THE NEW SYSTEM OF HONORS.

THE new plan proposed by the Committee on Honors and Honorable Mention appears to be not only a great improvement upon the present scheme, but a necessary consequence of the elective system. So long as a prescribed curriculum throughout the college course was adhered to, an average mark may have been regarded as some evidence of conscientious work, more or less reliable as a criterion of scholarship. But under the elective system, which encourages special studies in the course marked out by the student for his career in life, he should receive from the college a proper recognition of his actual standing in those special branches of study, or else the present plan of determining college rank by an average mark ought to be entirely abolished, and a final examination for a degree substituted, as in the German universities.

The time has gone by when students, as a general rule, enter college with the intention of obtaining what is usually understood as a "liberal education." In old times things were different. That was the period when learning was the special privilege of the few, but now, when education runs through the public schools and colleges free to all as the water that satisfies the thirsty, affairs are changed, and institutions of learning must be guided by the progress of events, and conform to the present condition of the world.

Although a low college rank cannot make void or hardly detract from real acquirements, yet there always follows it a sense of injustice which a college should by every possible means seek to avoid, as it burns into the very marrow of the young and sensitive.

Surely there must be something radically wrong in a system which permits such injustice. That the evil exists every student well knows, however disinclined some may be, for very obvious reasons, to acknowledge or speak of it. Not only is the average system often unjust, but it is calculated, in the case of those students who strive only for marks, to work serious evil. The only way to avoid this result is courageously to sacrifice college rank to more solid advantages in after life.

Ranking upon an average is particularly liable to be unjust in a mixed system, partly prescribed and partly elective. Greek may be studied only because it is required for the entrance examination and during the Freshman year. The mark of the student who is indifferent to this study drags down his average, and as he intends to drop Greek as soon as possible, a greater proficiency would be of no advantage, so soon is the whole to be neglected and forgotten.

Illustrations might be multiplied ad infinitum, but they are obvious to every one interested in the subject. The present system leads directly to the selection of "soft electives," and favorite instructors known as "easy markers," - a royal road indeed to high college rank.

The new plan proposed will give to a student the credit due him for proficiency in any special study, and at the same time retain all the advantages heretofore derived from an average. It is a long step forward in the direction of doing greater justice to all, and is a necessary corollary to the elective system, and therefore it is earnestly to be hoped that it will be adopted.