New-York tribune., 1902-12-22

are to study medicine may have one year OK sas
four allowed them as having been spent IN
and the very recent change to three years S
abxasa ano to fS~ be for @ the purpose
back to the former state of things But with
dition is worse than ever, Among many objections
1t is not to be supposed that the sInde1ts df
will look with favor on system whlch enaDies
President Eliot according to one OF the weekly
journals. defended his course OF turning the IoGr
presidents. He proposes that undergraduates snail
work during vacations bad thing ron issfaS esg6S
to the freshman class shall be raised. II Is easy
condition Of things they viii be intensified by this
proposition, that boys shall give up their vacation
presses it. -four years may be jamned into three -
AS raising the standard for admission to the the
raised. President Eliot stated that he was yield
ing to the pressure of the material world, ana
that the cries Of the professional schools were ring
the small colleges President Tucker, of Dart
mouth. said that he wished e consider the inter
ests of undergraduates entering the proteS<lonss
Dr. Hopkins of Williams and Presde9t Wls0r -rII gi
and it is to be hoped that the small colleges OF
New-England and the great college OF NeWIJersey
back to the old condition of things that Is to
say to rational method Of carving M on eolgs tbis
and professional or university training, ,5
racaI reeay sT te Is frobIe There Should be
a return to the old fashioned American colleges,
departments Of Yale, Harvard, Princeton and
Union Admissions should be easier; the hlsn
schools and preparatory schools would then tone
themselves down to the lesSened requirements, ana
bows could 90 together in their good old way get
out OF college when they were nineteen or twenty,
and 80 into the universitie~ with tnelr LnLnos s
trained such degree that no technlcal OF oreau
and butter instruction IN the universities, LOT the
purpose of pleading cases. preaching sermons, or
caring for the sick could efface the hberalzing
effects OF their college course.
All these professions would be learned profes-
sions with the same standard In these colleges
of the ancient order there might properly be any
revision of the curriculum thc-t the changes OF
the twentieth century have made necessary But
optional studies should be abandoned The pro
fessors, and they alone. should choose What ~ IS
proper for these young gentlemen to study Tne1r
freedom In that respect does rot tend to make
better scholars, more appreciatiVe ana active SUI
dents when once in the university, but only leaos
to such a diffusion Of energy that many students
come up to the degree OF B. A. knowing a very
exactly or thoroughly Of anything. They are not
able TO read the Latin or Greek language nuenI-
": they cannot speak French German
The system of some decades ago was not so am
bilious but it was better. With most young men
a little of the sound classical and rathematical
vantage of living four years in an academic World
whose impress left them and IL was not
DELAYED until they too old fully TO enjoy IT,
Were the educational question IN our country, as
regards prepar tor schools and colleges. once ad-
tusted on the basis which have attempted 10 Out,
the country the pleasant and easy task of arrang.
ing professional schools and the otner parts OF
a real university, in a manner that would at once
give symmetry and increased power 70 our hlgner
education. D. B. ST. JOHN hOOoA;.
No. 20 East Thrteenth-st-. Manhattan. Dec TO-