The Chickasha daily express. (Chickasha, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1899-current, 1905-05-03

4 4 + edictory address at Johns
SsfoN Hopkins University on the
subject of men over forty that we take
this opportunity Of quoting his own
words. His plan of chloroforming men
over sixty sinks into humorous perver-
sion of Anthony Trolope's whimsical
suggestion;
II am going to be very bold and touch
on another question of some delicacy,
but of infinite Importance in university
life, one that has not been settled in
this country. / refer to fixed period
for the teacher, either of time of SER
vice or of age. Except in some pro-
prietary schools, l do not know Of any
institutions in which there is a time
limit of, say twenty years service. as
in some Of the London hospitals, or in
which a man is engaged for term of
years. Usually the appointment is aut
vitam aut culpam, as the old phrase
reads. II is very serious matter in
our young universities to have all of
the professors growing old at the same
time. In some places only an epidemic,
time limit, or an age limit, can save
the situation.
Il have two fixed ideas well known
to my friends, harmless obsessions
with which | sometimes bore them,
but which have direct bearing on this
important problem. The first is the
comparative uselessness Of men above
forty years of age This may seem
shocking, and yet, read Alright, the
worlds history bears out the state
ment. Take the sum Of human achieve
ment in action, in science, in art, in
literature-subtract the work of the
men above forty, and, while we should
miss great treasures, even priceless
treasures, we should practically be
where we are to-day. 1t is difficult to
name a great and far-reaching con
quest of the mind which has not been
given to the world by man on whose
back the sun was still shining. The
effective. moving, vitalizing work of
the world is done between the ages of
twenty-five and forty years = these
fifteen golden years of plenty, the ana
bolic or constructive period, in which
there is always balance in the mental
bank and the credit is still good.
"In the science and art of medicine
there has not been an advance of the
first rank which has not been initiated
by young or comparatively young men.
Yesalius, Harvey, Hunter, Bichat,
Laennec, Virchow, Lister, Koch-the
green years were yet on their heads
when their epoch-making studies We're
made. To modify an old saying, man
is sane morally at thirty, rich mental
ly at forty, wise spiritually at fifty
or never. The young men should be
encouraged and afforded every possible
chance to show what is in them If
there is one thing more than another
upon which the professors of the uni
versity are to be congratulated, it is
this very sympathy and fellowship with
their junior associates, upon whom
really in many departments, in mine
certainly, has fallen the brunt of the
work. And herein lies the chief value
of the teacher who has passed his
climacteric and is no longer a produc-
tive factor; he can play the man mid
wife, as Socrates did to Thesetetus,
and determine whether the thoughts
which the young men are bringing to
tile light are false idols or true and
noble births.
MY second fixed idea is the useless
ness Of men above sixty years of age,
| and tha poolar,lo l,lo bannft ~ would
be in commercial, political, and in pro
fessional life if, as a matter ofycourse,
men stopped work at this age. Donne
tells us in his 'Biathanatos' that by the
laws of certain wise states sexagen-
arii were precipitated from bridge,
and in Rome men of that age were not
admitted to the suffrage, and were
called depontani because the way to the
senate was per pontem and they from
age were not permitted to come hither.
In that charming novel, the Fixed
Period Anthony Trollope discusses the
practical advantages in modern life of
a return to this ancient usage, and the
plot hinges on the admirable scheme of
a college into which at sixty men re-
tired for q year of contemplation be-
fore a peaceful departure by chloro-
form. That incalculable benefits might
follow such a scheme is apparent to
any one who, like myself. is nearing
the limit, and who has made a careful
study of the calamities which may be-
fall men during the seventh and eighth
decades!
"Stil more when he contemplates the
many evils which they perpetuate un-
consciously and with impunityl AS it
can be maintained that all the great
advances have come from men under
forty. so the history of the world shows
that very large proportion of the evils
may be traced to the sexagenarians-
nearly all the great mistakes politically
and socially, all of the worst poems.
most Of the bad pictures, majority
of the had novels, and not a few of the
bad sermons and speeches. 1t is not
to be denied that occasionally there is
a sexagenarian whose mind, as Cicero
remarks, stands out of reach of the
body's decay. Such one has learned
the secret of Herminnus that ancient