The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-06-04
TIE ADVANTAGES OF THE SMALL
COLLEGE.
Baccalaureate Address, Wake Forest
1905, by President G. Il. Taylor.

y
A Roman satirist once wrote. that
some days of life are to be marked
with a white stone. This is such a day
| for you, young gentlemen. 1t is the
| elimination of your college course.
| 1t is the beginning of your reward for
| toll persistence and patience. With all
my heart l congratulate you. For it
is no small thing to have honestly won
q diploma from such an institution as
Wake Forest. 1t really implies as
much of faithful work as is required
for the same, degrees in any of the
great or perhaps overgrown colleges
j am not referring to specialized post
graduate work in those universities
whose chief stress is upon the train
/ ing of experts. But it may be claim
ed, I believe, that the under graduate
work done in institutions which num-
Der their students by thousands is no
more thorough and successful than is
done in many of the So-called small
colleges" of our land. May | venture
briefly to set forth the advantages and
claims of these smaller institutions?
/ 1t is only within the last few years
| that the term small colleges" has
come into vogue and that distinc-
, ton has been made between the big
| and small olleges-sometime in such
| a way as to impute inferiority to the
latter. SO far from admitting this in
| feriority in all that makes for true
culture, / am ready to contend that
small colleges, when adequately equip
ped and manned, have some distinct
advantages. That these are capable OF
giving the best training is proved by
the fact that, up to a few years ago,
every college in this country was
small college. Within the memory of
men still living, not a college in the
United States enrolled more students
or employed more professors than
Wake Forest has now. In 1850, Brown
University had 120 students, Amherst
I1S2 and Harvard only 296-fewer by
seventeen than Wake Forest has had
this session. And yet, out of these small
colleges, North, South and West, came
the men who, mainly, have made the
country what it is. AS compared with
many colleges Of today, William and
Mary was microscopic when it sent
forth Jefferson and Madison and Mum
roe. SO was yarmouth when it train
ed Daniel Webster. Bowdoin was only
a little country college, when among
its students in the same year were
H. w. Longfellow, Nathaniel Haw-
thorne, Sergeant S. Prentiss, future
President Franklin Pierce, and four
United States Senator'S in embyro. Ii
enrolled only 10S students, but almost
every one of these attained to emf
nence in some line of Achievement.
| This is an exceptional case; but 1t
serves to reveal and prove the posi-
bilities of small colleges.
Be the reason what it may, it is
fact that small colleges have accom-
plished and are accomplishing more,
in proportion to the numbers of their
patrons than are the great universe
ties and colleges of our land. | shall
not attempt to set forth all the causes
of their excellence, but even a cursory
glance will enable us to understand
why small colleges offer some pecul-
lar advantages.
/. Closer and more intimate rela-
tons between "a student and his pro-
fessors are possible in these institu-
. tons. There is a limit in human ma
ture to the possible range of &C.
quaintance, to say nothing of cordial
relations. Now one cannot insist too
strongly upon the Importance of the
extra classroom relations between
profess ors and students as an educa-