the athletic establishments attachedto the universities is also coming to have avalue as vocational training; in that the menso trained and vouched for by theseestablishments are finding lucrativeemployment as instructors, coaches,masseurs, etc., engaged in similar athletictraffic in various schools, public or private. Soalso, and for the same reason, they are foundeligible as "muscular Christian" secretaries incharge of chapters of the Y.M.C.A. and the likequasi-devout clubs and gilds. Indeed in all butthe name, the athletic establishments aretaking on the character of "schools" or"divisions" included under the collectiveacademic administration, very much after thefashion of a "School of Education" or a"School of Journalism"; and they are in effect"graduating" students in Athletics, with due,though hitherto unofficial, certification ofproficiency. So also, latterly, one meets withproposals, made in good faith, among officialacademic men to allow due "academic credit"for training in athletics and let it count towardgraduation. By indirection and subreption, of

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CHAPTER VIII upon which business principles converge, andin which they find their consummateexpression, -- even though it is broadly to berecognized and taken account of that such isthe deliberate appraisal awarded by thecommon sense of civilized mankind. The profitand loss here spoken for is not profit andloss, to mankind or to any given community, inrespect of that inclusive complex of intereststhat makes up the balanced total of good andill; it is profit and loss for the cause oflearning, simply; and there is here noaspiration to pass on ulterior questions. Asrequired by the exigencies of such anargument, it is therefore assumed, pro forma,that profit and loss for the pursuit of learningis profit and loss without reservation; verymuch as a corporation accountant will auditincome and outlay within the affairs of thecorporation, whereas, qua accountant, he willperforce have nothing to say as to the ulteriorexpediency of the corporation and its affairsin any other bearing.

Summary and Trial Balance

As in earlier passages, so here inspeaking of profit and loss, the point of viewtaken is neither that of material advantage,whether of the individuals concerned or of thecommunity at large, nor that of expediency forthe common good in respect of prosperity orof morals; nor is the appraisal here venturedupon to be taken as an expression of praiseor dispraise at large, touching this incursion ofbusiness principles into the affairs of learning.

By and large, the intrusion ofbusinesslike ideals, aims and methods intothis field, with all the consequences thatfollow, may be commendable or the reverse.All that is matter for attention and advisementat the hands of such as aim to alter, improve,amend or conserve the run of institutionalphenomena that goes to make up the currentsituation. The present inquiry bears on thehigher learning as it comes into this currentsituation, and on the effect of this recourse tobusiness principles upon the pursuit oflearning.

I

Not that this learning is therefore to betaken as necessarily of higher and moresubstantial value than that traffic incompetitive gain and competitive spending

Business principles take effect inacademic affairs most simply, obviously andavowably in the way of a businesslikeadministration of the scholastic routine;

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where they lead immediately to abureaucratic organization and a system ofscholastic accountancy. In one form oranother, some such administrative machineryis a necessity in any large school that is to bemanaged on a centralized plan; as theAmerican schools commonly are, and as, moreparticularly, they aim to be. This necessity isall the more urgent in a school that takesover the discipline of a large body of pupilsthat have not reached years of discretion, asis also commonly the case with thoseAmerican schools that claim rank asuniversities; and the necessity is all the moreevident to men whose ideal of efficiency is thecentralized control exercised through asystem of accountancy in the modern largebusiness concerns. The larger Americanschools are primarily undergraduateestablishments, -- with negligible exceptions;and under these current American conditions,of excessive numbers, such a centralized andbureaucratic administration appears to beindispensable for the adequate control ofimmature and reluctant students; at the sametime, such an organization conduces to anexcessive size. The immediate and visibleeffect of such a large and centralizedadministrative machinery is, on the whole,detrimental to scholarship, even in the

undergraduate work; though it need not beso in all respects and unequivocally, so far asregards that routine training that is embodiedin the undergraduate curriculum. But it is atleast a necessary evil in any school that is ofso considerable a size as to precludesubstantially all close or cordial personalrelations between the teachers and each ofthese immature pupils under their charge, as,again, is commonly the case with theseAmerican undergraduate establishments.Such a system of authoritative control,standardization, gradation, accountancy,classification, credits and penalties, willnecessarily be drawn on stricter lines themore the school takes on the character of ahouse of correction or a penal settlement; inwhich the irresponsible inmates are to beheld to a round of distasteful tasks andrestrained from (conventionally) excessiveirregularities of conduct. At the same time thisrecourse to such coercive control andstandardization of tasks has unavoidablygiven the schools something of the characterof a penal settlement.

As intimated above, the ideal of efficiencyby force of which a large-scale centralizedorganization commends itself in thesepremises is that pattern of shrewdmanagement whereby a large business

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concern makes money. The underlyingbusiness-like presumption accordinglyappears to be that learning is a merchantablecommodity, to be Produced on a piece-rateplan, rated, bought and sold by standardunits, measured, counted and reduced tostaple equivalence by impersonal, mechanicaltests. In all its bearings the work is herebyreduced to a mechanistic, statisticalconsistency, with numerical standards andunits; which conduces to perfunctory andmediocre wOrk throughout, and acts to deterboth students and teachers from a freepursuit of knowledge, as contrasted with thepursuit of academic credits. So far as thismechanistic system goes freely into effect itleads to a substitution of salesmanlikeproficiency -- a balancing of bargains in staplecredits -- in the place of scientific capacity andaddiction to study.

highest bidder. Yet these more unscholarlymembers of the staff will necessarily beassigned the more responsible anddiscretionary positions in the academicorganization; since under such a scheme ofstandardization, accountancy and control, theschool becomes primarily a bureaucraticorganization, and the first and unremittingduties of the staff are those of officialmanagement and accountancy. The furtherqualifications requisite in the members of theacademic staff will be such as make forvendibility, -- volubility, tactful effrontery,conspicuous conformity to the popular taste inall matters of opinion, usage and conventions.

The need of such a businesslikeorganization asserts itself in somewhat thesame degree in which the academic policy isguided by considerations of magnitude andstatistical renown; and this in turn issomewhat closely correlated with the extentof discretionary power exercised by thecaptain of erudition placed in control. At thesame time, by provocation of the facilitieswhich it offers for making an impressivedemonstration, such bureaucraticorganization will lead the universitymanagement to bend its energies withsomewhat more singleness to the parade ofmagnitude and statistical gains. It also, and in

The salesmanlike abilities and the men ofaffairs that so are drawn into the academicpersonnel are, presumably, somewhat undergrade in their kind; since the pecuniaryinducement offered by the schools is ratherlow as compared with the remuneration foroffice work of a similar character in thecommon run of business occupations, andsince businesslike employees of this kind mayfairly be presumed to go unreservedly to the

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the same connection, provokes to apersistent and detailed surveillance anddirection of the work and manner of life of theacademic staff, and so it acts to shut offinitiative of any kind in the work done.(1*)

and association between teachers andstudents; as also from the imposition of amechanically standardized routine upon themembers of the staff, whereby anydisinterested preoccupation with scholarly orscientific inquiry is thrown into thebackground and falls into abeyance. Few ifany who are competent to speak in thesepremises will question that such has been theoutcome. To offset against this work ofmutilation and retardation there are certaingains in expedition, and in the volume oftraffic that can be carried by any givenequipment and corps of employees.Particularly will there be a gain in thestatistical showing, both as regards thevolume of instruction offered, and probablyalso as regards the enrolment; sinceaccountancy creates statistics and itsabsence does not.

Intimately bound up with thisbureaucratic officialism and accountancy, andworking consistently to a similar outcome, isthe predilection for "practical efficiency" that isto say, for pecuniary success -- prevalent inthe American community.(2*) This predilectionis a matter of settled habit, due, no doubt, tothe fact that preoccupation with businessinterests characterizes this community in anexceptional degree, and that pecuniary habitsof thought consequently rule popular thinkingin a peculiarly uncritical and prescriptivefashion. This pecuniary animus falls in withand reinforces the movement for academicaccountancy, and combines with it to further aso-called "practical" bias in all the work of theschools.

Such increased enrolment as may be dueto businesslike management and methods isan increase of undergraduate enrolment. Thenet effect as regards the graduate enrolment-- apart from any vocational instruction thatmay euphemistically be scheduled as"graduate" -- is in all probability rather adecrease than an increase. Throughindoctrination with utilitarian (pecuniary)ideals of earning and spending, as well as by

It appears, then, that the intrusion ofbusiness principles in the universities goes toweaken and retard the pursuit of learning,and therefore to defeat the ends for which auniversity is maintained. This result follows,primarily, from the substitution of impersonal,mechanical relations, standards and tests, inthe place of personal conference, guidance

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engendering spendthrift and sportsmanlikehabits, such a businesslike managementdiverts the undergraduate students fromgoing in for the disinterested pursuit ofknowledge, and so from entering on what isproperly university work; as witness therelatively slight proportion of graduatestudents outside of the professional schools-- who come up from the excessively largeundergraduate departments of the moreexpansive universities, as contrasted with thenumber of those who come into universitywork from the smaller and less businesslikecolleges.

of impracticable scholars and scientists on theacademic staff, whose unbusinesslikescholarly proclivities and inability to keep theminer's-inch of scholastic credit always inmind, must in some measure always defeatthe perfect working of standardization andaccountancy.

As might be expected, this regime ofgraduated sterility has already made fairheadway in the undergraduate work,especially in the larger undergraduateschools; and this in spite of any efforts On thepart of the administration to hedge againstsuch an outcome by recourse to an intricatesystem of electives and a wide diversificationof the standard units of erudition so offered.

The ulterior consequences that followfrom such businesslike standardization andbureaucratic efficiency are evident in thecurrent state of the public schools; especiallyas seen in the larger towns, where theprinciples of business management have hadtime and scope to work out in a fair degree ofconsistency. The resulting abomination ofdesolation is sufficiently notorious. And thereappears to be no reason why a similarly staleroutine of futility should not overtake theuniversities, and give similarly foolish results,as fast as the system of standardization,accountancy and piece-work goesconsistently into effect, -- except only for thecontinued enforced employment of a modicum

In the graduate work the like effect isonly less visible, because the measuresleading to it have come into bearing morerecently, and hitherto less unreservedly. Butthe like results should follow here also, justso fast and so far as the same range ofbusiness principles come to be worked intothe texture of the university organization inthe same efficacious manner as they havealready taken effect in the public schools.And, pushed on as it is by the progressivesubstitution of men imbued with the tastesand habits of practical affairs, in the place ofunpractical scholarly ideals, the movement

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toward a perfunctory routine of mediocrityshould logically be expected to go forward ata progressively accelerated rate. The visibledrift of things in this respect in the academicpursuit of the social sciences, so-called, is anargument as to what may be hoped for in thedomain of academic science at large. It is onlythat the executive is actuated by a sharpersolicitude to keep the academic establishmentblameless of anything like innovation oriconoclasm at this point; which reinforces thedrift toward a mechanistic routine and acurtailment of inquiry in this field; it is not thatthese sciences that deal with the phenomenaof human life lend themselves more readily tomechanical description and enumeration thanthe material sciences do, nor is their subjectmatter intrinsically more inert or lessprovocative of questions.

they tend to coincide; so that the orbit comesnear the perfection of a circle; having virtuallybut a single centre, which may perhapsindifferently be spoken of as the university'spresident or as its renown, according as onemay incline to conceive these matters in termsof tangible fact or of intangible.

The system of standardization andaccountancy has this renown or prestige asits chief ulterior purpose, -- the prestige ofthe university or of its president, which largelycomes to the same net result. Particularly willthis be true in so far as this organization isdesigned to serve competitive ends; whichare, in academic affairs, chiefly the ends ofnotoriety, prestige, advertising in all itsbranches and bearings. It is throughincreased creditable notoriety that theuniversities seek their competitive ends, andit is on such increase of notoriety, accordingly,that the competitive endeavours of abusinesslike management are chiefly spent. Itis in and through such accession of renown,therefore, that the chief and most tangiblegains due to the injection of competitivebusiness principles in the academic policyshould appear.

II

Throughout the above summary review,as also through the foregoing inquiry, theargument continually returns to or turnsabout two main interests, -- notoriety and theacademic executive. These two might becalled the two foci about which swings theorbit of the university world. These conjugatefoci lie on a reasonably short axis; indeed,

Of course, this renown, as such, has nosubstantial value to the corporation oflearning; nor, indeed, to any one but the

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university executive by whose management itis achieved. Taken simply in its first incidence,as prestige or notoriety, it conduces in nodegree to the pursuit of knowledge; but in itsulterior consequences, it appears currently tobe believed, at least ostensibly, that suchnotoriety must greatly enhance the powers ofthe corporation of learning. These ulteriorconsequences are (believed to be), a growthin the material resources and the volume oftraffic.

of tolerance on this head is quite narrow; andit is apparently growing incontinentlynarrower.

So far as any university administrationcan, with the requisite dignity, permit itself toavow a pursuit of notoriety, the gain that isavowedly sought by its means is an increaseof funds, -- more or less ingenuously spokenof as an increase of equipment. An increasedenrolment of students will be no less eagerlysought after, but the received canons ofacademic decency require this object to bekept even more discreetly masked than thequest of funds.

Such good effects as may follow from asedulous attention to creditable publicity,therefore, are the chief gains to be set offagainst the mischief incident to "scientificmanagement" in academic affairs. Hence anyline of inquiry into the business managementof the universities continually leads back tothe cares of publicity, with what might to anoutsider seem undue insistence. The reasonis that the businesslike management andarrangements in question are habitually --and primarily required either to serve theends of this competitive campaign of publicityor to conform to its schedule of expediency.The felt need of notoriety and prestige has amain share in shaping the work and bearingof the university at every point. Whatever willnot serve this end of prestige has no securefooting in current university policy. The margin

The duties of publicity are large andarduous, and the expenditures incurred inthis behalf are similarly considerable. So thatit is not unusual to find a Publicity Bureau --often apologetically masquerading under aless tell-tale name -incorporated in theuniversity organization to further thisenterprise in reputable notoriety. Not onlymust a creditable publicity be provided for, asone of the running cares of theadministration, but every feature of academiclife, and of the life of all members of theacademic staff, must unremittingly (though ofcourse unavowedly) be held undersurveillance at every turn, with a view tofurthering whatever may yield a reputable

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notoriety, and to correcting or eliminatingwhatever may be conceived to have adoubtful or untoward bearing in this respect.

the outcome, to any appreciable extent;assuredly not apart from the case of the stateuniversities that are dependent on the favourof local politicians, and perhaps apart fromgifts for conspicuous buildings.

This surveillance of appearances, and ofthe means of propagating appearances, isperhaps the most exacting detail of dutyincumbent on an enterprising executive.Without such a painstaking cultivation of areputable notoriety, it is believed, a dueshare of funds could not be procured by anyuniversity for the prosecution of its work as aseminary of the higher learning. Its more alertand unabashed rivals, it is presumed, wouldin that case be able to divert the flow of loosefunds to their own use, and would so outstriptheir dilatory competitor in the race for sizeand popular acclaim, and therefore, it issought to be believed, in scientific andscholarly application.

With whatever (slight) reservation maybe due, publicity in university management isof substantially the same nature and effect asadvertising in other competitive business; andwith such reservation as may be called for inthe case of other advertising, it is an engineof competition, and has no aggregate effect.As is true of competitive gains in business atlarge, so also these differential gains of theseveral university corporations can not beadded together to make an aggregate. Theyare differential gains in the main, of the samenature as the gains achieved in any othergame of skill and effrontery. The grossaggregate funds contributed to universityuses from all sources would in all probabilitybe nearly as large in the absence of suchcompetitive notoriety and conformity. Indeed,it should seem likely that such donors as aregifted with sufficient sense of the value ofscience and scholarship to find it worth whileto sink any part of their capital in that behalfwould be somewhat deterred by thespectacle of competitive waste and futileclamour presented by this academic

In the absence of all reflection -- not anuncommon frame of mind in this connection --one might be tempted to think that all thisacademic enterprise of notoriety andconciliation should add something appreciableto the aggregate of funds placed at thedisposal of the universities; and that each ofthese competitive advertising concerns shouldso gain something appreciable, withoutthereby cutting into the supply of fundsavailable for the rest. But such is probably not

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enterprise; so that the outcome might as wellbe a diminution of the gross aggregate ofdonations and allowances. But such anargument doubtless runs on very precariousgrounds; it is by no means evident that thesemunificent patrons of learning habituallydistinguish between scholarship and publicity.But in any case it is quite safe to presumethat to the cause of learning at large, andtherefore to the community in respect of itsinterest in the advancement of learning, noappreciable net gain accrues from thiscompetitive publicity of the seats of learning.

publicity doubtless costs appreciably morethan it brings. So far as it succeeds in itspurpose, its chief effect is to divert the flow offunds from one to another of the rivalestablishments. In the aggregate thisexpedient for procuring means for theadvancement of learning doubtless results inan appreciable net loss.

The net loss, indeed, is always muchmore considerable than would be indicated byany statistical showing; for this academicenterprise involves an extensive and almostwholly wasteful duplication of equipment,personnel and output of instruction, asbetween the rival seats of learning, at thesame time that it also involves an excessivelyparsimonious provision for actual scholasticwork, as contrasted with publicity; so also itinvolves the overloading of each rival corps ofinstructors with a heterogeneous schedule ofcourses, beyond what would conduce to theirbest efficiency as teachers. This competitiveparcelment, duplication and surreptitiousthrift, due to a businesslike rivalry betweenthe several schools, is perhaps the gravestdrawback to the American university situation.

In some slight, or doubtful, degree thiscompetitive publicity, including academicpageants, genteel solemnities, and the like,may conceivably augment the grossaggregate means placed at the disposal ofthe universities, by persuasively keeping thewell-meaning men of wealth constantly inmind of the university's need of additionalfunds, as well as of the fact that such gifts willnot be allowed to escape due public notice.But the aggregate increase of funds due tothese endeavours is doubtless not largeenough to offset the aggregate expenditureon notoriety. Taken as a whole, and countingin all the wide-ranging expenditure entailedby this enterprise in notoriety and themaintenance of academic prestige, university

It should be added that no aggregategain for scholarship comes of diverting anygiven student from one school to anotherduplicate establishment by specious offers of

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a differential advantage; particularly when, asfrequently happens, the differentialinducement takes the form of the extra-scholastic amenities spoken of in an earlierchapter, or the greater alleged prestige ofone school as against another, or, as alsohappens, a surreptitiously greater facility forachieving a given academic degree.

as, e.g., merchandising, advertisement is ameans of competitive selling, and is justifiedby the increased profits that come to thesuccessful advertiser from the increasedtraffic; and on the like grounds a painstakingconformity to conventional usage, inappearances and expenditure, is there wiselycultivated with the same end in view. In theaffairs of science and scholarship, simply assuch and apart from the personal ambitions ofthe university's executive, there is nothingthat corresponds to this increased traffic orthese competitive profits,(3*) -- nor will thediscretionary officials avow that suchincreased traffic is the purpose of academicpublicity. Indeed, an increased enrolment ofstudents yields no increased net income, noris the corporation of learning engaged(avowedly, at least) in an enterprise thatlooks to a net income. At the same time, suchincreased enrolment as comes of thiscompetitive salesmanship among theuniversities is made up almost wholly ofwasters, accessions from the genteel andsporting classes, who seek the university as ameans of respectability and dissipation, andwho serve the advancement of the higherlearning only as fire, flood and pestilenceserve the needs of the husbandman.

In all its multifarious ways and means,university advertising carried beyond themodicum that would serve a due "publicity ofaccounts" as regards the work to be done,accomplishes no useful aggregate result. And,as is true of advertising in other competitivebusiness, current university publicity is not aneffective means of spreading reliableinformation; nor is it designed for that end.Here as elsewhere, to meet the requirementsof competitive enterprise, advertising mustsomewhat exceed the point of maximumveracity.

In no field of human endeavour iscompetitive notoriety and a painstakingconformity to extraneous standards of livingand of conduct so gratuitous a burden, sincelearning is in no degree a competitiveenterprise; and all mandatory observance ofthe conventions -- pecuniary or other -- isnecessarily a drag on the pursuit ofknowledge. In ordinary competitive business,

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Competitive publicity, therefore, and itsmaid-servant conventional observance, wouldappear in all this order of things to have noserious motive, or at least none that canfreely be avowed; as witness theunwillingness of any university administrationformally to avow that it seeks publicity orexpends the corporate funds in competitiveadvertising. So that on its face this wholeacademic traffic in publicity and genteelconventionalities appears to be little elsethan a boyish imitation of the ways andmeans employed, with shrewd purpose, inbusiness enterprise that has no analog withthe pursuit of knowledge. But the aggregateyearly expenditure of the universities on thiscompetitive academic publicity runs well upinto the millions, and it involves also anextensive diversion of the energies of thegeneral body of academic men to thesepurposes of creditable notoriety; and such anexpenditure of means and activities is notlightly to be dismissed as an unadvised playof businesslike fancy on the part of theuniversity authorities.

singularly futile traffic is carried on arecommonly men of commonplace intelligenceand aspiration, bound by the commonplacehabits of workday intercourse in a businesscommunity. The histrionic afflatus is also by nomeans wanting in current universitymanagement, and when coupled withcommonplace ideals in the dramatic art itsoutcome will necessarily be a tawdry,spectacular pageantry and a straining aftershowy magnitude. There is also the lowermotive of unreflecting clannishness on thepart of the several university establishments.This counts for something, perhaps for morethan one could gracefully admit. It stands outperhaps most baldly in the sentimental rivalry-- somewhat factitious, it is true -shown atintercollegiate games and similar occasions ofinvidious comparison between the differentschools. It is, of course, gratifying to theclannish conceit of any college man to be ableto hold up convincing statistical exhibitsshowing the greater glory of "his own"university, whether in athletics, enrolment,alumni, material equipment, or schedules ofinstruction; whether he be an official, student,alumnus, or member of the academic staff;and all this array and circumstance will appealto him the more unreservedly in proportion ashe is gifted with a more vulgar sportsmanlike

Unquestionably, an unreflecting imitationof methods that have been found good inretail merchandising counts for something inthe case, perhaps for much; for the academicexecutives under whose surveillance this

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bent and is unmoved by any dispassionateinterest in matters of science or scholarship;and in proportion, also, as his habitualoutlook is that of the commonplace man ofaffairs. In the uncritical eyes of thecommonplace men of affairs, whoseexperience in business has trained them intoa quasi-tropismatic approval of notoriety as ameans of advertising, these pueriledemonstrations will, of course, have a highvalue simply in their own right. Sentimentalchauvinism of this kind is a good and efficientmotive to emulative enterprise, as far as itgoes, but even when backed with thedirectorate's proclivity to businesslike make-believe, it can, after all, scarcely be made tocover the whole voluminous traffic that muston any consistent view go in under the headof competitive publicity.

indeed, are not in any sensible degreeaccountable for this pursuit of prestige, sincethey have but little discretion in thesematters; in substance, the government of acompetitive university is necessarily of anautocratic character, whatever plausible formsof collective action and advisement it may befound expedient to observe. The seat ofdiscretion is in the directorate; though manydetails of administration may be left to thedeliberations of the staff, so long as thesedetails do not impinge on the directorate'sscheme of policy. The impulse and initiative tothis enterprise in publicity, as well as thesurveillance and guidance in the matter,radiates from this centre, and it is here,presumably, that the incentives to suchenterprise are immediately felt. Theimmediate discretion in the conduct of thesematters rests in the hands of the directiveacademic head, with the aid and advice of hiscircle of personal counsellors, and with thebacking of the governing board.

III

The abiding incentives to this traffic inpublicity and genteel observance must besought elsewhere than in the boyishemotions of rivalry and clanish elation thatanimates the academic staff, or even in thehistrionic interest which the members of thestaff or the directorate may have in theprestige of their own establishment. The staff,

The incentives that decide the policy ofpublicity and guide its execution mustaccordingly be such as will appeal directly tothe sensibilities of the academic head and ofthe members of the governing board; and thisapplies not only as regards the traffic inpublicity by print and public spectacles, but

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also as regards the diversion of thecorporation of learning to utilitarian ends, andas regards the traffic in conventionalobservances and conformity to popularopinion. What these incentives may be, thatso appeal to the authorities in discretion, andthat move them to divert the universities fromthe pursuit of knowledge, is not altogethereasy to say; more particularly it is not easy tofind an explanation that shall take account ofthe facts and yet reflect no discredit on theintelligence or the good faith of thesediscretionary authorities. The motives thatactuate the members of the governing boardsare perhaps less obscure than those whichdetermine the conduct of the academicexecutive. The governing boards are, ineffect, made up of businessmen, who do nothabitually look beyond the "practical" interestof commercial gain and the commonplaces ofcommercial routine and political bravado. It is(should be) otherwise with the academicmanagement, who are, by tradition,presumed to be animated with scholarlyideals, and whose avowed ulterior motive isin all cases the single-minded furtherance ofthe cause of learning.

have a serious part in the matter. In allprobability there is in no case a sensiblepecuniary gain to the university as such fromits expenditures on publicity, and there is stillless question of gain in any other than thepecuniary respect. There is also commonly novery substantial pecuniary gain to be derivedfrom this business either by the academichead or by the members of the board, -- anexceptional instance to the contrary will notvitiate this general proposition. It all brings noappreciable pecuniary return to them,particularly so far as it is concerned with thepursuit of prestige; and apart fromexceptional, and therefore negligible, cases itadmits of no appreciable conversion of fundsto private use. At the same time it seemsalmost an affront to entertain the notion thatthese impassively purposeful men of affairsare greatly moved by personal motives ofvanity, vaingloriously seeking renown forefficiently carrying on a traffic in publicity thathas no other end than renown for efficientlycarrying it on. And yet it will be foundextremely difficult to take account of the factsand at the same time avoid such an odiouslypersonal interpretation of them.

On its face it should not seem probablethat motives of personal gain, in the form ofpecuniary or other material interest, would

Such, indeed, would have to be theinference drawn by any one who mightingenuously take the available facts at their

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face value, -- not counting as facts the dutifulprotestations of the authorities to thecontrary. But it should be kept in mind that atransparent ingenuousness is notcharacteristic of business phenomena, withinthe university or without. A degree ofdeviation, or "diplomacy," may be forced onthe academic management by thecircumstances of their office, particularly bythe one-eyed business sense of theirgoverning boards. Indeed, admissions to suchan effect are not altogether wanting.

perhaps with reason, feared that suchremissness would presently lead to hisretirement from office; at least something ofthat kind seems a fair inference from the runof the facts. His place would then be suppliedby an incumbent duly qualified on this score ofone-eyed business sagacity, and one whowould know how to keep his scholarlyimpulses in hand. It is at least conceivablethat the apprehension of some suchcontingency may underlie current universitymanagement at some points, and it maythere fore in some instances have given theadministration of academic affairs an air oflight-headed futility, when it should rather becredited with a sagaciously disingenuousyielding to circumstance.

Rated as they are, in the popularapprehension, as gentlemen and scholars,and themselves presumably accepting thisrating as substantially correct, no feature ofthe scheme of management imposed on theacademic executive by business principlesshould (presumably) be so repugnant to theirsensibilities and their scholarly judgment asthis covert but unremitting pursuit of aninnocuous notoriety, coupled as it necessarilyis with a systematic misdirection of theacademic forces to unscholarly ends; butprudential reasons will decide that this mustbe their chief endeavour if they are to holdtheir own as a competitive university. Shouldthe academic head allow his sense ofscholarly fitness and expediency to hamperthis business of reputable notoriety, it is,

The run of the facts as outlined above,and the line of inference just indicated asfollowing from them, reflect no great credit onthe manly qualities of the incumbents ofexecutive office; but the alternative, as alsonoted above, is scarcely preferable even inthat respect, while it would be even lessflattering to their intellectual powers. Yetthere appears to be no avoiding the dilemmaso presented. Of disinterested grounds forthe common run of academic policy thereseem to be only these two lines to choosebetween: -- either a short-sighted and

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headlong conformity to the vulgar prejudicethat does not look beyond "practical" trainingand competitive expansion, coupled with aboyish craving for popular display; or astrategic compromise with the elders of thePhilistines, a futile doing of evil in the hopethat some good may come of it.

respectability. There is a small class ofAmerican university corporations that are soplaced, by the peculiar circumstances of theirendowment, as to be above theapprehension of need, so long as they arecontent to live anywhere nearly within thedomain of learning; at the same time thatthey have nothing to lose through alienatingthe affections of the vulgar, and nothing togain by deferring to the sentimental infirmitiesof elderly well-to-do persons. This class is nota numerous one; not large enough to set thepace for the rest; but evidently also notnumerous enough to go on their ownrecognizances, and adopt a line of policysuited to their own circumstances and notbound to the fashion set by the rest. Some ofthe well known establishments of this classhave already been alluded to in anotherconnection.

This latter line of apology is admissibleonly in those cases where the universitycorporation is in an exceptionally precariousposition in respect of its endowment, where itis in great need and has much to hope for inthe way of pecuniary gain through stoopingto conventional prejudices, that are of noscholastic value, but that are conceived tobind its potential benefactors in a web offatally fragile bigotry; or, again, where theexecutive is in sensible danger of beingsuperseded by an administration imbued with(conceivably) yet lower and feebler scholarlyideals. Statistical display, spectacular stage

properties, vainglorious make-believe andobsequious concessions to worldly wisdom,should seem to have no place in the counselsof these schools; which should thereforehopefully be counted on to pursue the questof knowledge with that single mind whichthey profess. Yet such is eminently, not to saypre-eminently, not the case. Their policy inthese matters commonly differs in no sensible

Now, it happens that there are notableinstances of universities where such a policyof obsequiously reputable notoriety andaimless utilitarian management is pursuedunder such circumstances of settledendowment and secure tenure as to precludeall hazard of supersession on the part of theexecutive and all chance of material gain fromany accession of popular renown or stagnant

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degree from that pursued by the needierestablishments that are engaged in adesperate race of obsequiousness, for fundsto be procured by favour of well-to-do donors,or through the support of worldly-wiseclergymen and politicians. Indeed, some ofthe most pathetic clamour for popularrenown, as well as instances of the mostprofligate stooping to vulgar prejudice, are tobe credited to establishments of this,potentially independent, class. Themanagement, apparently, are too well imbuedwith the commonplace preconceptions ofworldly wisdom afloat among the laity, toadmit of their taking any action on their owndeliberate initiative or effectually takingthought of that pursuit of learning that hasbeen entrusted to their care. So, perhapsthrough some puzzleheaded sense ofdecorum, they have come to engage in thisbootless conventional race for funds whichthey have no slightest thought of obtaining,and for an increased enrolment which theyadvisedly do not desire.

for the appointment of schoolmasters insteadof scholars on the academic staff, for thesafe-keeping and propagation of genteelconventionalities at the cost of scholarship,for devout and polite ceremonial, -- one isconstrained to believe that such a universityexecutive goes in for this policy of tawdryroutine because he lacks ordinary intelligenceor because he lacks ordinary courage. Hisdiscretion is overborne either by his ownstore of unreflecting prejudice, or by fear oflosing. personal prestige among the ignorant,even though he has no substantial ground,personal or official, for so yielding to currentprejudice. Such appears to be the state of thecase in these instances, where the exigenciesof university politics afford no occasion forstrategic compromise with the worldly-wise;which pointedly suggests that the likethreadbare motives of unreflecting imitationand boyish make-believe may also haveunduly much to do with academic policy, evenin that common run of cases that mightotherwise have best been explained as aneffect of shrewd strategy, designed to maketerms with the mischievous stupidity of anunderbred laity.

In the light of these instances, one isconstrained to believe that the academicexecutive who has so been thrown up asputative director of the pursuit of learningmust go in for this annexation of vocationalschools, for amateurish "summer sessions,"

But any discussion of motives necessarilyhas an invidious air, and so can not but bedistasteful. Yet, since this executive policy can

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be explained or understood only as theoutcome of those motives that appealdecisively to the discretionary officials, it isnecessary to pursue the inquiry a degreefarther at this point, even at the cost of suchslight odium as may not be avoided, and atthe risk of a certain appearance of dispraise.It is perhaps needless to say that thisquestion of motivation is not gone into hereexcept as it may serve to exhibit the run ofthe facts. The run of the facts is not intelligibleexcept in the light of their meaning aspossible motives to the pursuit of that policyof which they are the outcome.

traits of character; they are little else than anaccentuation of the more commonplacefrailties of commonplace men. As a side lighton this spiritual complexion of the typicalacademic executive, it may be worth notingthat much the same characterization willapply without abatement to the class ofprofessional politicians, particularly to thatlarge and long-lived class of minor politicianswho make a living by keeping well in thepublic eye and avoiding blame.(4*)

There is, indeed more than a superficialor accidental resemblance between thetypical academic executive and theprofessional politician of the familiar and morevacant sort, both as regards the qualificationsrequisite for entering on this career and asregards the conditions of tenure. Among thegenial make-believe that goes to dignify theexecutive office is a dutiful protest, indeed, asomewhat clamorous protest, of conspicuousself-effacement on the part of the incumbent,to the effect that the responsibilities of officehave come upon him unsought, if notunawares; which is related to the facts inmuch the same manner and degree as thelike holds true for the manoeuvres of thosewise politicians that "heed the call of duty"and so find themselves "in the hands of theirfriends." In point of fact, here as in political

On the above considerations, it followsthat the executive heads of these competitiveuniversities are a picked body of men,endowed with a particular bent, such as willdispose them to be guided by the run ofmotives indicated. This will imply that theyare, either by training or by native gift, men ofa somewhat peculiar frame of mind, --peculiarly open to the appeal of parade andephemeral celebrity, and peculiarly facile inthe choice of means by which to achievethese gaudy distinctions; peculiarly solicitousof appearances, and peculiarly heedless ofthe substance of their performance. It is notthat this characterization would implyexceptionally great gifts, or otherwise notable

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office-seeking, the most active factor thatgoes to decide the selection of the eventualincumbents of office is a tenacious andaggressive self-selection. With due, but by nomeans large, allowance for exceptions, theincumbents are chosen from among a self-selected body of candidates, each of whomhas, in the common run of cases, beenresolutely in pursuit of such an office for someappreciable time, and has spent much timeand endeavour on fitting himself for its duties.Commonly it is only after the aspirant hasachieved a settled reputation for eligibilityand a predilection for the office that he willfinally secure an appointment. The number ofaspirants, and of eligibles, considerablyexceeds the number of such executive offices,very much as is true for the parallel case ofaspirants for political office.

office are such as will convince such a boardof their serviceability. Among theindispensable general qualifications,therefore, will be a "businesslike" facility inthe management of affairs, an engagingaddress and fluent command of languagebefore a popular audience, and what is called"optimism," -- a serene and voluble loyalty tothe current conventionalities and aconspicuously profound conviction that allthings are working out for good, except forsuch untoward details as do not visiblyconduce to the vested advantage of the well-to-do businessmen under the established lawand order. To secure an appointment toexecutive office it is not only necessary to bepossessed of these qualifications, andcontrive to put them in evidence; the aspirantmust ordinarily also, to use a colloquialism, bewilling and able to "work his passage" byadroit negotiation and detail engagements onpoints of policy, appointments andadministration.

As to the qualifications, in point ofcharacter and attainments, that so go tomake eligibility for the executive office, it isnecessary to recall what has been said in anearlier chapter(5*) on the characteristics ofthose boards of control with whom rests thechoice in these matters of appointment.These boards are made up of well-to-dobusinessmen, with a penchant for popularnotability. and the qualifications necessary tobe put in evidence by aspirants for executive

The greater proportion of such aspirantsfor executive office work their apprenticeshipand manage their campaign of office-seekingwhile engaged in some universityemployment. To this end the most likely line ofuniversity employment is such as will comprisea large share of administrative duties, as,

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e.g., the deanships that are latterly receivingmuch attention in this behalf; while of thework of instruction the preference should begiven to such undergraduate class-work aswill bring the aspirant in wide contact with theless scholarly element of the student body,and with those "student activities" that comefavourably under public observation; andmore particularly should one go in for thequasi-scholarly pursuits of "universityextension"; which will bring the candidate intofavourable notice among the quasi-literateleisure class; at the same time thisemployment conduces greatly to assuranceand a flow of popular speech.

approach to the coveted office. The larger andmore substantial exception would, of course,be taken to the generalization as touchingthe use of the deanships in preparation forthe presidency.

The course of training and publicityafforded by the deanships and extensionlectures appears to be the most promising,although it is not the only line of approach.So, e.g., as has been remarked in an earlierpassage, the exigencies of academicadministration will ordinarily lead to theformation of an unofficially organized corps ofcounsellors and agents or lieutenants, whoserve as aids to the executive head. Whilethese aids, factors, and gentlemen-in-waitingare vested with no official status proclaimingtheir relation to the executive office or theirshare in its administration, it goes withoutsaying that their vicarious discretion and theirspecial prerogatives of access andadvisement with the executive head do notcommonly remain hidden from their colleagueson the academic staff, or from interestedpersons outside the university corporation;nor, indeed, does it appear that theycommonly desire to remain unknown.

It is by no means here intended toconvey the assumption that appointments toexecutive office are currently made exclusivelyfrom among aspiring candidates answeringthe description outlined above, or that theadministrative deanships that currentlyabound in the universities are uniformlylooked on by their incumbents as in some sorta hopeful novitiate to the presidential dignity.The exceptions under both of these generalpropositions would be too numerous to beset aside as negligible, although scarcelynumerous enough or consequential enoughentirely to vitiate these propositions as acompetent formulation of the typical line of

In the same connection, as has alsobeen remarked above, and as is sufficientlynotorious, among the large and imperative

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duties of executive office is public discourse.This is required, both as a measure ofpublicity at large and as a means of divulgingthe ostensible aims, advantages and peculiarmerits of the given university and its chief.The volume of such public discourse, as wellas the incident attendance at many public andceremonial functions, is very considerable; somuch so that in the case of any university ofreasonable size and spirit the traffic in thesepremises is likely to exceed the powers of anyone man, even where, as is not infrequentlythe case, the "executive" head is presentlyled to make this business of stately paradeand promulgation his chief employment. Ineffect, much of this traffic will necessarily bedelegated to such representatives of the chiefas may be trusted duly to observe its spiritand intention; and the indicated bearers ofthese vicarious dignities and responsibilitieswill necessarily be the personal aids andcounsellors of the chief; which throws them,again, into public notice in a most propitiousfashion.

be delegated to some competent lieutenantduring these extensive absences of the chief;and here, again, this temporary discretionand dignity will most wisely and fittingly bedelegated to some member of the corps ofpersonal aids who stands in peculiarly closerelations of sympathy and usefulness to thechief. It has happened more than once thatsuch an habitual "acting head" has come infor the succession to the executive office.

It comes, therefore, to something like ageneral rule, that the discipline which makesthe typical captain of erudition, as he is seenin the administration of executive office, willhave set in before his induction into office, notinfrequently at an appreciable interval beforethat event, and involving a consequent, moreor less protracted, term of novitiate,probation and preliminary seasoning; and theaspirants so subjected to this discipline ofinitiation are at the same time picked men,drawn into the running chiefly by force of afacile conformity and a self-selectivepredisposition for this official dignity.

So also, by force of the same exigenciesof parade and discourse, the chief executiveis frequently called away from home on amore or less extended itinerary; and theburden of dignity attached to the thief office issuch as to require that its ostensible duties

The resulting captain of erudition thenfalls under a certain exacting disciplineexercised by the situation in which theexigencies of office place him. Theseexigencies are of divers origin, and aresystematically at variance among themselves.

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So that the dominant note of his official lifenecessarily becomes that of ambiguity. Bytradition, -- indeed, by that tradition to whichthe presidential office owes its existence, andexcept by force of which there wouldapparently be no call to institute SuCh anoffice at all, -- by tradition the president of theuniversity is the senior member of the faculty,its confidential spokesman in official andcorporate concerns, and the "moderator" ofits town meeting like deliberative assemblies.As chairman of its meetings he is, by tradition,presumed to exercise no peculiar control,beyond such guidance as the superiorexperience of the senior member may bepresumed to afford his colleagues. Asspokesman for the faculty he is, by tradition,presumed to be a scholar of such erudition,breadth and maturity as may fairly commandsomething of filial respect and affection fromhis associates in the corporation of learning;and it is by virtue of these qualities ofscholarly wisdom, which give him his place assenior member of a corporation of scholars,that he is, by tradition, competent to serve astheir spokesman and to occupy the chair intheir deliberative assembly.

that earlier phase of academic history fromwhich the office derives its ostensiblecharacter, and to which it owes its hold on lifeunder the circumstances of the later growthof the schools. And it will be noted that thisoffice is distinctly American; it has nocounterpart elsewhere, and there appears tobe no felt need of such an office in othercountries, where no similar tradition of acollege president has created a presumptiveneed of a similar official in the universities,-the reason being evidently that theseuniversities in other lands have not, in thetypical case, grown out of an underlyingcollege.

In the sentimental apprehension of thelaity out of doors, and in a degree even in theunreflecting esteem of men within theacademic precincts, the presidential office stillcarries something of this traditionallypreconceived scholarly character; and it is thisstill surviving traditional preconception, whichconfuses induction into the office withscholarly fitness for its dignities, that stillmakes the office of the academic executiveavailable for those purposes of expansivepublicity and businesslike management that ithas been made to serve. Except for thisuncritical esteem of the office and itsincumbency, so surviving out of an inglorious

Such is the tradition of the AmericanCollege President, -and, in so far, of theuniversity president, -- as it comes down from

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past, no great prestige could attach to thattraffic in spectacular solemnities, edifyingdiscourse and misdirected business control,that makes up the substantial duties of theoffice as now conducted. It is therefore of theutmost moment to keep up, or rather tomagnify, that appearance of scholarlycompetence and of intimate solidarity with thecorporation of learning that gives thepresidential office this prestige value. Butsince it is only for purposes external, not tosay extraneous, to the corporation of learningthat this prestige value is seriously worthwhile, it is also only toward the outside thatthe make-believe of presidential erudition andscholarly ideals need seriously be kept up. Forthe common run of the incumbents today topose before their faculties as in any eminentdegree conversant with the run ofcontemporary science or scholarship, or asrising to the average even of their ownfaculties in this respect, would be as bootlessas it is uncalled for. But the faculties, as iswell enough understood, need of courseentertain no respect for their executive headas a citizen of the republic of learning, so longas they at all adequately appreciate hisdiscretionary power of use and abuse, astouches them and their fortunes and all theways, means and opportunities of academic

work. By tradition, and in the genial legendarylore that colours the proceedings of thefaculty-meeting, he is still the senior memberof an assemblage of scholarly gentlemen; butin point of executive fact he is their employer,who does business with and by them on acommercial footing. To the faculty, thepresidential office is a business proposition,and its incumbent is chiefly an object ofcircumspection, to whom they owe a "hired-man's loyalty."

It is toward the outside, in the face ofthe laity out of doors, that the high fence --"the eight-fold fence" -- of scholarlypretension is to be kept up. Hence theindicated means of its up-keep are such aswill presumably hold the (transient) respectand affection of this laity,quasi-scholarlyhomiletical discourse, frequent, voluminous,edifying and optimistic; ritualistic solemnities,diverting and vacant; spectacular affectationsof (counterfeit) scholastic usage in the way ofdroll vestments, bizarre and archaic; paradeof (make-believe) gentility; encouragementand (surreptitious) subvention of athleticcontests; promulgation of (presumablyingenuous) statistics touching the volume andcharacter of the work done.

It is only by keeping up thesemanifestations toward the outside, and

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making them good in the esteem of theunlearned, that the presidential office can bemade to serve the ends of the board ofcontrol and the ambitions of the incumbent;and this large apparatus and traffic of make-believe, therefore, is the first and mostunremitting object of executive solicitude. It isthe "place whereon to stand" while movingthe academic universe. The uses to be madeof the standing-place so achieved havealready been set out in some detail in earlierchapters. They centre about three mainconsiderations: Visible magnitude,bureaucratic organization, and vocationaltraining.

The first executive duty of the incumbentof office, therefore, is to keep his facultyunder control, so as to be able unhamperedto carry out the policy of magnitude andsecularization with a view to which thegoverning board has invested him with hispowers. This work of putting the faculty in itsplace has by this time been carried out withsufficient effect, so that its "advice andconsent" may in all cases be taken as amatter of course; and should a remnant ofinitiative and scholarly aspiration show itselfin any given concrete case in such a way asto traverse the lines of policy pursued by theexecutive, he can readily correct the difficultyby exercise of a virtually plenary power ofappointment, preferment and removal,backed as this power is by a nearlyindefeasible black-list. So well is the academicblack-list understood, indeed, and sosensitive and trustworthy is the fearsomeloyalty of the common run among academicmen, that very few among them will ventureopenly to say a good word for any one oftheir colleagues who may have fallen underthe displeasure of some incumbent ofexecutive office. This work of intimidation andsubornation may fairly be said to haveacquired the force of an institution, and toneed no current surveillance or effort.(6*)

As already noted in earlier passages, theboards of control are bodies of businessmenin whose apprehension the methodssuccessfully employed in competitive businessare suitable for all purposes of administration;from which follows that the academic headwho is to serve as their general manager isvested, in effect, with such discretionarypowers as currently devolve on thediscretionary officials of businesscorporations; from which follows, amongother things, that the members of the facultycome to take rank as employees of theconcern, hired by and responsible to theacademic head.

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The subservience of the faculty, or of aworking majority, may safely be counted on.But the forms of advisement andresponsibility are still necessary to beobserved; the president is still, by tradition,the senior member of the faculty, and itsconfidential spokesman. From which follows acertain, at least pro forma, disingenuousnessin the executive's coercive control of academicpolicy, whereby the ostensible discretion andresponsibility comes to rest on the faculty,while the control remains with the executive.But, after all, this particular run of ambiguityand evasions has reached such settled formsand is so well understood that it no longerimplies an appreciable strain on theexecutive's veracity or on his diplomatic skill.It belongs under the category of legal fiction,rather than that of effectual prevarication.

together with the many committees-for-the-sifting-of-sawdust into which the faculty of awell-administered university is organized.These committees being, in effect if not inintention, designed chiefly to keep the facultytalking while the bureaucratic machine goeson its way under the guidance of theexecutive and his personal counsellors andlieutenants. These matters, then, are alsowell understood, standardized, and accepted,and no longer require a vigilant personalsurveillance from the side of the executive.

As is well and seemly for any head of agreat concern, these matters of routine andcurrent circumlocution are presentlydelegated to the oversight of trustedsubalterns, in a manner analogous to thedelegation of the somewhat parallel duties ofthe caretakers of the material equipment.Both of these hierarchical corps ofsubordinates are in a somewhat similar case,in that their duties are of a mechanicallystandardized nature, and in that it isincumbent on both alike to deal in adispassionate, not to say impersonal, wayeach with the particular segment ofapparatus and process entrusted to his care;as is right and good for any official entrustedwith given details of bureaucratic routine.

So also as regards the businesslike, orbureaucratic, organization and control of theadministrative machinery, and its utilizationfor vocational ends and statistical showing. Allthat has been worked out in its generalfeatures, and calls, in any concrete case, fornothing much beyond an adaptation ofgeneral practices to the detail requirementsof the special case. It devolves, properly, onthe clerical force, and especially on thosechiefs of clerical bureau called "deans,"

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The exacting duties that remainpersonally incumbent on the academicexecutive, and claiming his ordinary andcontinued attention, therefore, are those ofhis own official prestige on the one hand, andthe selection, preferment, rejection andproscription of members of the academic staff.These two lines of executive duty are closelycorrelated; not only in that the staff isnecessarily to be selected with a view to theirfurthering the prestige of their chief and hisuniversity, but also in that the executive'sexperience in the course of this enterprise inpublicity goes far to shape his ideals ofscholarly endeavour and to establish hisstandards of expediency and efficiency in theaffairs of learning.

laity that is to be impressed and keptpropitiously in mind of the executive and hisestablishment, and it is therefore the laitythat is to be conciliated with presidentialaddresses; it is also to the laity that thetypical academic executive is competent tospeak without stultification. Hence the manyedifying addresses before popular audiences,at commencements, inaugurations,dedications, club meetings, church festivals,and the like. So that an executive whoaspires to do his whole duty in thesepremises will become in some sort anitinerant dispensary of salutary verbiage; anduniversity presidents have so come to beconventionally indispensable for the effusionof graceful speech at all gatherings of thewell-to-do for convivial deliberation on thestate of mankind at large.(7*)

By usage, guided, no doubt, by a shrewdsense of expediency in the choice of means, ithas, in the typical case, come to be thesettled policy of these incumbents ofexecutive office to seek the competitivelyrequisite measure of public prestige chiefly byway of public oratory. Now and again hisacademic rank, backed by the slow-dyingtradition that his office should be filled by aman of scholarly capacity, will bring theincumbent before some scientific body orother; where he commonly avoids offence.But, as has been remarked above, it is the

Throughout this elocutionary enterprisethere runs the rigorous prescription that thespeaker must avoid offence, that hisutterances must be of a salutary order, sincethe purpose of it all is such conciliation ofgoodwill as will procure at least the passivegood offices of those who are reached by thepresidential run of language. But, by andlarge, it is only platitudes and racy anecdotesthat may be counted on to estrange none ofthe audiences before which it is worth while

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for the captains of erudition to make theirplea for sanity and renown. Hence thepeculiarly, not to say exuberantly, inanecharacter of this branch of oratory, coupledwith an indefatigable optimism and good-nature. This outcome is due neither to a lackof application nor of reflection on the part ofthe speakers; it is, indeed, a finished productof the homiletical art and makes up somethingof a class of its own among the artisticachievements of the race. At the same time itis a means to an end.(8*)

does the temper of the audiencesympathetically affect that of the speaker, asdoes also his familiar contact with the samerange of persons, such as goes with andtakes a chief place in this itinerant edification;but there is also the opportunity which all thiswide-ranging itinerary of public addressesaffords for feeling out the state of popularsentiment, as to what ends the university isexpected to serve and how it is expectedbest to serve them. Particularly do the solemnamenities of social intercourse associatedwith this promulgation of lay sermons lendthemselves felicitously to such a purpose; andthis contact with the public and its spokesmendoubtless exercises a powerful control overthe policies pursued by these academicexecutives, in that it affords them thereadiest, and at the same time the mosthabitual, indication as to what line of policyand what details of conduct will meet withpopular approval, and what will not.

However, the clay sticks to the sculptor'sthumb, as the meal-dust powders the miller'shair and the cobbler carries sensible traces ofthe pitch that goes into his day's work, andas the able-bodied seaman "walks with arolling gait." So also the university executive,who by pressure of competitive enterprisecomes to be all things to all audiences, willcome also to take on the colour of his ownphilandropic pronouncements; to believe,more or less conveniently, in his ownblameless utterances. They necessarilycommit him to a pro forma observance of theirtenor; they may, of course, be desired asperfunctory conciliation, simply, but in carryingconviction to the audience the speaker'seloquence unavoidably bends his ownconvictions in some degree. And not only

Since, then, it is necessarily theendeavour of the competitive executives tomeet the desires of their public as best theycan, consistently with the demands ofmagnitude and eclat imposed by their positionas chiefs of these competitive concerns, itbecomes a question of some moment whatthe character of this select public opinion may

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be, to which their peregrinations exposethem; and how far and with what limitationsthe public opinion that so habitually impingeson their sensibilities and shapes their canonsof procedure may be taken as reflecting thesentiments of the public at large, or of anygiven class of the population.

of the wholly idle rich, nor the great majoritywho work with their hands, are present inappreciable force; particularly not the latter,who are busy elsewhere; nor do the learnedclass come in evidence in this connection, --except, of course, the "scholars byappointment," within whose officialcompetency lie precisely such occasions ofpublic evidence.

The public that so contributes to thehabitual bent of the academic executives isnecessarily a select fraction of the laity, ofcourse, -- self-selected by virtue ofmembership in the various clubs, churchesand other like organizations under whoseauspices the edification and amenities inquestion are commonly brought into bearing,or by virtue of voluntary attendance at theseoccasions of quasi-culture and gentility. It issomewhat exclusive fragment of the public,pecuniarily of a middling grade, as is indeedalso its case in other than the pecuniaryrespect. Apart from the (very consequential)convivial gatherings where businessmen willnow and again come together and lend agenial ear to these executive spokesmen ofphilandropism, it will be found that at theaudiences, and at their attendant solemnitiesof hospitality, the assembly is made up ofvery much the same elements as make up theeffective constituency of the moderately well-to-do churches.(9*) Neither the small minority

Doubtless, the largest, tone-giving andeffective, constituent in this self-selectedpublic on whose temper the universitypresident typically leans, and from whosebent his canons of circumspection are drawn,is the class of moderately well-to-do andserious-minded women who have outlived thedistractions of maternity, and so have cometo turn their parental solicitude to thecommon good, conceived as a sterilization ofthe proprieties. The controlling ideals ofefficiency and expediency in the affairs of thehigher learning accordingly, in so far as theyare not a precipitate of competitive businessprinciples simply, will be chiefly of thisderivation. Not that the captains of eruditionneed intimately harbour precisely thosenotions of scholarship which this constituencywould enjoin upon them, and for which theydutifully speak in their conciliatory sermonsbefore these audiences; but just as happens

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in all competitive retail business that has todeal with a large and critical constituency, sohere, -- the captains find themselvesconstrained in their management of theaffairs of learning to walk blamelessly in thesight of this quasi-public spirited wing of thelaity that has by force of circumstances cometo constitute the public, as seen in theperspective of the itinerant philandropist.

misdirected not only in the more obvioussense that its guidance is disserviceable tothe higher learning, but also (what is more tothe immediate point) in the sense that itdiscredits the executive and his tactics in theesteem of that workday public that does nothabitually give tongue over the cups at five-o'clock.(10*)

It is perhaps unnecessary, as it wouldassuredly be ungraceful, to pursue this quasi-personal inquiry into the circumstances thatso determine that habitual attitude of theexecutive. The difficulties of such anambiguous position should be sufficientlyevident, and the character of the demandswhich this position makes on the incumbentshould be similarly evident, so far as regardsconduciveness to clean and honest livingwithin the premises of this executive office. Itmay, however, not be out of place to call tomind one or two significant, and perhapsextenuating, traits among those conventionsthat go to make up the situation. Unlike whatoccurs in the conduct of ordinary businessand in the professions, there has hithertobeen worked out no code of professionalethics for the guidance of men employed inthis vocation, -- with the sole exception ofthat mandatory inter-presidential courtesythat binds all members of the craft to a strict

The executive and all his works andwords must avoid blame from any source fromwhich criticism might conceivably affect thetraffic with which he is occupied,such is thefirst of those politic principles that govern theconduct of competitive business. Theuniversity must accordingly be managed witha first view to a creditable rating in thoseextraneous respects, touching which thatselect laity that make up the executive'seffective public are competent to holdconvictions. The resulting canons ofmanagement will be chiefly of the nature oftabus, since blame is best avoided by a codeof avoidance. and since the forum in whichthese tabus are audited is a forum in whichthe matronly negations of piety, propriety andgenteel usage take precedence of work,whether scholarly or otherwise, a misdirectedcowardice not infrequently comes to rule thecounsels of the captains of erudition, --

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enforcement of the academic black-list, -all ofwhich leaves an exceptionally broad field forcasuistry. So that, unlike what happens in thebusiness community at large, nostandardization has here determined thelimits of legitimate prevarication; nor can sucha standardization and limit be worked out solong as the executive is required, in effect, tofunction as the discretionary employer of hisacademic staff and hold them to account asagents for whom he is responsible, at thesame time that he must, in appearance, betheir confidential spokesman and theircolleague in the corporation of learning. And itis impossible to forego either of theserequirements, since the discretionary powerof use and abuse is indispensable to thebusinesslike conduct of the enterprise, whilethe appearance of scholarly co-partnery withthe staff is indispensable to that prestige onwhich rests the continued exercise of thispower. And so also it has similarly provedunavoidable (perhaps as an issue of humaninfirmity) that the executive be guided ineffect by a meretricious subservience toextra-scholastic conventions, all the whilethat he must profess an unbiassed pursuit of"the increase and diffusion of knowledgeamong men."

IV

With all due endeavour to avoid theappearance of a study in total depravity, theforegoing analysis has come, after all, toconverge on the growth and derivation ofthose peculiar ambiguities and obliquities thatgive character to the typical academicexecutive. Not that all academic executives,without exception, are (in the historicalpresent) to be found fully abreast of thatmature phase of the type that would so bereflected by the exigencies of their office asoutlined above. Nor need it be believed orargued that no man may enter on theseduties of office but such as are specially fitted,by native gift and previous training, for justsuch an enterprise in meretricious notorietyas these official duties enjoin. The exceptionsto such a rule are not altogether rare, andthe incumbent may well have entered on theduties of office with preconceptions and aimssomewhat at variance with what its disciplineinculcates. But, it should be called to mind,the training that makes a typical executivecomes with the most felicitous andindefeasible effect not in the predisposingdiscipline of candidature but in the workdayconduct of office. And so consistent andunremitting is this drift of the duties of office,

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overt and covert, that, humanly speaking, anyone who submits to its discipline through anappreciable period of years must unavoidablycome to conform to type. Men ofunmanageably refractory temperament, suchas can not by habituation be indued with therequisite deviation and self-sufficiency, will ofnecessity presently be thrown out, as beingincompetent for this vocation. Instances ofsuch rejection after trial will come to mind, butsuch instances are, after all, not so frequentor so striking as to throw doubt on thegeneral rule. The discipline of executive officewill commonly shape the incumbent to itsuses. It should seem beyond reason toexpect that a decade of exposure to theexigencies of this high office will leave theincumbent still amenable to the dictates ofcommonplace tolerance and common honesty.

enterprise by sedulous training in all the artsof popularity and by a well organized backingof influential "friends." The like happenedmore frequently a quarter of a century ago, atthe time when the current situation wastaking shape under the incipient incursion ofbusiness principles into university policy. But itdoes not appear that those incumbents whoso enter on these duties, will fare notablyotherwise in the end than do the otherswhose previous training has already bentthem to the typical policy of deviation, fromthe outset.

An illustrative instance or two may wellbe to the point. And the same illustrations willperhaps also serve to enforce the view thatanything like an effectual university -- aseminary of the higher learning, as distinctfrom an assemblage of vocational schools -- isnot a practicable proposition in America undercurrent conditions. Such seems to be theconclusion vouched for by the two mostnotable attempts of the kind during the pastquarter-century. The two instances inquestion should appear to afford clearexperimental evidence to that effect, thoughit is always possible to allege that personal orlocal conditions may so far have affectedthese experimental instances as still to leavethe case in doubt.

As intimated above, men with ingrainedscholarly ideals and a consistent aim to servethe ends of learning will still occasionally bedrawn into the executive office by force ofcircumstances -- particularly by force of theslow-dying preconception that thepreferences of the academic staff shouldcount for something in the choice of theirsenior member; and this will happen in spiteof the ubiquitous candidature of aspirantswho have prepared themselves for this

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In these two instances, in the MiddleWest and in the Far West, the matter hasbeen tried out under conditions as favourableto the cause of learning as the Americancommunity may hope to offer, barring only thepossible inhibition due to an untoward localcolour of sentiment. Each of these two greatestablishments has been favoured with anendowment of such magnitude as would beadequate to the foundation of an effectualuniversity, sufficient to the single-mindedpursuit of the higher learning, with all the"modern appliances" requisite to scientific andscholarly work, if only their resources hadbeen husbanded with a single mind to thatend; and in either case the terms of theendowment have been sufficiently tolerant toadmit such pursuit of knowledge withoutarriËre pensee. The directive hands, too,under whose discretionary control each ofthese establishments entered on itsadventures and attained its distinctivecharacter, were men who, at one point oranother in their administration of academicpolicy, entertained a sincerely conceivedscholarly ambition to create a substantialuniversity, an institution of learning.(11*)And, in a general way, the two attempts haveequally failed of their avowed initial purpose.

In the persons of their discretionaryheads, the two enterprises were from theoutset animated with widely divergent idealsand aspirations in matters of scholarship, andwith singularly dissimilar and distinctive traitsof character, resembling one another in littleelse than a sincere devotion to the cause ofscholarship and an unhampered discretion intheir autocratic management of affairs; but itis an illuminating comment on the force ofcircumstances governing these matters, thatthese two establishments have gone down tosubstantially the same kind and degree ofdefeat, -- a defeat not extreme but typical,both in kind and degree. In the one case, themore notorious, the initial aim (well known topersons intimately in touch with the relevantfacts at the time) was the pursuit ofscholarship, somewhat blatant perhaps, butnone the less sincere and thoughtful; in thecompanion-piece it was in a like degree thepursuit of scientific knowledge andserviceability, though, it is true, unschooledand puzzle-headed to a degree. In bothenterprises alike the discretionary heads soplaced in control had been selected byindividual businessmen of the untutored sort,and were vested with plenary powers. Underpressure of circumstances, in both casesalike, the policy of forceful initiative and

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innovation, with which both alike entered onthe enterprise, presently yielded to theubiquitous craving for statistical magnitudeand the consequent felt need of conciliatorypublicity; until presently the ulterior object ofboth was lost in the shadow of theseimmediate and urgent manoeuvres ofexpediency, and it became the rule of policyto stick at nothing but appearances.

gallery was presently, on a change ofexecutive personnel, succeeded by a genialsurrender to time and tide, an aimless gum-shod pusillanimity, has apparently changedthe drift of things in no very appreciabledegree.(12*)

In the companion-piece, the enterprisehas been brought to the like manner anddegree of stultification under the simpleguidance of an hysterically meticulousdeference to all else than the main facts. Inboth cases alike the executive solicitude hascome to converge on a self-centred andirresponsible government of intolerance,differing chiefly in the degree of its efficiency.Of course, through all this drift of stultificationthere has always remained -- decus etsolamen -- something of an amiably inefficientand optimistic solicitude for the advancementof learning at large, in some unspecifiedmanner and bearing, some time, but not tointerfere with the business in hand.

So that both establishments have comesubstantially to surrender the university ideal,through loss of effectual initiative andcourage, and so have found themselvesrunning substantially the same course ofinsidious compromise with "vocational" aims,undergraduate methods, and the counsels ofthe Philistines. The life-history of each, whilediffering widely in detail of ways andmethods, is after all macle up, for the greaterpart, of futile extensions, expansions,annexations, ramifications, affiliations andpronunciamentos, in matters that are no moregermane to the cause of learning than is thestate of the weather. In the one case, thechase after a sufficient notoriety took thedirection of a ravenous megalomania, thebusiest concern of which presently came to behow most conspicuously to prolong a shoutinto polysyllables; and the further fact thatthis clamorous raid on the sensibilities of the

It is not that either of these two greatschools is to be rated as useless for whatevereach is good for, but only that that pursuit oflearning on which both set out in thebeginning has fallen into abeyance, by forceof circumstances as they impinge on thesensibilities of a discretionary executive. Asvocational schools and as establishments for

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the diffusion of salutary advice on the state ofmankind at large, both are doubtless all thatmight be desired; particularly in respect oftheir statistical showing. It is only that theaffairs of the higher learning have comedefinitively to take a subsidiary, or putative,place. In these establishments; and to allappearance irretrievably so, because both arenow committed to so large and exacting avolume of obligations and liabilities, legal andcustomary, extraneous and alien to theirlegitimate interest, that there is no longer areasonable chance of their coming to anythingof serious import in the way of the higherlearning, even, conceivably, under the mostenlightened management in the calculablefuture. In their bootless chase after ablameless publicity, both have sunk theirendowment in conspicuous real estate,vocational, technical and accessory schools,and the like academic side-issues, to such anextent as to leave them without means topursue their legitimate end in any adequatemanner, even if they should harbour aneffectual inclination to pursue it.(13*)

on those persons who have this(unavoidable) work of stultification in hand.Rather, it is dispassionately to be gatheredfrom the run of the facts as set out abovethat those persons on whom theseexigencies impinge will, by force ofhabituation, necessarily come to take thebent which these current conditions enforce,and without which this work could not well bedone; all on the supposition -- and it is by nomeans an extravagant assumption -- thatthese persons so exposed to these agenciesof spiritual disintegration are by native giftendowed with the commonplace traits ofhuman nature, no more and no less. It is theduties of the office, not a run of infirmitiespeculiar to the incumbents of office, that makethe outcome. Very much like that of themedicine-man, the office is one which will notabide a tolerant and ingenuousincumbent.(14*)

V

In all the above argument andexposition, touching the executive office andits administrative duties, the point of thediscussion is, of course, not the personalcharacteristics of the typical executive, noreven the spiritual fortunes of the persons

These remarks on the typical traits of theacademic executive have unavoidably takenthe colour of personalities. That such is thecase should by no means be taken asintentionally reflecting anything like dispraise

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exposed to the wear and tear of executiveoffice; although these matters might wellengage the attention of any one given tomoralizing. The point is, of course, thatprecarious situation in which the university,considered as a corporation of the higherlearning, is placed under these currentconditions, and the manner in which thesecurrent conditions give rise to this situation.Seen from the point of view of the higherlearning, and disregarding considerationsextraneous to that interest, it is evident thatthis run of events, and the conditions whichdetermine them, are wholly untoward, not tosay disastrous. Now, this inquiry is nowiseconcerned to reform, deflect or remedy thiscurrent drift of things academic away from theancient holding ground of the higher learning;partly because such an enterprise in reformand rehabilitation lies beyond its competence;and partly, again, because in all this currentmove to displace the higher learning theremay conceivably be other ends involved,which may be worth while in some otherbearing that is alien to the higher learning butof graver consequence for the fortunes of therace, -- urgent needs which can only beserved by so diverting effort and attentionfrom this pursuit. Yet, partly out of areasonable deference to the current prejudice

that any mere negative criticism and citationof grievances is nothing better than anunworthy experiment in irritation; and moreparticularly as a means to a more adequateappreciation of the rigorous difficultiesinherent in this current state and drift ofthings; it may not be out of place to offersome consideration of remedial measuresthat have been attempted or projected, orthat may be conceived to promise a way out.

As is well known, divers and variousremedial measures have been advocated bycritics of current university affairs, from time totime; and it is equally evident on reflectionthat these proposed remedial measures arewith fair uniformity directed to the treatmentof symptoms, -- to relieve agitation andinduce insensibility. However, there is at leastone line of aggressively remedial action thatis being tried, though not avowedly as ameasure to bring the universities into linewith their legitimate duties, but rather with aview to relieving them of this work which theyare no longer fit to take care of. It is a movedesigned to shift the seat of the higherlearning out of the precincts of the schools.And the desperate case of the universities,considered as seminaries of science andscholarship, is perhaps more forcibly broughtin evidence by what is in this way taking place

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in the affairs of learning outside the schoolsthan by their visible failure to take care oftheir own work. This evidence goes to saythat the difficulties of the academic situationare insurmountable; any rehabilitation of theuniversities is not contemplated in thislatterday movement. And it is so coming to berecognized, in effect though tacitly, that for alltheir professions of a single-minded addictionto the pursuit of learning, the academicestablishments, old and new, are no longercompetent to take the direction of affairs inthis domain.

of the academic community. This move lookslike a desperate surrender of the universityideal. The reason for it appears to be theproven inability of the schools, undercompetitive management, to take care of thepursuit of knowledge.

Seen from the point of view of the higherlearning, this new departure, as well as theapparent need of it, is to be rated asuntoward; and it reflects gravely enough onthe untoward condition into which the rule ofbusiness principles is leading the Americanschools. Such establishments of research arecapable, in any competent manner, of servingonly one of the two joint purposes necessaryto be served by any effective seminary of thehigher learning; nor can they at alladequately serve this one purpose to thebest advantage when so disjoined from itsindispensable correlate. By and large, thesenew establishments are good for researchonly, not for instruction; or at the best theycan serve this latter purpose only as a moreor less Surreptitious or supererogatory sideinterest. Should they, under pressure ofinstant need, turn their forces to instructionas well as to inquiry, they would incontinentlyfind themselves drifting into the sameequivocal position as the universities, and thedry-rot of business principles and competitive

So it is that, with a sanguine hope bornof academic defeat, there have latterly beenfounded certain large establishments, of thenature of retreats or shelters for theprosecution of scientific and scholarly inquiryin some sort of academic quarantine,detached from all academic affiliation andrenouncing all share in the work ofinstruction. In point of form the movement isnot altogether new. Foundations of a similaraim have been had before. But the magnitudeand comprehensive aims of the newestablishments are such as to take them outof the category of auxiliaries and throw theminto the lead. They are assuming to take overthe advance in science and scholarship, whichhas by tradition belonged under the tutelage

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gentility would presently consume theirtissues after the same fashion.

also that they and the work which they havein hand are not self-perpetuating, whetherindividually and in detail or taken in the large;since their work breeds no generation ofsuccessors to the current body of scientistson which they draw. As the matter standsnow, they depend for their personnel on thepast output of scholars and scientists fromthe schools, and so they pick up and turn toaccount what there is ready to hand in thatway -- not infrequently men for whom theuniversities find little use, as being refractorymaterial not altogether suitable for theacademic purposes of notoriety. When thisacademic source fails, as it presently must,with the increasingly efficient application ofbusiness principles in the universities, thereshould seem to be small recourse forestablishments of this class except to run intothe sands of intellectual quietism where theuniversities have gone before.

It is, to all appearance, impracticable andinadvisable to let these institutions ofresearch take over any appreciable share ofthat work of scientific and scholarly instructionthat is slipping out of the palsied hands of theuniversities, so as to include some consistentapplication to teaching within the scope oftheir everyday work. And this cuts out of theircomplement of ways and means one of thechief aids to an effectual pursuit of scientificinquiry. Only in the most exceptional, not tosay erratic, cases will good, consistent, saneand alert scientific work be carried forwardthrough a course of years by any scientistwithout students, without loss or blunting ofthat intellectual initiative that makes thecreative scientist. The work that can be donewell in the absence of that stimulus and safe-guarding that comes of the give and takebetween teacher and student is commonlysuch only as can without deterioration bereduced to a mechanically systematized task-work, -- that is to say, such as can, withoutloss or gain, be carried on under the auspicesof a businesslike academic government.

In this connection it will be interesting tonote, by way of parenthesis, that even now alarge proportion of the names that appearamong the staff of these institutions ofresearch are not American, and that even theAmerican-born among them are frequently notAmerican-bred in respect of their scientifictraining. For this work, recourse is necessarilyhad to the output of men trained elsewhere

This, imperatively unavoidable, absenceof provision for systematic instruction in thesenew-found establishments of research means

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than in the vocational and athleticestablishments of the American universities,or to that tapering file of academic men whoare still imbued with traditions so alien to thecurrent scheme of conventions as to leavethem not amenable to the dictates ofbusiness principles. Meantime, that which iseating the heart out of the Americanseminaries of the higher learning should indue course also work out the like sterilizationin the universities of Europe, as fast and asfar as these other countries also come fullyinto line with the same pecuniary ideals thatare making the outcome in America. Andevidence is not wholly wanting that the likeproclivity to pragmatic and popular traffic isalready making the way of the academicscientist or scholar difficult and distasteful inthe greater schools of the Old World. Americais by no means in a unique position in thismatter, except only in respect of the eminentdegree in which this community is pervadedby business principles, and its consequentfaith in businesslike methods, and itsintolerance of any other than pecuniarystandards of value. It is only that this countryis in the lead; the other peoples ofChristendom are following the same lead asfast as their incumbrance of archaic usagesand traditions will admit; and the generality of

their higher schools are already beginning toshow the effects of the same businesslikeaspirations, decoratively coloured withfeudalistic archaisms of patriotic buncombe.

As will be seen from the aboveexplication of details and circumstances, suchpracticable measures as have hitherto beenoffered as a corrective to this sterilization ofthe universities by business principles,amount to a surrender of these institutions tothe enemies of learning, and a proposal toreplace them with an imperfect substitute.That it should so be necessary to relinquishthe universities, as a means to the pursuit ofknowledge, and to replace them with asecond-best, is due, as has also appearedfrom the above analysis, to the course ofpolicy (necessarily) pursued by the executiveofficers placed in control of academic affairs;and the character of the policy so pursuedfollows unavoidably from the dependence ofthe executive on a businesslike governingboard, backed by a businesslike popularclamour, on the one hand, and from his being(necessarily) vested, in effect, with arbitrarypower of use and abuse within the academiccommunity, on the other hand. It follows,therefore, also that no remedy or correctivecan be contrived that will have anything morethan a transient palliative effect, so long as

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these conditions that create the difficulty areallowed to remain in force.

apparatus and incidents of competitivebusiness, it follows that the only remedialmeasures that hold any promise ofrehabilitation for the higher learning in theuniversities can not be attempted in thepresent state of public sentiment.

All of which points unambiguously to theonly line of remedial measures that can beworth serious consideration; and at the sametime it carries the broad implication that in thepresent state of popular sentiment, touchingthese matters of control and administration,any effort that looks to reinstate theuniversities as effectual seminaries of learningwill necessarily be nugatory; inasmuch as thepopular sentiment runs plainly to the effectthat magnitude, arbitrary control, andbusinesslike administration is the only sanerule to be followed in any human enterprise.So that, while the measures called for aresimple, obvious, and effectual, they are alsosure to be impracticable, and for none butextraneous reasons.

All that is required is the abolition of theacademic executive and of the governingboard. Anything short of this heroic remedy isbound to fail, because the evils sought to beremedied are inherent in these organs, andintrinsic to their functioning.

Even granting the possibility of makingsuch a move, in the face of popular prejudice,it will doubtless seem suicidal, on firstthought, to take so radical a departure; inthat it would be held to cripple the wholeacademic organization and subvert thescheme of things academic, for good and all:-- which, by the way, is precisely what wouldhave to be aimed at, since it is the presentscheme and organization that unavoidablywork the mischief, and since, also (as touchesthe interest of the higher learning), they worknothing but mischief.

While it still remains true that the long-term common sense judgment of civilizedmankind places knowledge above businesstraffic, as an end to be sought, yet workdayhabituation under the stress of competitivebusiness has induced a frame of mind that willtolerate no other method of procedure, andno rule of life that does not approve itself asa faithful travesty of competitive enterprise.And since the quest of learning can not becarried on by the methods or with the

It should be plain, on reflection, to anyone familiar with academic matters thatneither of these official bodies serves anyuseful purpose in the university, in so far asbears in any way on the pursuit of

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knowledge. They may conceivably both beuseful for some other purpose, foreign oralien to the quest of learning; but within thelines of the university's legitimate interestboth are wholly detrimental, and verywastefully so. They are needless, except totake care of needs and emergencies to whichtheir own presence gratuitously gives rise. Inso far as these needs and difficulties thatrequire executive surveillance are not simplyand flagrantly factitious, -- as, e.g., theonerous duties of publicity -- they arealtogether such needs as arise out of anexcessive size and a gratuitously complexadministrative organization; both of whichcharacteristics of the American university arecreated by the governing boards and theirexecutive officers, for no better purpose thana vainglorious self-complacency, and with nobetter justification than an uncriticalprepossession to the effect that large size,complex organization, and authoritativecontrol necessarily make for efficiency;whereas, in point of fact, in the affairs oflearning these things unavoidably make fordefeat.

of the prejudices of the ignorant and of theselfishly interested parties; the obstacles toany such move lie simply in the popularprejudice which puts implicit faith in large,complicated, and formidable organizations,and in that appetite for popular prestige thatanimates the class of persons from which theboards and executives are drawn.

This unreasoning faith in large anddifficult combinations has been induced in themodern community by its experience with thelarge-scale organization of the mechanicalindustries, and still more particularly by theconvincing pecuniary efficiency of large capital,authoritative control, and devious methods, inmodern business enterprise; and of thispopular prejudice the boards of control andtheir executive officers have at least their fullshare, -- indeed they owe their place andpower in great part to their being animatedwith something more than an equitable shareof this popular prepossession. It isundeniable, indeed it is a matter of course,that so long as the university continues to bemade up, as is now customary, of anaggregation of divers and sundry schools,colleges, divisions, etc., each and several ofwhich are engaged in a more or less overtrivalry, due to their being so aggregated intoa meaningless coalition, -- so long will

Objection to any such measure ofabolition is not to be grounded in theirimpracticability or their inefficiency, -supposingonly that they could be carried out in the face

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something formidable in the way of acentralized and arbitrary government beindispensable to the conduct of theuniversity's affairs; but it is likewise patentthat none of the several constituent schools,colleges, etc., are any the better off, inrespect of their work, for being so aggregatedin such an arbitrary collective organization.The duties of the executive -aside from thecalls of publicity and self-aggrandizement --are in the main administrative duties thathave to do with the interstitial adjustments ofthe composite establishment. These resolvethemselves into a co-ordinatedstandardization of the several constituentschools and divisions, on a mechanicallyspecified routine and scale, which commonlydoes violence to the efficient working of allthese diverse and incommensurableelements; with no gain at any point,excepting a gain in the facility of controlcontrol for control's sake, at the best. Much ofthe official apparatus and routine office-workis taken up with this futile control. Beyondthis, and requisite to the due working of thiscontrol and standardization, there is thecontrol of the personnel and the checking-upof their task work; together with thedisciplining of such as do not sufficiently

conform to the resulting schedule ofuniformity and mediocrity.

These duties are, all and several,created by the imposition of a central control,and in the absence of such control the needof them would not arise. They are essentiallyextraneous to the work on which each andseveral of the constituent schools areengaged, and their only substantial effect onthat work is to force it into certain extraneousformalities of routine and accountancy, suchas to divert and retard the work in hand. Soalso the control exercised more at large bythe governing board; except in so far as it isthe mere mischief-making interference ofignorant outsiders, it is likewise directed tothe keeping of a balance between units thatneed no balancing as against one another;except for the need which so is gratuitouslyinduced by drawing these units into anincongruous coalition under the control ofsuch a board; whose duties of office in thisway arise wholly out of the creation of theiroffice.

The great and conspicuous effect ofabolishing the academic executive and thegoverning board would be, of course, that theuniversity organization as now known wouldincontinently fall to pieces. The severalconstituent schools would fall apart, since

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nothing holds them together except thestrong hand of the present centralgovernment. This would, of course, seem amonstrous and painful outrage to all thosepersons who are infatuated with a venerationof big thing; to whom a "great" -- that is tosay voluminous -- university is an object ofpride and loyal affection. This class of personsis a very large one, and they are commonlynot given to reJection on the merits of theirpreconceived ideals of "greatness." So thatthe dissolution of this "trust"-like universitycoalition would bitterly hurt their feelings. Sointolerable would the shock to this popularsentiment presumably be, indeed, that noproject of the kind can have any reasonablechance of a hearing.

correlation and control only with a view tocentralized management.

The aggregate of forces engaged andthe aggregate volume of work done in theschools would suffer no sensible diminution.Indeed, the contemplated change shouldbring a very appreciably heightened efficiencyof all the working units that are now tied upin the university coalition. Each of these unitswould be free to follow its own devices, withinthe lines imposed by the work in hand, sincenone of them would then be required to walkin lock-step with several others with which ithad no more vital articulation than the lock-step in question.

Articulation and co-ordination is goodand requisite where and so far as it is intrinsicto the work in hand; but it all comes tonothing better than systematized lag, leakand friction, so soon as it is articulation andcoordination in other terms and for otherends than the performance of the work inhand. It is also true, the coalition of theseseveral school units into a pseudo-aggregateunder a centralized control gives a deceptiveappearance of a massive engine working tosome common end; but, again, massmovement comes to nothing better thaninhibition and misdirection when it involves a

Apart from such loss of "prestige value"in the eyes of those whose pride centres onmagnitude, the move in question wouldinvolve no substantial loss. The chief directand tangible effect would be a considerablesaving in "overhead charges," in that thegreater part of the present volume ofadministrative work would fall away. Thegreater part -- say, three-fourths -- of thepresent officers of administration, with theirclerical staff, would be lost; under the presentsystem these are chiefly occupied with thecorrelation and control of matters that need

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coalition of working units whose work isnecessarily to be done in severalty.

parliamentarians and lobbyists, ever at handto divert the faculty's action from anymeasure that might promise to have asubstantial effect. By force of circumstances,chief of which is the executive office, thefaculties have become deliberative bodiescharged with power to talk. Their seriousattention has been taken up with schemes forweighing imponderables and correlatingincommensurables, with such a degree ofverisimilitude as would keep the statistics andaccountancy of the collective administration incountenance, and still leave some play in thejoints of the system for the personal relationof teacher and disciple. It is a nice problem inself-deception, chiefly notable for an endlessproliferation.

Left to themselves the several schoolswould have to take care each of its ownaffairs and guide its endeavours by theexigencies of its own powers and purposes,with such regard to inter-collegiate comityand courtesy as would be required by thesubstantial relations then subsisting betweenthem, by virtue of their common employmentin academic work.

In what has just been said, it is notforgotten that the burden of their own affairswould be thrown back on the initiative andcollective discretion of the several faculties, sosoon as the several schools had onceescaped from the trust-like coalition in whichthey are now held. As has abundantlyappeared in latterday practice, these facultieshave in such matters proved themselvesnotable chiefly for futile disputation; whichdoes not give much promise of competentself-direction on their part, in case they weregiven a free hand. It is to be recalled,however, that this latterday experience ofconfirmed incompetence has been gatheredunder the overshadowing presence of asurreptitiously and irresponsibly autocraticexecutive, vested with power of use andabuse, and served by a corps of adroit

At the same time it is well known -- toowell known to command particular attention --that in current practice, and of necessity, theactual effective organization of each of theseconstituent school units devolves on theworking staff, in so far as regards theeffectual work to be done. even to theselection of its working members and theapportionment of the work. It is all done "byauthority" of course, and must all be arrangeddiscreetly, with an ulterior view to its sanctionby the executive and its due articulation withthe scheme of publicity at large; but in all

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these matters the executive habitually comesinto bearing only as a (powerful) extraneousand alien interference, -- almost whollyinhibitory, in effect, even though with a showof initiative and creative guidance. And thisinhibitory surveillance is exercised chiefly ongrounds of conciliatory notoriety towards theoutside, rather than on grounds that touchthe efficiency of the staff for the work in hand.Such efficiency is commonly not barred, it isbelieved, so long as it does not hinder theexecutive's quest of the greater glory. Thereis, in effect, an inhibitory veto power touchingthe work and its ways and means.

scholastic traffic in the way of athletics,fraternities, student activities, and the like;and except so far as regards those schoolsthat might still continue to be "gentlemen'scolleges," devoted to the cultivation of theirregularities of adolescence and to theirtransfusion with a conventional elegance;these latter, being of the nature of penalsettlements, would necessarily requiregovernment by a firm hand. That work ofintimately personal contact and guidance, in acommunity of intellectual enterprise, thatmakes up the substance of efficient teaching,would, it might fairly be hoped, not beseriously hindered by the ill-co-ordinatedefforts of such an academic assembly, even ifits members had carried over a good share ofthe mechanistic frame of mind induced bytheir experience under the rigime ofstandardization and accountancy.

But even when taken at its best, andwhen relieved of the inhibition and deflectionworked by the executive, such an academicbody can doubtless be counted on to manageits collective affairs somewhat clumsily andincompetently. There can be no hope oftrenchant policy and efficient control at theirhands; and, it should be added, there needbe no great fear of such an outcome. Theresult should, in so far, be nearly clear gain,as against the current highly efficientmanagement by an executive. Relatively littleadministration or control would be needed inthe resulting small-scale units; except in sofar as they might carry over into the newregime an appreciable burden of extra-

Indeed, there might even be ground tohope that, on the dissolution of the trust, theunderlying academic units would return tothat ancient footing of small-scale parcelmentand personal communion between teacherand student that once made the Americancollege, with all its handicap of poverty,chauvinism and denominational bias, one ofthe most effective agencies of scholarship inChristendom.

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The hope -- or delusion -- would be thatthe staff in each of the resulting disconnectedunits might be left to conduct its own affairs,and that they would prove incapable of muchconcerted action or detailed control. It shouldbe plain that no other and extraneous power,such as the executive or the governingboards, is as competent -- or, indeed,competent in any degree -- to take care ofthese matters, as are the staff who have thework to do. All this is evident to any one whois at all conversant with the run of academicaffairs as currently conducted on the grandscale; inasmuch as it is altogether a matter ofcourse and of common notoriety within theprecincts, that this is precisely what theseconstituent schools and units now have to do,each and several; with the sole qualificationthat they now have to take care of thesematters under the inhibitory surveillance ofthe executive and his extraneous interests,and under the exactions of a super-imposedscheme of mechanical standardization andaccountancy that accounts for nothing but itssuperimposition. At the same time theworking force of the staff is hampered with aload of dead timber imported into its body toadminister a routine of control andaccountancy exacted by the executive's needof a creditable publicity (15*)

This highly conjectural tracing ofconsequences to follow from this hypotheticaldissolution of the trust, may as well bepursued into a point or two of detail, astouches those units of the university coalitionthat have an immediate interest in point ofscholarship, -- the Collegiate ("Arts") divisionand the Graduate School. The former beingleft to its own devices and, it might be hoped,being purified of executive megalomania, itshould seem probable that something of areversion would take effect, in the direction ofthat simpler scheme of scholarship thatprevailed in the days before the coming ofelectives. It was in the introduction ofelectives, and presently of alternatives andhighly flexible curricula, that the move first setin which carried the American college off itsfooting as a school of probation andintroduction to the scholarly life, and has leftit a job-lot of ostensibly conclusive short-cutsinto the trades and professions. It need notfollow that the ancient curriculum would bere-established, but it should seem reasonablethat a move would take effect in the directionof something like a modern equivalent. TheGraduate School, on the other hand, havinglost the drag of the collegiate division and thevocational schools, should come into action asa shelter where the surviving remnant of

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scholars and scientists might pursue theirseveral lines of adventure, in teaching and ininquiry, without disturbance to or from theworldly-wise who clamour for the greaterglory.

NOTES:

1. "He has stifled all manly independenceand individuality wherever it has exhibiteditself at college. All noble idealism, and all thegraces of poetry and art have been shrivelledby his brutal and triumphant power. He hasmade mechanical efficiency and administrativeroutine the goal of the university'sendeavour. The nobler ends of academic lifewill never be served so long as thisspokesman of materialism remains in power."

Now, all this speculation as to whatmight happen has, of course, little else than aspeculative value. It is not intended, seriouslyand as a practical measure, to propose theabolition of the president's office, or of thegoverning board; nor is it intended to intimatethat the captain of erudition can be dispensedwith in fact. He is too dear to thecommercialized popular imagination, and hefits too convincingly into the businessmen'spreconceived scheme of things, to permit anysuch sanguine hope of surcease from skilledmalpractice and malversation. All that is hereintended to he said is nothing more than theobiter dictum that, as seen from the point ofview of the higher learning, the academicexecutive and all his works are anathema,and should be discontinued by the simpleexpedient of wiping him off the slate; andthat the governing board, in so far as itpresumes to exercise any other than vacantlyperfunctory duties, has the same value andshould with advantage be lost in the sameshuffle.

History will relate that one of theeminent captains, through an incumbency ofmore than a quarter of a century, in auniversity of eminent wealth and volume, hasfollowed a settled policy of defeating anyovert move looking to scientific or scholarlyinquiry on the part of any member of hisfaculty. Should a man of scholarly proclivitiesby any chance sift through the censorshipexercised in virtue of the executive'sappointing power, as might happen, since thecaptain was himself not qualified to pass agrounded opinion on any man's qualificationsin that respect; and should he then giveevidence of continuing to spend time andthought on matters of that nature, his burdenof administrative and class-room tasks wouldpresently be increased sufficiently to subdue

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his wayward bent; or, in an incorrigible case,the offender against the rule of academicsterility would eventually be retired byseverance of his connection with this seat oflearning.

action of the economic law of supply anddemand. It can not be conducted on 'businessprinciples.' There is no 'demand' for educationin the economic sense.... Society is the onlyinterest that can be said to demand it, andsociety must supply its own demand. Thosewho found educational institutions or promoteeducational enterprise put themselves in theplace of society and assume to speak and actfor society, not for any economic interest." --Lester F. Ward, Pure Sociology, p. 575.

In some sinister sense the case reflectscredit on the American academic community atlarge, in that, by the close of this quarter-century of preventive regimen, the resultingacademic staff had become a byword ofnugatory intrigue and vacant pedantry.

2. So far has this predilection made itsway in the counsels of the "educators" thatmuch of the current discussion of desiderandain academic policy reads like controversialargument on "efficiency engineering," -- an"efficiency engineer" is an accountantcompetent to advise business concerns howbest to increase their saleable output per unitof cost. And there has, indeed, been at leastone tour of inspection of American universitiesby such an "efficiency engineer," undertakenin the service of an establishment foundedwith a view to academic welfare andgoverned by a board of university presidents.The report submitted by the inquiry inquestion duly conforms to the customary linesof "scientific management."

4. Indeed, the resemblance is visible. Asamong professional politicians, so also asregards incumbents and aspirants foracademic office, it is not at all unusual, nordoes it cause surprise, to find such personsvisibly affected with those characteristicpathological marks that come of what isconventionally called "high living" -- latehours, unseasonable vigils, surfeit of victualsand drink, the fatigue of sedentary ennui. Aflabby habit of body, hypertrophy of theabdomen, varicose veins, particularly of thefacial tissues, a blear eye and a colourationsuggestive of bile and apoplexy, -- when thisunwholesome bulk is duly wrapped in aconventionally decorous costume it isaccepted rather as a mark of weight andresponsibility, and so serves to distinguishthe pillars of urbane society. Nor should it be

3. "Education is the one kind of humanenterprise that can not be brought under the

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imagined that these grave men of affairs anddiscretion are in any peculiar degree prone toexcesses of the table or to nerve-shatteringbouts of dissipation. The exigencies ofpublicity, however, are, by current use andwont, such as to enjoin not indulgence insuch excursions of sensual perversity, somuch as a gentlemanly conformity to a largeroutine of conspicuous convivialities."Indulgence" in ostensibly gluttonous boutsof this kind -banquets, dinners, etc. -- is notso much a matter of taste as of astutepublicity, designed to keep the celebrants inrepute among a laity whose simplest andmost assured award of esteem proceeds onevidence of wasteful ability to pay. But thepathological consequences, physical andotherwise, are of much the same nature ineither case.

homiletical university executives alluded toabove, and their understudies, while it is alsonot strictly inclusive of all these executives.There is indeed a fairly obvious contingentcomes in from among those minor politiciansand clergymen who crave the benefit of aninoffensive notoriety, and who are at thesame time solicitous to keep their fellow-menin mind of the unforgotten commonplaces.One will necessarily have misgivings aboutputting forward a new technical term foradoption into a vocabulary that is alreadytop-heavy with technical innovations."Philandropist" has been suggested. It is nota large innovation, and it has the merit ofbeing obviously self-explanatory. At the sametime its phonetic resemblance to an olderterm, already well accepted in the language,should recommend it to the members of thecraft whom it is designed to signalize, andwith whom phonetic considerations arehabitually allowed weight. The purists willdoubtless find "philandropist" a barbarism;but that is an infirmity that has attached tomany technical designations at theirinception, without permanently hindering theiracceptance and serviceability; it is also notwholly unfitting that the term chosen shouldbe of such a character.

5. See pp. 68-73, 79-81, above.6. As bearing on this "hired-man's

loyalty" of the academic staff and the meansof maintaining it, see, e.g., a paper by GeorgeCram Cook in the Forum for October, 1913, on"The Third American Sex," especially pp. 450-455.

7. Unfortunately, the language wants acompetent designation for public-mindedpersonages of this class; which comprisessomething appreciably more than the 8."The time has come, the walrus said,

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To talk of many things." negatively and by indirection they work out inan (uncertain but effectual) selectiveelimination of such persons as are worthwhile in point of scholarship and initiative;while positively and by direct incitement itresults that the tribe of Lo Basswood hasbeen elected to fill the staff with vacancy.

Within the last few years one of themore illustrious and fluent of the captains oferudition hit upon the expedient of having atrusted locum tenens appointed to take overthe functions of the home office for a term ofyears, while the captain himself "takes theroad" -- on an appreciably augmented salary-- to speak his mind eloquently on manytopics. The device can, however, scarcely yetbe said to have passed the experimentalphase. This illustrious exponent ofphilandropism commands an extraordinaryrange of homily and is a raconteur of quiteexceptional merit; and a device thatcommends itself in this special case,therefore, may or may not prove a feasibleplan in general and ordinary usage. But in anycase it indicates a felt need of some measureof relief, such as will enable the run ofpresidential speech to gain a little somethingin amplitude and frequency.

At the same time the case is notunknown, nor is it altogether a chanceoccurrence, where such an executive withplenary powers, driven to uncommonlyfatuous lengths by this calculus of expedientnotoriety, and intent on putting a neededpatch on the seat of his honour, hasendeavoured to save some remnant of good-will among his academic acquaintance byprotesting, in strict and confidential privacy,that his course of action taken in conformitywith these canons was taken for the sake ofpopular effect, and not because he did notknow better. apparently having by familiaruse come to the persuasion that a knave ismore to be esteemed than a fool, andoverlooking the great ease with which he hasbeen able to combine the two characters.

9. So, e.g., a certain notably self-possessed and energetic captain of eruditionhas been in the habit of repeating ("on thespur of the moment") a homily on one of thestaple Christian virtues.

11. In all fairness it should be noted, asa caution against hasty conclusions, that inboth of these cases this initial scholarlyintention has been questioned -- or denied --by men well informed as to the later state of

10. These resulting canons of blamelessanility will react on the character of theacademic personnel in a two-fold way:

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things in either of the two universities inquestion. And it may as well be admittedwithout much reservation that the later stateof things has carried no broad hint of an initialphase in the life-history of these schools, inwhich ideals of scholarship were given firstconsideration. Yet it is to be taken asunequivocal fact that such was the case, inboth instances; this is known as an assuredmatter of memory by men competent to speakfrom familiar acquaintance with the relevantfacts at the time. In both cases, it is only inthe outcome, only after the pressure ofcircumstances has had time to act, that arounded meretricious policy has taken effect.What has misled hasty and late-comeobservers in this matter is the relatively verybrief -inconspicuously brief -- time intervalduring which it was found practicable to letthe academic policy be guided primarily byscholarly ideals.

matters of scholarship and science has, onthe whole, and to date, left the university inan increasingly hopeful posture as a seminaryof the higher learning. All of which wouldappear to suggest a parallel with the classicinstance of King Stork and King Log, Indeed,at the period of the succession alluded to, thecase of these fabled majesties wasspecifically called to mind by one and anotherof the academic staff. It would appear thatthe academic staff will take care of itsostensible work with better effect the lesseffectually its members are interfered withand suborned by an enterprising captain oferudition.

13. There is a word to add, as to themeasure of success achieved by theseenterprises along their chosen lines ofendeavour. Both of the establishmentsspoken of are schools of some value in manydirections, and both have also achieved alarge reputation among the laity. Indeed, thecaptains under whose management the twoschools have perforce carried on their work,are commonly held in considerable esteem ashaving achieved great things. There is nodesire here to understate the case; but itshould be worth noting, as bearing on theuse and academic value of the presidentialoffice, that the disposal of very large means

12. As a commentary on the force ofcircumstances and the academic value of theexecutive office, it is worth noting that, in thecase cited, an administration guided by aforceful, ingenious and intrepid personality,initially imbued with scholarly ideals of a sort,has run a course of scarcely interruptedacademic decay; while the succeeding reign ofastute vacuity and quietism as touches all

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-means of unexampled magnitude -- has goneto this achievement. A consideration of theseresults, whether in point of scholarship or ofnotoriety, as compared with the means whichthe captains have disposed of, will leave onein doubt. It should seem doubtful if theresults could have been less excellent or lessstriking, given the free disposal of anendowment of 20 or 30 millions, and upward,even under the undistinguished anduneventful management of commonplacehonesty and academic traditions without theguidance of a "strong man." It is, indeed, noteasy to believe that less could have beenachieved without the captain's help. There isalso evidence to hand that the loss of the"strong man" has entailed no sensible losseither in the efficiency or in the good reputeof the academic establishment; rather thereverse.

them, their tenor may yet be instructive, andtheir scant elegance may be over-looked foronce, in view of that certain candour that isscarcely to be had without a colloquial turn.They should serve better than manyelaborate phrases to throw into relief the kindand measure of esteem accorded thesemature incumbents of executive office by themen who assist behind the scenes. So, inbold but intelligible metaphor, one hears, "Heis a large person full of small potatoes," "Theonly white thing about him is his liver," "Half-a-peck of pusillanimity," "A four-flusher."Something after this kind is this aphoristicwisdom current in the academic community, inso far as it runs safely above the level ofscurrility. In point of taste, it would be out ofthe question to follow the same strain ofdiscourteous expressions into that largervolume of more outspoken appraisal that liesbelow that level; and even what has so beensparingly cited in illustration can, of course,not claim a sympathetic hearing as being inany way a graceful presentment of the senseintended to be conveyed in these figures ofspeech. Yet the apology may be accepted,that it conveys this sense intelligibly even ifnot elegantly.

14. Within the precincts, it is not unusualto meet with a harsher and more personalnote of appraisal of what are rated as thefrailties of the executive. There are manyexpressions to be met with, touching thismatter, of a colloquial turn. These willcommonly have something of an underbredair, as may happen in unguarded colloquialspeech; but if it be kept in mind that theirpersonal incidence is duly to be read out of

Indeed, a person widely conversant withcurrent opinion and its expression among the

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personnel of the staff, as touches thecharacter and academic value of a capableand businesslike executive, mightunguardedly come to the persuasion that thetypical academic head, under these latterdayconditions. will be a feebleminded rogue. Suchis, doubtless, far from being the actualvaluation underlying these many artlessexpressions that one meets with. Anddoubtless, the most that could be said wouldbe that, in point of orientation, the typicalexecutive, qua executive, tends to fall in withthe lines so indicated; that the exigencies ofthe executive office are of a kind that wouldconverge upon such an issue "in the long run"and "in the absence of disturbing causes";not that the effectual run of circumstances willat all commonly permit a consummation ofthat kind and degree.

under the aegis of the university corporationby "annexation," "affiliation," "absorption,"etc. Any one who cares to take stock of thatmatter and is in a position to know what isgoing on can easily assure himself that thereasons which decide in such a case are notadvisedly accepted reasons intrinsic to theneeds of efficiency for the work in hand, butrather reasons of competitive expediency, ofcompetitive advantage and of prestige;except in so far as it may all be -- as perhapsit commonly is -- mere unreflecting conformityto the current fashion. In this connection it isto be remarked, however, that even if thecurrent usage has no intrinsic advantage, asagainst another way of doing, failure toconform with the current way of doing willalways entail a disadvantage.

"Indeed... we may say as Dr Boteler saidof strawberries. 'Doubtless God could havemade a better berry, but doubtless God neverdid.'"

THE END

15. It will be objected, and with muchreason, that these underlying "school units"that go to make up the composite Americanuniversity habitually see no great evil in sobeing absorbed into the trust. They lendthemselves readily, if not eagerly, to schemesof coalition; they are in fact prone to draw in