Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-05-04
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES r. TRACETELL.

| The George Washington University
only recently secured data which
showed that American college men and
women, in the main. are as serious
minded as young people have ever been.
Raccoon ocercoatS only seem to cover
the entire student body-one raccoon
coat will be remembered, naturally
enough, when h hundred plain wool
coats are forgotten.
x
So it goes all along the line. In a
college of 500 men there will be a
small clique who get drunk but the
great bulk of the students do not. Ex-
actly the same thing may be said of
every great business establishment.
There is always a group which drinks,
but as long as its members manage to
keep the drinking out of the office
nothing is said about it. Yet it must
be admitted that visitor who should
be waited upon by drunken employe
would probably carry away with him
mono too favorable impression of the
firm and its employees as whole.
Such an impression. however, would
prove unfair to the scores of workers
who did not get drunk. The serious,
sober workers would still be in the ma
jority, the huge majority
Exactly the same thing may be said
of 1.-THE enthusiasts of learning" AL
though sometimes and in some quarters
the emphasis is placed upon the unin-
telligent at the expense of the lntelll-
gent. and the absurd at the cost of the
serious. it will be found in every case
that the intelligent and the serious are
very much there in the background.
Every one knows this. but sometimes
the ballyhoo is so great that even the
most ardent enthusiast is thrown off
his balance by the noise.
All he has to do, however, to get back
his faith in humanity is to open the
pages of any one of the great mag
azines and read the advertisements
Here is a picture of bespectacled
young man who has invented new
sort of alloy. Surely he is an en-
thusiast of learning. He never found
his alloy and got a great business firm
to make it and advertise it by laughing
like an idiot every evening at the night
club antics. No, he must have known
his chemical symbols. He was an
enthusiast about higher things and it
will do no good to call him Rabbit"
What does he care?
Certainly there is nothing particu
larly poppy" or "snappy," or mod
crnistic" about this good enthusiasm
of which we speak. 1t is as old as
beings, to be more precise. It's dew
otees do not shock the community by
displays of nakedneSS. but go about
their business of being interested in
the acquisition of knowledge. 1t IS
fine old business. one which does not
guarantee its disciples any short road to
health. wealth and wisdom. 1t does
not say that mo effort is required" or
promise startling uniform which will
make every one stare. Learning. in
the best sense of an old-fashioned
word is something into which a man
may put his whole self and come out
again himself. You can't do that with
some phases of life. You go in whole
end come out in part. They do harsh
things to one.
Learning never leaves any marks on
o man except good ones. It has to deal
with the things of the mind and the
spirit. and carries with it all the dur
able satisfactions of life which men
throughout the ages have agreed to
call good.
Learning's enthusiasts are to be
found by their millions-but they don't
make so much noise about it. True
modesty is one of the things learning
teaches. She has a sincere contempt
for bluff and buster Even If she and
her friends know that others are secur-
ing the hogs share of attention, they
will not resort to the tricks of the opposi-
ton. They tried it once, and felt very
ashamed They turned back to tho
study and read book, and found
therein peace and happiness. The en-
thusiastS of learning will ever con-
template it. with veneration.