Philadelphia's Provincialism.

The Nation for December 10 has three long letters on "Philadelphia's Provincialism." One writer says: "I am a native of another part of the country, and have for half-a-dozen years been living in one of the suburbs of Philadelphia; and, having become much attached to this ugly city and its delightful people, I have longed for some authoritative voice to reveal to them that the world was not bounded by the Delaware and the Schuylkill. It is too much to hope that your able article, or even the awakened consciences of the Times and the Press, will effect a conversion, but they may make the question to be asked in Philadelphia, 'Is, then, salvation come to the Gentiles?'"

After discussing the subject in its political, social, and moral and religious aspects, the same writer continues: 'It may be said, 'Why criticise the workings of one and the same principle in these different departments, without suggesting a remedy?' It would be almost impossible to name a remedy that should have any immediate effect in the cases mentioned. It must be a long time before renewed vitality creeps into the nerves and muscles of a patient who is 'run down.' But there is one department where a change of present policy might have much direct effect upon the life of the community; and that is, the University of Pennsylvania. I do not mean that such change would be possible if this should cease to be the headquarters where protection is taught as a doctrine of political economy, for Philadelphia's regeneration will probably come in other respects sooner than in this; but a renovating change would begin if the principle of protection should cease to be applied to the policy of the University itself. The institution has no dormitories. Students, therefore, who do not live at home, board chiefly in private families. It being the case that no provision is made for students from a distance, few such come, and the great majority of undergraduates is composed of those who live in Philadelphia and its neighborhood, and who come and to every day between the University and home. Some years ago the trustees had a large legacy offered them if they would build dormitories. After consideration, they declined it, as it would involve a change in their whole policy. The aim of this policy is to train boys up in the way they should go, meaning by that, so that they will regard Philadelphia doctrines, ideas, atmosphere, and surroundings as final. The result is that the institution is an advanced kind of high school, where the scholars go and recite their lessons, are marked, and then go home again. It is needless to say that the principles of the new education, as set forth so ably in the Andover Review for November, find no place nor favor here. 'I do not believe in trying that sort of thing with boys,' was the remark made to me of the matter. Such opinions are unconsciously based on experience furnished by the University of Pennsylvania, and, thus applied, I should concur in them. It would be utterly unwise to attempt to introduce the system in full operation at Harvard at once into the University. A foot-ball player here, in explaining to me the causes of the defeat of the University by another college team, said: 'their men, you know, are much larger than ours.' 'How so?' said I. 'What is the average age of your men at entrance?' 'Sixteen.' One has only to compare this, even allowing the number to have been a round one, with the fact, given in the Andover Review, that the average age of the students who entered Harvard in 1884 was eighteen years and ten months, to see that it is boys who attend the University rather than young men.

Such a state of things is a positive harm. It is not merely that the University furnishes education of second-class character, but it prevents many bright men who are capable of a first-class education from receiving it elsewhere, by persuading them or their parents that what it has to furnish is just as good. There is a large number in every college in regard to whom it makes little difference whether the opportunities furnished them are first or second-class. They will get about as much from one as the other. But the 'remnant,' the bright men with possibilities in them, are a college's most precious opportunity. And it is just these who are the greatest sufferers from the system that gives them a provincial tone for life, instead of imparting, as a University should, a sentiment of universality."