New-York tribune., 1921-06-20
Educators Call
For World-W Wide
Service Ideals
Extremists of All Types
Condemned by Hadley
i'll Final Baccalaureate
Address TO Yale Men
Hibben Praises Roosevelt
Selfish Patriot Assailed at
Princeton; Think for Your
selves, Harvard Men Told

Baccalaureate sermons were deliv-
cred yesterday by the presidents of
Yale, Princeton and Harvard universi-
AAs in conjunction with the COM
mencement week exercises.
At Yale President Hadley asserted
shat life is a contest and that the high
est sportsmanship is found in strur
cling. under Christian ideals. Con
trasting the militant with the pacitist
Ideals, he said that both had much to
recommend them, but that neither was
night because neither takes the trouble
TO look at the Indirect and lasting eff
fects Of conflict.
President Hibben, addressing the
graduates at Princeton, told them that
America could not afford to purchase
freedom from international obligation
by paying the price of a loss OF inter
national power and leadership.
Harvard graduates heard President
Lowell expound the need of thought,
more than the need of organization or
machinery, in the return of the world
to normalcy.
Hadley's Last Baccalaureate
President Hadley, who will retire
next Wednesday, delivered his last
baccalaureate address to the Yale grad
uating class in Woolsey Hall. He
said:
Looked at by itself and apart from
it's results any contest is usually a
mixture of pleasure and pain. of GOOD
and evil. The pacihst who thinks the
lighting spirit fundamentally bad and
the militant who thinks it fundament-
ally good can both find plenty Of
facts to support their contentious
10 the pacifist all strife is n
cruel and unchristian thing; un
worthy. Of intelligent men if devoted
to trivial object like winning game.
cruel and destructive if carried into
MES moro serious business. The
strongest man gets the prize; the less
strong are crowded back; the weakest,
even though they strain themselves to
the breaking point, can get nothing
but disappointment or loss. The result
OF such contest seems to the pacifst
Ii mere triumph Of strength or cum
ming; the glory accorded to the victor
defiance of social justice. The mill
tant takes the opposite viewpoint. He
looks only at the good. In every con-
test ne sees chance for men to show
whatthey can do. The winner proves
his power to lead. Those who lust
fail to win are trained in manly quail
ties essential to human progress. Even
those who drop out altogether learn
the measure of their powers and lini-
tations more effectively in this way
than in any other and are given the
choice between following the leader at
distance Or finding some other more
congenial line of effort, instead Of
being allowed to block the wheels of
progress and reduce the pace of the
whole body to suit the powers of the
slowest.
Either Extreme Bad
either view OF life has much to
justify it; either works badly when
carried to an extreme Where people
have become so peaceful that they re-
fuse to fight on principle, religion
and philosophy have lost touch with
life. Peace has been purchased at the
cost of progress; morality has suffered
for lack of men who could fight in be-
half of the oppressed. But in going
to the other extreme Of loving fight
for its own sake and making success
the primary test of fitness, militant
philosophers have lost touch with real
life just as completely as did the
pacifist philosophers, and have tailed
just as decisively. For political or
commercial successes which win the
admiration of one age meet little but
contempt in the next. Militant Ger
many seemed but a few years ago un-
conquerable; where do its leaders
stand to-day, even in the estimation
Of their own people?
Neither pacifst nor militant is
right, because neither takes the trouble
effects of conflict. A contest is not
good or bad in itself; it is good or
bad according to the spirit in which
it is conducted and the kind of leaders
which it brings to the front. If con-
Quoted for a selfish end and by un-
scrupulous methods it breeds selfish
leaders and narrow-minded followers.
II conducted for an unseltsh end end
by honorable methods it trains lead
ers who can serve the people and fol-
lowers who have better ideals than
the Persians heard that the prizes in
the Olympic games were not money
but crowns of laurel, one of them said:
Against what manner of men, o king,
hast thou brought US to fight, who
contend not for money but for honor?
This is the touchstone that determines
whether the race is good or bad; this
the Greek spirit, which, broadened IN
its scope to include wider ideals of
honor and service than the old Greeks
had dreamed, underlies and gives
vitality TO the teaching of Jesus and
of Paul. Not to withdraw from con-
tests, but to contend on the field of
public service; not TO stife ambition,
but to make success in meeting others
needs the goal of ambition and the
test of fitness for leadership-thls is
the Christian teaching"
Hibben Cites Roosevelt
In Alexander Hall at Princeton yes
terday morning, President Hibben ad-
dressed the outgoing class of 1921 as
follows:
"What is your ambition in life? If
/ read your mind and heart Alright, it is
to communicate something of the
knowledge and wisdom with which