The Portland daily press., 1867-08-05
The Commencement senson


The Comme eucemeut Sensou
The materialissic tendencies OF the Ameri-
can people are of,en the subject oil uncompli-
mentary remark by ill-natured foreign critics.
1t may be that there is some foundation for
their structures, and that the longing to accu-
mulate- perishable treasure is the national
weakness. But al this season of the year
when the columns of all the papers from Kan
sas to Maine are crowded with reports Of the
anniversary exercises of all sorts Of educa-
| tional institutions, Brother Jonathan seems
hardly to deserve the reproach. The COM
| mencement season is at its height, and every
one puts op, for the nonee, classic air and
goes to see some relative graduate. An epi-
cure in matters intellectual has wide scope to
crafty his taste, for besides the universities
and colleges proper, he need not go far out of
his way to find female colleges, agricultural
| colleges, medical colleges-seminaries where
young men are taught how to astonish the
world by forensic or pulpit oratory-
| normal, scientific or polytechnic-al flourish
| ing and all more or less richly endowed. If
| this is materialism, let them make the most
of it! For our part we fear rather lest much
learning shall make the people mad. 1t were
surely grievous misfortune ifthe whole pop
ulace should leave raising corn and potatoes
and devote undivided attention to calculating
eclipses and preparing new editions OF Theoc-
ritus and Plato. But the time having come
when it is no marvel for mechanic to be able
to read Horace in the original, and no dis
| credit to professional man TO diversity his
pursuits by making garden or moving hay
when good artizan is as literally coinpensa-
ted as lawyer or clergyman there is no
danger that manual industry will be neglect
ed. Universal education does not impair the
physical activity of people, but equalizes la
Dor by ennobling it.
The colleges of Maine are just entering upon
Colby University have rooontiy boon. -troated
most generously by wealthy patrons, while
Bates, at the close af its first year, finds itself
well patronzed, and in easy pecuniary cir
cumstances. n Is not this favorable time for
the introduction ofthose reforms in the course
of study and methods OF instruction which
have long been demanded by public senti-
ment? There is a very general feeling that
| the usual curriculum is too little practical
| that Latin and Greek receive too much at
tion-and that some branches of higher
mathematics might properly give place to
studies Of more general utility Harvard,
partly from the influence Of popular senti-
l III ,,o1 ,,uin
tions, of its governing body, has made radical
innovations upon a course of study which has
the sole merit of antiquity. HHo
AS for the ancient languages, the complaint
is not only that they receive more attention,
than their Importance demands, but that, after
all the time devoted to their requirement
they are but imperfectly mastered The diff
| Guilty arises in some measure from faulty
method of study and of instruction. Many
eminent writers upon the subject have con-
tended that Greek and Latin could be acquir'
ed with greater facility than they now are,
| it the course taken with respect to modern
language were epursued-commenciDg with the
| requirement of a vocabulary, and leaving the
grammatical relations of words to be investiSat-
| ed afterwards. 1t is but letting the abstract
follow the concrete as it is more natural TO DO.
| One of the most eminent linguists OF the age,
| who mastered large number of languages in
| a surprisingly short space OF time, found that
he accomplished the task with comparative
ease by reading great masses OF text at the
outset. In doing so he naturally gained an
| insight into the iJloms and peculiar eonstruc-
tions of the tongue, without making them an
object of particular attention. Ii course
| something like this were pursued in colleges,
graduates, who attend commencement with
| their friends, would not feel so much embar-
| rassed when asked to translate the sonorous
period of the Latin orator. 1t really is awrath-
provoking circumstance to be asked the
meaning of chance phrase of writer by
fiend who has unlimited confidence in the
| nrofrndity of your acquirments, ard after
wards to find marginal note in which the
author gives version totally at variance with
the one you have promptly furnished-to find
that your translation is as wide of the mark
as that of the Irishman who stoutly maintain
ed that plluibus unlBa is the Latin for Hail
Columbia.
To most students the mathematical studies
of the last two years of their course
are only valuable as a means of
discipline. Beyond plain trigonomctry there
| is nothir @ that is of much utility in business
| or professional life, except where young men
devote themselves to special branches of sci
ence. and become astronomers or engineers.
For these exceptional cases ample provision
has been made in schools established for the
express purpose of giving the requisite instruc-
t;on. But in the ordinary academic course,
comic sections and the calculus have about as
much practical value for the embryo lawyers,
doctors and cler5ymen who study them, as
would Coptic hieroglyphics or Scandinavian
| runes.