DR. LOWELL PAYS HIGHEST TRIBUTE TO BOSTON LATIN

Paying tribute to the founders of Boston Latin School and to those who have been responsible for the maintenance of its high standards, President-Emeritus Lowell yesterday afternoon addressed a gathering of nearly two thousand graduates of the school in commemorating its tencentenary celebration.

After sketching the early history of the school and commenting on the difficulties confronting the public schools of the past and of today, the speaker went on to give the reasons which appeared to him to explain the school's having weathered the centuries without lowering its standards.

"Now, curiously enough, at the same time that the public schools have tended toward more teaching--that is, more of direct imparting of knowledge--higher education has tended toward the other and slower procedure. For example, instead of the older practice of lectures and reading text-books, the law schools began sixty years ago to use the case method of instruction--much slower so far as the bare learning of legal principles by sheer memory is concerned, but much more effective in teaching law students to think. And the system has spread from school to school until it has now been adopted almost everywhere in America.

"The distinction between self-education under guidance and direct instruction by imparting information is not absolute and irreconcilable. It is one of emphasis, attitude, and tendency, yet it is of prime importance. It is not without significance, and to some extent reflects and measures the current of the times.

"That the Boston Latin School attained and through centuries has preserved its leading position among the institutions of the land, is due to the tenacity of its grip on high standards, to its insistence on hard work, and to its methods of self-education.

"So long as these are retained, its preeminence will endure, and future generations may look back to its present management with the same gratitude that we feel for its adventurous and far-sighted founders."