The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1900-06-27

| tion
1.-The chief and fundamental charge Mr..
Eliot makes is that the Jesuits do not
| follow the example of Harvard and of
certain other colleges, which permit the
students almost unlimited freedom in
electing their own studies. Now any one
who reflects for a moment will see that
to give a callow youth the right to choose
his own studies is to ruin him. The aver
age youth will always neglect the hard
things and choose the easiest study. For
instance, he viii neglect latin, Greek and
mathematics (and the facts show that he
does) and prefer in their places something
easy and light Harvard approves, nay
coddles him for his poor choice, and gives
him an A. B. if he knows nothing but a
French comedy. or the chemical
properties of animal fat Such a gradu-
ate is certainly not an educated person.
His so-called education is based on the
extreme independence of the individual
which Guisot calls the dominant char
acter of barbarism. Yet Harvard is filing
the country with just such graduates to
spread the principles of false culture and
veneered barbarism.
THE old proverb says that you cannot
make a silk purse out of a sow's ear
and no Jesuit college ever tries to do that,
but Harvard's President is doing it, and
blaming others for not following his in
iquitous example In fact, considering
the lack of discipline IN Harvard, the
lack of restraint upon the young men
who go there, the temptations and dis
fractions to which they are exposed night
and day, the go as you please spirit of
them under President Eliot, 1 am not as
tonished to find that their average senior
is not as we'll educated as the freshmen
of the Jesuit college. The Jesuit no more
believes in indifferintism in education
than he believes in it in religion. There
is a hierarchy in the branches of knowl-
edge. A knowledge of bugs is not as i'm
portant as a knowledge of Greek, Latin
or of English literature. The Jesuit
chooses the best in everything, in litera-
ture and science, and he cempels the
youth to learn that and allows him to
elect his studies only when he has ac-
quired wisdom with age and experience.
''The Jesuit stands to the student
in the place of parents and does
what the good parent does-he pro-
The student is not allowed to injure him
self by the sweets which he prefers to
wholesome rourishment. Not only the
Jesuits, but the majority of intelligent
educators, abroad and at home, among
them even professors in Harvard, and the
very best authorities in other universities,
condemn this elective system of Mr.. Eliot.
A professor of many years standing in
Princeton University told me recently
that all the American universities are de-
teriorating because of the abuse OF the
elective system. Formerly said he, we
ruled the young men, they had to learn
what we told them; but now they rule US,
or rather their indulgent mothers rule
US. The student, discontented with
Greek or Latin or mathematics,
goes home and coaxes his mother
to let him take something easy in their
stead She consents and the university
has to obey or lose pupil. Thus the
young man is graduated, knowing only
French comedy, Fourberies de Seapin,
for instance, with a taste for 'Sapho,' but
knowing nothing of the orations of Cicero
or Demonsthen'es. nothing of the treas
ures of Greek and Latin literature. Now,
without a knowledge of these, no man has
received a liberal education. They are
treasures which contain the wealth of
ancient knowledge and in form they will
always remain best knowledges of good
taste in every species of literature.
1.-THE Jesuit colleges are, therefore, SUI
perior to Harvard not only in discipline
and method but in matter. They teach
more and better matter than Harvard.
The matter is selected according to the
dignity of the subject and not at the
good pleasure of some immature fiedg-
ling.
"But a special superiority of the Jesuit
college is its course of mental philosophy,
of which Harvard knows nothing but
name You, gentlemen, during the past
year, have been studying, as an ordinary
course, logic, or the art of reasoning;
metaphysics, which treat of the funda-
mental truths necessary for the intellect
to know, and ethics, which treat of the
fundamental laws of morality which gov
ern the individual, the family and the
State. Had you studied in Harvard,
YOU would have received no such
training as you have received here
during the past year-the best possible
preliminary Training lOI lAS oeu0S VI ie-
medicine, politics or literature. Harvard,
like all non-Catholic colleges, has no
proper philosophy course Since the day
when Luther. because he lacked logical
mind and was only a passionate discla1m-
er with political influence to back him, at
tackled Aristotle Thomas Aquinas and the
scholastics, it is hard to find scholar
outside of the Catholic Church whose
mind is not crooked and superficial, inca
nable of dealing with metaphysical truths,
or of distinguishing between the true and
the false. Yet Dante, a great philosopher
and the greatest of all the poets, has
said
"Che auegli ira stolti bene abasso,
che senza distinzion afferma Mega"
President Eliot is ap roof of my state
ment. His mind, as hown in his zigzag
argument. reminds me of a buckled saw,
which, as every Jersey farmer knows, Is
one SO bent and crooked that is twists n
the hand and will not saw the wood. l
admit that there are some things in which
Harvard may excel. 1t may excel in the
study of bugs or coprolites, for instance,
and know more about them than the
graduates of Jesit colleges do. But where
is Harvard when there is question of
knowledge or social and ethical principles,
the most important of all the branches
o feducation. In these, Harvard's intel
lect is a buckled saw. In the hands of
every Jesuit you will find the learned,
comprehensive, subtle and profound
T,J,t7,,,eo Ar,,iroc