The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-04-24


taught him.
The self-educated business man who has
been successful not alone as a money
maker. but as leader of men," he said,
lis man gifted with an abnorInally large
brain. 1t is not always the good fortune
of the sons of rich men TO inherit that adj
vantage of their fathers; in fact, 1t is the
exception. Therefore, the assumption of
some successful men that their sons will
be as we'll prepared for business life without
a college training is based on wrong prem
ICES. There is no doubt that college train
ing prepares a man for the big things of
life better than any home training or plain
business experience. all other things being
equal. 1t gives him broader view and
enables him to see the interreation of
things-to understand that no thing stands
by itself. 1 can see only one drawback:
can fancy the university man may object to
doing the ordinary duties which belong to
the apprenticeship of business life. can
imagine him being q little 'cocky' about be-
ginning at the bottom of the ladder. One
of the humorous papers expressed the idea
better by cartoon than can give it in
words perhaps. 1t pictured two old gen.
flemen in conversation, one saying to the
other that he had just taken his grandson
into the business, and in reply to a query
as to how the arrangement worked, he said:
I seem to please him. +"
] asked DR.. Patton If university train-
ing helped boy to find himself more
quickly than be possibly could do while he
remained under the restrictions of home
life.
"Undou tedly," he answered. I'VE can
observe TIT in the contrast between the
home stude4 ts--those who live in Princeton
and come here to school-and the boys who
come a thousand miles to live here during
the term
asked Dr. Patton what degree OF liberty
should be allowed to student at college.
The investment of the student with the
franchises Of his manhood is a slow pro-
cess he said. Here at Princeton we stand
toward the students in the position of the
parents or guardians at least we feel that
to be our duty. Therefore, we keep careful
watch and ward over the young men who
come to US, and if we find them becoming
addicted to any vice we at once notify those
who have sent them here. We want to know
where the student spends his time, and how
he spends it And it is in the possession of
this knowledge that we find ourselves able
70 maintain the morale of the college itself.
In his home the boy is surrounded by walls
of paternalism. When he reaches college,
ne finds he is comparatively independent.
The freshman finds in his new independ~
ence opportunity sometimes to take a
big loaf, and often he finds too late that he
has lost his year. Perhaps this teaches him
q lesson and in the end is benefit, but we
constantly strive against this in the first
year because that is, in measure, the cru
cial period, the one in which the undergrad
siate gains, unhampered, his first lesson in
province of the college to do aught which
would not encourage the broadening of the
mind, the ability to grasp the affairs of life
in a large way, to consider the world on a
basis Of wide scope. 1 think the modern
tendency is in the direction OF promoting
all these things, and it seems to me there
is no agent so powerful in this regard as
the training which one receives in college.
1t is folly to say that college life is not
beneficial to any one. This must be borne
in mind: 1t is not so much what we learn in
college as the training of the mind that is
received. the ability to concentrate thought
that Is impaired. 1t seems to me that moth
ing is more impossible than that the mind
of man who has picked up his knowledge
in desultory way shall be valuable, as
resourceful, as the mind of the man who
has received the benefit of college training
This is the liberalism of student life. In
this way college equips man for whatever
his life may be when he goes into the
world. Too many people fail to distinguish
between liberalism and uprightness, and
narrow mindedness. Broad minded liberality
IS an evidence of enlightened progress. We
believe that in Princeton. We try to impress
&c upon the minds of the undergraduates"
TO INFLUENCE STUDENTS.
liz, 90 I, f- fan cf1 &c
DR. Patton said: THE student, as a rule
is a man who thinks. do not know of any
audience as responsive that composed of
undergraduates. If the person speaking to
them clothes his thoughts in the direct Ian
guage of everyday life he will find evidence
of ready appreciation in the faces before
him. I go about good deal and preach to
many different congregations, but 1 have
yet to find the one which meets me as the
congregation composed of my own students
] think an undergraduate audience is of
marked benefit to the speaker. For in
stance. a congregation in a church will give
a man respectful attention, though he be
dull and uninteresting Inasmuch as the
members have entered the church for the
purpose of hearing him speak, they feel
they owe it to him to show no evidence of
the fact that he fails TO attract them. In
Nn9 undergraduate audience any lack OF in
tcrest makes itself promptly manifest. Ma
fure here asserts herself If the speaker
grows dry and prosy his attention will. be
called to the fact by the indifference of his
audience or by signs more positive in their
character. This condition of affairs puts
the man who speaks to the students on his
mettle Tt unconsciously forces him to inn
prove his methods unul. by the attention
he secures from the undergraduate, he
gauges the degree of thoroughness with
which he is imparting the information to
them which it is his duty to see that they
acquire. Listening to the different members
OF the faculty year after year has broad
ening effect on the student. He broadens
because he has benefited by the culture of
men who look at different sides of the same
question. He is enabled to listen to differ
ent views of the same subject very often
and he learns why these different views are
held. In other words. he looks, week in
and week out, into the minds of men who
have made the continuous study of one or
several subjects their life work Profiting
by their knowledge, he unconsciously alb
serbs methods by which it is possible for
him to avoid the great stumbling blocks in
life, the mistakes that many others have