"... Knowledge and Learning"

The editor of the McGill daily is alarmed. He fears lest the great mass of college undergraduates develop into so many intellectual snobs. Collegians, he thinks, become so wrapped up in their educations that they despise all men who have not had the advantages they possess; they so cram themselves with learning that an effort is required for them to make their speech "comprehensible to the uneducated man."

There is certainly, plenty of mourning to be done over the imperfection of the average undergraduate. It does not proceed, however, from his over-education; so far from agreeing with the Canadian editor, we are inclined to think that collegiate chatter is more apt to be incomprehensible to the educated than to the uneducated. To the Cornellian, academic duties serve as the background for the year's activities, and he is willing to let them stay as far in the background as his more vital enjoyments require. Be he interested in extra-curricular activities, the social whirl, or merely loafing, he allots his time so as to accommodate that interest. If something has to be neglected. It is his University work; he does not intend to let his studies, interfere with his education.

Undergraduates at Cornell pack Bailey Hall for concerts, they provide a moderately large audience at the Dramatic Club, they occasionally attend lectures by visiting speakers. But the vast majority are more consistent in their devotion to the moving pictures, a technical discussion of the tactics employed in the Oshkosh-Podunk football game absorbs them more than a good book, and the bridge table is more popular than the lecture hall.

McGill may fear intellectual snobbery. Cornell needs first to acquire a significant intellectual curiosity on the part of its undergraduate body; concern over snobbery may follow later. Cornell Daily Sun