Daily camera., 1901-09-09
COLLEGE EDUCATION.
valuahls 1qui,aeat lse 4 Mar
startiag h Any Dasinses.
NetaAls D9anDles ~ AsneAt AAe1s
Dueoessful AneFtoans-1oAey
~ osGtiAe not the Nohlest Ain
S1 0aakiAA.

Inc C0mploa0t 10 OItSo p<Ou8ut
against college education, that It
Aandicaps . young man 'or business
career BY consuming four years which
otherwise could be devoted 70 getting
. practical start In commercial life,
formed the text for some suggestive
observations by Mr.. Whitelaw Reid. IN
an address delivered not long ago at
the Leland Stanford university, says
the Boston Transcript. The opinion
that the boy who skips the college
course and starts In life at the age OF
lS has better chance of success than
Ahe college graduate has frequently
been expressed by men conspicuous in
the commercial world. The president
of the steel trust has very recently de-
clared that the boy who goes directly
from the lower schools into business
will leave the boy who goes TO college
90 far behind that the latter will never
be able to catch up. Andrew Carnegie
also regards . college training as dis
qualification for business. THE grad
uAte," he says. has not the slightest
chance Of success as against the boy
who swept the office"
This disparaging view Of the col.
lege is admitted by Mr.. Reid to be per-
fectly correct for one who judges the
worth OF education exclusively from
the commercial point Of view. II the
end of educating man Ia only ito get
him ready to keep shop, or run fac
tory, or an iron mill, or to go to Wall
street, or In some way merely to make
money" then it is q waste Of time to
spend four years upon a course of
study which can have no immediate
practical value. He acknowledges that
'.it Is difficult to match from among
college or university graduates such
an array of non-collegiate names, rep
resentine the greatest business sue
cess. as will readily occur to everyone.
The men who consolidated the Astor
fortune came. it is true from Heidel-
berg; but the man who founded II did
not. The founders of the Vanderbilt,
the Morgan, the Moses Taylor. the
Goelet, the Mackey. the Gould or the
Cooper fortunes came from no college
at home or abroad. Take the most con-
spicuous business successcsconfessed-
ly won and maintained by high ability.
now or recently at the front In New
York. c. P. Huntington. for example.
was emancipated from schools Of any
kind long before he was ~. So were
John and William Rockefeller. and so.
not to weary You with more enumera-
tion-so was Andrew Carnegie"
But those examples of successful
sef-made men do not, in Mr. Reds
opinion. furnish any argument against
the desirability of college training
for young men who look forward to
business as career. He rightly holds
that money-making is not the chief
end OF existence. and that the educa-
uon of American youth should not be
planned with q view to getting them to
work at the earliest possible age
There Is no reason" declares Mr.
Reid. why the institution of higher
learning should not develop along the
best lines for the sake of the steadily
increasing number in this prosperous
land who take time for the best things.
This Is NO longer a young. poor peo-
pie on a wild. unexplored continent.
struggling desperately with hard cir
cumstances to make a beginning 1t is
a great nation. rich with the unprece-
dented progress and accumulated pros
perity Of hundred years. The aver
age man no longer needs. like the sons |
of the pioneers, to sacrifice the high |
est things Of which he is capable for |
the sake Of getting into the shop early.
so as not to be outstripped in the mere
race for living. Success in American |
life hereafter will be measured with |
more characters than merely the dol |
lar mark; and the American education |
must be shaped In the future to fit the |
man, rather than merely his business"