INJURY PLUS INSULT

The current issue of "The Commonweal" states that "the greatest defect of the American colleges is that they teach rather than educate, and the general run of them totally fail to create a love of learning or an enthusiasm for the higher life."

This is the old familiar plaint of those who are continually weeping over the American college. It is shown that if a man receives a real education at college, he does so in spite of the college and not because of it. Statistics are produced to show that the billiard room of the Harvard Union is more popular than its library; that only six men submitted essays in the Union essay contest, while over one hundred entered its bridge tournament. The doubtful inference is drawn that the college is responsible for this deplorable state of affairs.

Granted that these conditions are general, is it quite fair to put all the blame on the college? Is the existence of such a state of affairs more than a reflection of the general attitude of the American people? If the undergraduate prefers billiards to books, and bridge to essays, it is hardly fair to load upon the universities blame which falls more justly upon the homes and schools. Some visitors have marvelled at the colleges' ability to awaken any spirit of scholarship in the stolid and uninterested material dumped upon them yearly. The patient camels scarcely deserve this last straw, an accusation of fomenting the very conditions which they are struggling earnestly, albelt impotently, to reverse.