Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1900-07-27
LIFE y LEARNING.
COLLEGE EDUCATION APPLIED TO
THE INDUSTRIES.

shire College of Agriculture and Me
chauic Arts Emphasizes the Connection
in "A Centennial Address.
President G. 5. Murkland, Phi. D., of
the New Hampshire College of Agricul-
ture and Mechanic Arts. Durham, n. H.,
spoke concerning the college and the
industries. In substance he said
at is the function of the college to set
men free. This office, although charac-
t~eristic, is not peculiar to the college. 1t
is the task of every institution of learn
ing, perhaps of every institution of any
kind, to remove the accidental %restric-
tons which impede the free exercise of
our native powers and arrest or distort
our normal development. The freedom
of service gives point to the college
work. The lack of it makes that work
p%erfunctory and vague,-as it so often is.
/ doubt if there is any educational need
more pressing thar that of reinstating
the freedom of service as the one educa-
tional ideal.
1T is no mere accident, perhaps, that
when the number of college men so great
ly exceeds the number of available chanc-
es in the older professions, there should
be thrown open so many new opportu-
mites elsewhere. At any rate such is the
fact. For the man in the first vigor of his
youth. at the age when one leaves col
iege, for him there are openings almost
numberless. If the college graduate
does not find them, and | confess that
there is some slight prejudice against
him, it is in no small part for lack of sat-
,sfactory adjustment of the college to
the industries. For these latter have
appropriated to themselves the best pro-
duets of the modern civilization. Is
there an important discovery in any
science: Straightway it becomes the
basis, or the auxiliary, of a new industry.
An eXperimenter in chemical physics
puts some marble and coal dust into a
retort and fuses them with the electric
arc. The porous stone which ne takes
out he throws carelessly, into a pail
of water, and observes the bubbles rise
10 the surface. a few days afterward
somebody is manufacturing a%cetylene
lanterns for bicycles. Our everyday
facilities. telegraph. telephone and the
rest, are so many Illustrations Of the in
dustrial appropriation of learning: and
they are specific ceases, alSc. Of the new
varieties Of freedom offered to the
scholar.
But this very effectiveness of the col
iege recoils upon it with a new definite
ness Of demand. The college must do
more because it has done so much. Hay
Ing touched life with learning here and
there, it must continue till the two are
coeXtensive. Indeed the two, life and
learning, are growing more symmetrical.
every day. There is no point in either
where the other may not touch. Surely
every lover Of learning will say that
there is no point where they should not
touch. In getting nearer the ultimate
association of the two, we are both
charging life with learning and quick
ening learning with life. The bur
den of it must be borne, as it has been
borne, by the college. Never was a
time when the college was so ALSO
lutely necessary as it is to-day. 1t Is in
dispensable to the industries. They all
look to the college for their development.
and for the enlargement of freedom in
their domain. And they will not look in
vain.
Nevertheless It is still somewhat
grudgiugly that the colleges come to
recognize that after ali there are indus
trles.-and industries without which our
common freedom would be sadly cur
tailed. 1t is not yet easy for the college
70 cOncede that the freedom Of the schol-
AT in the industries should assume as
large proportions In the college outlook
a. that of the scholar unemployed or of
the scholar in a learned profession. The
college will not achieve its full use until
ii educates mel for the industries. Edu-
Gated In some fashion they will be. And,
thus equipped, they are likely to demand
the readiustment of some of our common
estimates.
"The college Constituency would not in
crease so rapidly if the college education
did not pay so well. The college gradu-
ate does have a better chance at the
prizes, even when the prizes are esti-
mated at their value in coin. on the
other hand, nothing could be more fatal
20 the freedom of the scholar than the
Over-emphasis upon a fact so subsidi-
airy. The inducement to such over-em-
pasis is peculiarly great as it appeals to
the specialized education. And it is no
easy matter to resist the appeal and turn
a deaf ear 70 the considerations of imme-
diate profit. Certainly the specialized
education has difficulties of its own.
Nevertheless it is gaining a vast constit-
uency. Men are aiming at the industries
and Ignoring the college.
| take that the very stress of the spec
ialized education gives it much of its at
tractive force, and makes the industries
themselves seem more worthy of respect.
1t is not the financial aspect of any given
industry which repels, o~rlfails to attract,
the scholar. 1t is rather that in the as
sociations, In the conditions to which he
must in some measure submit, he fears