THE EVOLUTION OF THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY.

FOR every system of education there is a reason. For every change in the processes of education there is a reason. These reasons do not depend upon the preferences of the teacher, but originate in forces which are far beyond his control. The Chinese student learns the Chinese classics, for through that avenue of knowledge alone can he gain distinction among his fellows, or seek preferment under the state. The Mohammedan youth studies the Koran, for upon that book all Mohammedan institutions are based. In each case the purpose of scholarship is essentially utilitarian, and that training is given which best qualifies the recipient for active participation in the intellectual life of his own immediate surroundings. To that aim all successful schemes of education are directed, all being, in motive, fundamentally the same. Subjects and methods vary with differing environments; but applicable knowledge and intellectual power are always kept in view.

With the revival of learning in medieval Europe the modern university began. Latin was learned, not for discipline or culture, but because it was the common language of all scholars throughout the Western World. To a less extent Arabic was studied, in order that the medical and scientific lore of the Moors might be made accessible. Later, in spite of opposition, Greek came into vogue for the sake of its treasures in literature and philosophy. For each language there was a definite use; each one opened a path to other knowledge; each was taken as a means and not an end. The study of language for its own sake, for mental discipline, for abstract culture, is a conception of recent growth. Such considerations never appealed to the medieval mind. For every study there was a practical reason, and scholarship meant available power. In the church or the law, that power could be applied to definite purposes, and therefore it was useful to its possessor. With a limited field for intellectual activity, however, education was necessarily narrow. It was conservative, submissive to authority, and hostile to innovation; but being the creature of its environment it fulfilled its purpose, and left to us an inheritance of precedents which is partly beneficial and partly embarrassing.

Step by step, by slow changes from the medieval university, the Oxford and Cambridge of the seventeenth century were developed, and after them the earliest American colleges were modelled. Latin and Greek were still the dominant studies, but with an increased appreciation of their literary value; mathematics was just beginning to assume its modern form; philosophy had become less scholastic; the stimulus of the Reformation was evident throughout the intellectual world. Authority was questioned, precedents were disregarded, innovations were proposed in every department of human thought. The old scholarship was modified to meet the new conditions, and came across the Atlantic in its altered form.

On this side of the ocean, although the English pattern was generally followed, another change took place; and the colonial college was given, at least in New England, a distinctly Puritan aspect. Harvard, which was the earliest of the American institutions, was established with especial reference to the training of young men for the Christian ministry; and "Christian," to its founders, meant "Calvinistic." Here again Latin was a fundamental study, for the practical reason that it was still the universal language of scholarship, and that in it were written nearly all the greater treatises upon science and philosophy. Greek and Hebrew were also of use to clergymen, and received due attention; philosophy of a narrow kind was taught; and for mathematics there was a moderate provision. The limitations of the mathematical field we can best appreciate if we remember that Harvard College was founded in 1636, when Galileo and Descartes were still living, but before Newton and Leibnitz were born. The physical and natural sciences hardly existed; geology and chemistry were almost unknown; and the modern languages, apart from the vernacular, were of so little importance to scholarship that they were commonly disregarded altogether. Theology was the crown of all knowledge, and to that all else was subservient. Aside from theological learning, the scholar was one who knew the ancient languages and literatures; and little more was expected. The college stood for the knowledge of the day; it met the demands of its own time and environment; its limitations were natural, and not to be evaded.

With the development of science during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the problem of the higher education assumed a new form. New branches of learning came into existence and acquired great importance; and for these the universities were compelled to provide. Latin, considered as a language for practical use, became steadily of less and less value; for the new knowledge was mostly published in the modern

tongues of Europe, and not in the common speech of former times. Hence the English, French, and German languages came into prominence, not only for their literatures, but as keys to knowledge, without which no scholar could get full access to the learning of his fellows. To these, unless some unforeseen change occurs, Russian may yet be added; for the intellectual activities of Russia are enormous, and find their chief expression in the mother tongue. In short, Latin and Greek, which once filled a large part of the educational field, now fill a much. smaller portion of it, and the lost positions are occupied in some measure by English, French, and German. Furthermore, new reasons are assigned for the continued study of the ancient languages; and high attainment in the latter demands a working knowledge of the modern tongues. The classical student who would fully understand ancient life, ancient history, or ancient art, or who seeks to go far in philological or archæological studies, must be able to read the works of French and German authors. Without these aids to scholarship his advancement will be slow indeed.

The development of the new education naturally took place by slow degrees; each novelty being first questioned, then tolerated, and finally encouraged. At the outset, the new subjects were treated by what were apparently the old methods; that is, they were taught by lectures and text-books, and each one was given a relatively small amount of time. They were subordinate in rank to the older studies, being regarded as contributory to general information, but as having little or no influence in respect to mental discipline. The classics and mathematics still lay at the foundation of all collegiate training; and the attempt was made to pursue them with undiminished thoroughness, and to assimilate a mass of new material at the same time. The obvious result of this policy was that little or no real science was learned, and the only gain to the student was an overloaded memory. A smattering of scientific facts was given, but with no solid discipline in scientific thought or method, and no training in the power to reason accurately from personally observed data. The memory of the pupil was exercised, but his intellect received only the old cultivation. Even the teachers of science were often quite untrained, and unable to see clearly the problems which lay before them.

From this condition of affairs several consequences followed. Independent schools of science were established, and these attracted a class of students who cared little for scholastic traditions, but had definite purposes in view. The training which the colleges denied was sought

elsewhere; and there sprang up between opposing theories of education a rivalry which exists to the present day. Science demanded the fullest recognition; the classics held the field; and each claimed a supremacy which the other could not admit. The classics, however, were on the defensive side of the controversy; and the evidently diminished utility of Latin and Greek led to excuses for their retention in the list of required subjects.

Thus arose the fallacious distinction between disciplinary and nondisciplinary studies; a distinction for which there was apparently some ground. It was, however, based upon the comparison of incommensurable quantities, and therefore had no foundation in the nature of things. Years of systematic training in Latin, under competent instructors and by established methods, undoubtedly gave a mental discipline of some real value; short courses in science, with untrained instructors and no laboratory practice, gave no discipline at all. Thoroughness in one class of subjects was compared with defective training in another, and so the real questions at issue were obscured. It is now seen that all studies are disciplinary, when pursued seriously, systematically, and by proper methods; but all do not give the same kind of discipline, nor are all methods alike. The chief tactical advantage of the classical position was found in the fact that the preparatory schools were organized and equipped with reference to classical work, while for scientific studies the college student had no preparation whatever. So long as the sciences were given an inferior place and inferior opportunities in education, no just estimate of their educational value could be made. The conservatism of the colleges was not altogether unreasonable. A tried and successful system of education could not be hastily supplanted by an untried scheme. The necessary and inevitable changes were only to be effected by slow degrees, through a natural process of evolution. Science was first to prove her claims and establish her methods of instruction.

It is no paradox to state that conservatism is often the greatest of innovators. The conservative man, when adjusting himself to new ideas, retains his old habits of thought, and so is led to curious misconceptions. Thus, in the early teaching of experimental science, at least in the American colleges, instruction was given by means of lectures and text-books, without laboratory practice, and the teacher supposed that he was applying established methods to his task. In reality he was wandering far away from the recognized pathway to learning, and attempting to do what could only end in failure. All successful study requires direct contact with the thing itself, with the actual subject

matter of investigation; reading alone or hearsay alone having no solid educational value. In Latin the pupil worked directly with the language, writing exercises and making translations; in mathematics he applied the rules to the actual solution of problems; and in each case the process implied the full equivalent of laboratory practice. The Latin laboratory was equipped with books, blackboards, pencils, and paper; but it was a true laboratory none the less, and the thing itself was studied at first hand. Mere reading or hearing about Latin would never have made a scholar. No mathematician was ever trained without long and hard discipline over the equations. The physical and natural sciences needed different laboratories; but the principle of direct study was the Just as the Latin scholar works with Latin, so should the student of chemistry handle chemical substances and apparatus, making the facts a part of his own experience, and giving to the deductions therefrom a real and vital meaning.

same.

Thus the pupil learns to examine phenomena, to discriminate between essentials and non-essentials, to verify facts, and to draw correct conclusions from what he sees a form of mental discipline in which the older education was woefully deficient. Literary studies improve the taste and cultivate the powers of expression; from linguistic training verbal accuracy is acquired; the mastery of grammatical rules with their long lists of exceptions gives a certain alertness to the memory; mathematical exercises develop the reasoning faculty and teach the highest precision of thought and statement. Each of these subjects has its place in the educational field, and yet all together cannot fill it completely. The powers of observation are yet to be cultivated, and here experimental science comes into play. To see clearly and to think clearly are the essence of its teaching; the application of logic to verified evidence is its intellectual domain.

Educational advances, however, are not brought about by philosophizing; they are answers to demands which cannot be denied. Every real step forward corresponds to some real necessity, to some increase of knowledge, to some change in the intellectual activity of the time. The growth of the physical and natural sciences compelled their recognition by the colleges, first as additions to their curricula, then as substitutes, wholly or in part, for something which had previously been regarded as essential. With the development of the laboratory system a new pressure was brought to bear upon the schools, and different institutions were differently affected.

The equipment and maintenance of laboratories and museums, which