The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-07-25
SHOULD A COLLEGE EDUCATED
A Dissent from the View that a Boys "ISentH
Should Rule in a Choice of Studies.

A Dissent from the View that a Boys 'Bentr
Should Rule in a Choice of Studies.
f. r. Sill, in August Atlantic.
In meeting the public on this matter of the
course OF study, the college finds itself con-
tronted with two or three false notions, so
lnveterato that they may we'll be classed as
popular delusions. Each of these, like moss
popular deluslons, has crystallized round a con-
venient phrase.
One such notion is that the choice of studies
for any gwen youth should be governed by his
natural predispositions. In other words, he
should follow MS bent" This has a plausible
sound, yet to apply it to the college course would
the college. When it comes to select
ing a life occupation. a specially.
or study, or practice, such as the various schools
OF the university undertake to furnish, a youth
should, DO doubt, choose according to his taste
and talent. But to choose on that ground alone
in his preparatory culture-course would simply
magnify any lack of balance in his original ma
ture. AS we'll might one advise a boy at the
gymnasium to devote himself to those exercises
IN which he naturally eXcelled. to the neglect of
all that found out his weak points; if the arms
were feeble, to use only the muscles of the
thigh; If the thighs were undeveloped, to use only
the arms. The purpose of the college is to 60
for mind and character what the gymnasium
does for the physical powers; to build up the
man all round: If the student 'hates
mathematics" it is probably because his
mind is naturally weak on the side of abstract
reasoning, and the hated study is therefore the
very study he needs. If he has a lofty disdain
of literature, it is very likely only an evidence of
some lack of that side Of culture somewhere in
his ancestry. There is nothing sacred about
a bent" So far from being an indication of
Providence, 1t is apt to be a mere indication Of
hereditary defect. If we look it from the side
OF its being a predisposition to weakness in some
particular directions, a bent away from certain
lines of study the form in which it chiefly shows
Itself IN college), we can see that the sooner it is
repaired by a generous mental diet the better
for the man and for the race to whose
ideal perfection he and his pos
terity are to contribute. Perhaps the
greatest danger to which the higher education is
at present exposed is that Of spreading before
the student a vast number Of miscellaneous sub
Jects, all recommended as equally valuable and
inviting him to choose according to his bent.
The result naturally is that the average boy fol-
lows that universal bent of human nature toward
the course that offers him the easiest time. If
this course happens to include strong studies,
easy only because he is specially interested in
them, the harm is not so great; but if it consists
chiefly Of high studies, introduced into the cur
riculum only because somebody was there to
teach them, and somebody else wanted them
taught land perhaps a little, too, because each
counts one in a catalogue), then the harm is
enormous. This becomes evident enough
if we use las we may for b~revity's sake
be permitted to do the reductio adj absurdum Of
an extreme illustrations; if we suppose that some
language having a great history and a great
literature, the Greek, for example, isaRjected in
favor of some barbarous tongue embodying
neither history nor literature; say, for example,
the Pawnee or the Eskimo; or if we suppose that
for exercise in writing and reasoning is substi-
tuted the collecting of postage stamps of all
nations, or practice on the guitar, Far short of
any such violent extremes, there are perfectly
we'll recognized differences between the efficiency
Of one study and another in educating a college
student. And it would seem wiser to trust the
choice to the governing body of the college than
to an inexperienced lad, swayed by some mo-
mentary whim, or by the class tradition of the
"easiness" of one subject or another; in other
words, by his natural bent.