bS7 
 
LIBRARY 
 
 OK Tin: 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 < . i K ' r ( > \ s 
 
 * 55 (ftrzr^L 
 
 ^Accessions No. 
 
 la*s No. 
 
With the Compliments of 
 
 W. F. POOLE. 
 
THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY CURRICULUM 
 
 Phi Beta Kappa Address 
 NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY JUNE 13 1893 
 
 WILLIAM FREDERICK ^POOLE LL D 
 Librarian of the Newberry Library 
 
 OF THK 
 
 TJKIVE. T 
 
 Chicago New York Toronto 
 FLEMING H REVELL COMPANY 
 
 1894 
 
COPYRIGHT 1894 
 By W F POOLE 
 
 Press of 
 
 Slason Thompson & Co. 
 Chicago 
 
flUKIVEI 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 AND THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY CURRICULUM 
 
 MY leading purpose in the preparation 
 of this address was a discussion of 
 the relations of the University Library to 
 University Education. I wished to show 
 that the study of Bibliography and of the 
 scientific methods of using books should 
 have an assured place in the University 
 Curriculum ; that a wise and professional 
 bibliographer should be a member of the 
 faculty and have a part in training all the 
 students ; that the Library should be his 
 class room, and that all who go forth into 
 the world as graduates should have such 
 an intelligent and practical knowledge of 
 books as will aid them in their studies 
 
4 The University Library 
 
 through life, and the use of books be to 
 them a perpetual delight and refreshment. 
 Books are wiser than any professor and 
 all the faculty ; and they can be made to 
 give up much of their wisdom to the stu- 
 dent who knows where to go for it, and 
 how to extract it. 
 
 I do not mean that the university stu- 
 dent should learn the contents of the 
 most useful books ; but I do mean that 
 he should know of their existence, what 
 they treat of, and what they will do for 
 him. He should know what are the most 
 important general reference books which 
 will answer not only his own questions, 
 but the multitude of inquiries put to him 
 by less-favored associates who regard him 
 as an educated man. If a question arises 
 as to the existence, authorship, or subject 
 of a book, an educated man should know 
 the catalogues or bibliographies by which 
 he can readily clear up the doubt. The 
 words Watt, Larousse, Graesse, Querard, 
 
and University Curriculum 5 
 
 Hoefer, Kayser, Hinrichs, Meyer, Hain 
 and Vapereau should not be unmeaning 
 sounds to him. He should know the 
 standard writers on a large variety of sub- 
 jects. He should be familiar with the 
 best method by which the original invest- 
 igation of any topic may be carried on. 
 When he has found it, he appreciates, 
 perhaps for the first time, what books are 
 for, and how to use them. He finds him- 
 self a professional literary or scientific 
 worker, and that books are the tools of 
 his profession. It is one of the most de- 
 lightful and inspiring incidents in a stu- 
 dent's experience when he has discovered 
 a key to the treasury of knowledge, a 
 method by which he can do useful and 
 practical work, and that he has a function 
 in life. No person has any claim to be a 
 scholar until he can conduct such an orig- 
 inal investigation with ease and pleasure. 
 This facile proficiency does not come by 
 intuition, nor from the clouds. Where 
 
6 The University Library 
 
 else is it to be taught, if not in the college 
 or university? With it, a graduate is pre- 
 pared to grapple with his professional 
 studies, to succeed in editorial work, or in 
 any literary or scientific pursuit for which 
 he may have the taste and qualification. 
 
 It is a well-known fact, and one regret- 
 ted by the wisest educators, that the great 
 majority of the students of the colleges 
 and universities of the country graduate 
 with very little knowledge of books or of 
 their uses. How the evil can be remedied, 
 is a question easier to ask than to answer. 
 Any scheme which may be proposed 
 meets with this objection: " The curric- 
 " ulum is full, and it is not possible to in- 
 " crease it." This objection furnishes me 
 with the opportunity, and a justification, 
 if one be needed, for a discussion of the 
 modern university curriculum. 
 
 The attentive observer of higher educa- 
 tion has seen, within the past two decades, 
 a marked improvement in college and uni- 
 
and University Curriculum 7 
 
 versity instruction, and in the direction I 
 have already indicated. More thought 
 is now given to the subject by ripe schol- 
 ars and experienced educators than ever 
 before ; and yet there is abroad a feeling 
 of unrest, and an impression that our 
 educational system is passing through a 
 transition period from one which was ex- 
 ceedingly faulty to some ideal method as 
 yet undeveloped and still in the future. 
 
 The need of educated men was never 
 so great as at present ; and yet this is an 
 admitted fact, that, while the number of 
 colleges and universities is increasing and 
 the classes of the older institutions are 
 larger, the number of graduates, when 
 compared with the increase of population 
 and wealth, is diminishing. The demand 
 for highly-trained men to fill the positions 
 which the recent amazing development in 
 the sciences and practical arts has created 
 in chemical and electrical laboratories, 
 in mining, metallurgy, engineering, trans- 
 
8 The University Library 
 
 portation, and general business is not 
 supplied. Higher qualifications are needed 
 in each of the old and learned professions. 
 In 1840 the proportion of undergraduates 
 to the population of the country was I to 
 1,549; in 1860, i to 2,012; in 1870, I to 
 2,615, and in 1880, I to 3,000. The dis- 
 parity is doubtless greater now. The age 
 at which students enter college is steadily 
 increasing. The average age of freshmen 
 at Harvard on admission is upwards of nine- 
 teen years. President Eliot views this fact 
 with solicitude and says it must be reduced. 
 "At the beginning of this century," he re- 
 marks, " many students graduated at the 
 "age at which they now enter." Suspect- 
 ing the tendency to be older than this 
 century, I made an examination of this 
 point with reference to the early classes 
 at Harvard, beginning with the first class 
 of 1642. In the classes from that date to 
 1659, 1 selected seventeen men best known 
 for the reputation they had achieved in 
 
and University Curriculum 9 
 
 life, and, looking up their ages, I found 
 that six of them had entered college at 
 thirteen years of age, two at fourteen, 
 six at fifteen and three at sixteen. It will 
 be a mistake to suppose that the scholastic 
 requirements at Harvard were then low. 
 I shall later state what those requirements 
 were, and will now only remark that there 
 was probably not one graduate at Har- 
 vard, in the last class of 1893, who could 
 have passed the final examinations and 
 taken the bachelor's degree in the class 
 of 1642. 
 
 The most successful professional and 
 literary men, as a rule, both in this coun- 
 try and in Europe, were the men who 
 completed their college studies early in 
 life. Colleges are now competing with 
 each other in raising the average age of 
 candidates for admission by increasing 
 the technical conditions of entering, 
 often in the form of grammatical puzzles 
 and philological conundrums. Business 
 
io The University Library 
 
 is offering larger prizes to our young men 
 than professional life. Parents are un- 
 willing that their sons should spend from 
 twelve to fifteen years of their mature life 
 in a preparatory school, in college, in pro- 
 fessional studies, and in fighting for a 
 lucrative position in the ranks of law, 
 medicine or technical science, when in less 
 time and with less labor and expense they 
 can establish themselves in some profit- 
 able business. They do not understand 
 why it is necessary for an American youth 
 to work with grammar and dictionary from 
 six to ten years in learning Latin ; and 
 they are amazed when they ascertain that 
 not one in fifty college graduates can 
 speak Latin, or understand it when spoken; 
 can write it with any freedom or accuracy, 
 or read with any pleasure a page of an 
 unfamiliar Latin author at sight. Is it 
 strange that so many college graduates 
 forget their Latin and Greek as soon as 
 possible after they have taken a diploma, 
 
and University Curriculum 1 1 
 
 and that occasionally we hear of one who 
 has the courage to boast that, when he 
 opens a copy of Homer, he does not know 
 the Greek alphabet ? The Roman boy, on 
 the other hand, learned from the lips of 
 his mother, or of an untrained nurse, usu 
 ally a slave, to speak Latin at three or 
 four years of age, without grammar, dic- 
 tionary or drill. It was not the Latin of 
 Cicero or Quintilian; but it was Latin, 
 nevertheless, and better Latin than Amer- 
 ican college graduates speak. It was the 
 beginning of a familiarity with the Latin 
 tongue which was later developed into an 
 idiomatic and scholarly style. Has the 
 human mind deteriorated in vigor during 
 the past two thousand years ? John Stuart 
 Mill learned from the lips of his father to 
 speak, read and write Greek at a very 
 early age. " I have no remembrance," he 
 says in his Autobiography, "of the time 
 " when I began to learn Greek. I have 
 " been told that it was when I was three 
 
12 The University Library 
 
 " years old. My earliest recollection on 
 " the subject is that of committing to 
 " memory what my father termed voca- 
 " bles, being lists of common Greek words, 
 " with their signification in English, which 
 " he wrote out for me on cards. Of gram- 
 " mar, until some years later, I learned no 
 " more than the inflexions of the nouns 
 "and verbs; but, after a course of voca- 
 " bles, proceeded at once to translation. 
 " I remember going through ^Lsop's Fa- 
 " bles, the first Greek book which I read. 
 " I read in 1813 [he was then seven years 
 "old] the first six dialogues of Plato/' 
 He gives a summary of " such other Greek 
 "prose authors as I remember to have 
 " read up to the time I was eight years 
 " old, namely: The whole of Herodotus, 
 " Xenophon's Cyropaedia, the Memora- 
 " bilia of Socrates, some of the Lives of 
 " the Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius, 
 " and part of Lucian and Isocrates." The 
 narrative he gives of his education, he 
 
and University Curriculum 13 
 
 says, " may be useful in showing how 
 " much more than is commonly supposed 
 " may be taught, and well taught, in those 
 " early years which, in the common modes 
 " of what is called instruction, are little 
 "better than wasted." Later he adds: 
 " The result of the experiment shows the 
 " ease with which this may be done, and 
 " places in a strong light the wretched 
 " waste of so many precious years as are 
 " spent in acquiring a modicum of Latin 
 " and Greek commonly taught to school 
 "boys, a waste which has led so many 
 " educational reformers to entertain the 
 " ill-judged proposal of discarding those 
 " languages altogether from general edu- 
 " cation." 
 
 The objectors to this theory will doubt- 
 less say: "John Stuart Mill could do 
 " this ; but where is another boy who 
 "could do it?" On this point Mr. Mill 
 remarks: "If I had been by nature ex- 
 " tremely quick of apprehension, or pos- 
 
14 The University Library 
 
 " sessed a very retentive memory, or were 
 " of a remarkably active and energetic 
 " character, the trial would not be con- 
 " elusive; but, in all these natural gifts, I 
 " am rather below than above par. What 
 " I could do could assuredly be done by 
 " any boy or girl of average capacity and 
 " healthy physical constitution. To the 
 " fact that through the early training be- 
 " stowed on me by my father, I started, 
 " I may fairly say, with the advantage of 
 "a quarter of a century over my contem- 
 " poraries." 
 
 This last remark applies not mainly to 
 his knowledge of the classical and modern 
 languages, but to his studies in history, 
 political economy, philosophy and social 
 science, and to his enormous reading in 
 general English and French literature. 
 
 Mr. Mill probably underrated his nat- 
 ural gifts; but instances of children acquir- 
 ing languages as readily, and by the same 
 natural method as he learned Greek and 
 
and University Curriculum 15 
 
 Latin, are matters of common observa- 
 tion. In the crowded foreign districts of 
 Chicago there are children five years of 
 age who have never been to school, and yet 
 they act as interpreters for their parents 
 in four or five languages. The only con- 
 dition a child needs in learning a language 
 is the opportunity to hear it spoken, and 
 to speak it. The ear, the tongue and the* 
 lips are the natural organs for learning 
 language. The eye has only a subordi- 
 nate function, and with children before 
 they can read it has no function of any 
 sort. 
 
 In our modern system of education, the 
 period in the life of a child when his ^ 
 instinct for language is so alert, his ear so f\ , ' 
 sensitive to sounds, and his memory of r K^ 
 words so retentive is allowed to run to 
 waste. The educators of the middle ages, 
 and even of two centuries ago in our own 
 country, did not make this mistake. Latin 
 then the language of scholars the 
 
1 6 The University Library 
 
 world over. Every educated man could 
 speak and write Latin. It was the lan- 
 guage in which great works of science, 
 philosophy and religion were written, and 
 all lectures in the universities of Europe 
 were delivered, a practice which is con- 
 tinued in some of the universities to this 
 day. Scholars taught their children the 
 classical languages as they did the mother 
 tongue, at the same time and in the same 
 way. Teachers drilled their pupils orally 
 in the use of the language. The modern 
 drudgery of grammar and dictionary work 
 was unknown. John Stuart Mill says that 
 in his day (early in this century) there 
 was no Greek and English dictionary, and 
 that when he met a new word he went to 
 his father for its meaning. Drill in " the 
 subjunctive of the essential part" was 
 deferred until the pupil had a full vocabu- 
 lary, was familiar with the inflections and 
 with the Roman plan of placing words in 
 constructing a sentence. Syntax was then 
 
and University Curriculum 17 
 
 evolved from the language itself, and not 
 taken from a grammar. The grammars 
 were very simple and wholly unlike the 
 ponderous and perplexing manuals now 
 put into the hands of modern students to 
 memorize. They had in them little more 
 than the inflections of nouns, pronouns, 
 adjectives and verbs. 
 
 The Latin grammar used almost uni- 
 versally for twelve centuries was called a 
 "Donatus", the name of its author, who 
 was born at Rome in the fourth century 
 and was the teacher of St. Jerome. It 
 was one of the early block-books, the pre- 
 cursors of the invention of printing made 
 in the early half of the fifteenth century; 
 and it was actually the first book which, 
 in 1450, came from the press of John 
 Gutenberg, the inventor of printing with 
 movable type. He then was at work on 
 his great folio Bible, finished in 1455, 
 which is generally regarded as the first- 
 printed book. The little grammar was 
 
 
 
1 8 The University Library 
 
 too small a matter to be called a book. 
 In the large type used on the Bible it 
 made thirty-four pages, and in type of 
 ordinary size only nine pages. From 1450 
 to 1500 more than fifty editions of this 
 grammar were printed in different coun- 
 tries of Europe. 
 
 The next popular Latin grammar was 
 "Corderius," named, like " Donatus," from 
 the Latin name of its author, who was 
 born in France in 1479, anc ^ was the 
 teacher of John Calvin. Like its prede- 
 cessor, it was a very simple manual, and 
 would not give any school boy the head- 
 ache. More than a thousand editions of 
 " Corderius " have been printed. The last 
 I have noticed was issued in England in 
 
 1854. 
 
 As the fashion of education in modern 
 times has drifted away from the natural 
 method of teaching the classical lan- 
 guages, grammars have been increasing in 
 size and in incomprehensibility to the 
 
and University Curriculum 19 
 
 youthful mind. The aim of instruction 
 also in preparatory schools and colleges 
 has wandered from the old purpose of 
 giving pupils a practical knowledge of the 
 languages and literatures of ancient Greece 
 and Rome, and has taken up the teaching 
 of grammatical metaphysics and philo- 
 logical subtilties as a substitute for Greek 
 and Latin. 
 
 Among the first settlers of New Eng- 
 land were many educated men. They 
 brought with them a classical culture then 
 common in England, but which now has 
 no counterpart there, nor in this country, 
 among men of their class. They were 
 the men who founded Harvard College 
 eight years after they landed, and laid the 
 foundation of the American Nation. The 
 freedom with which these men used the 
 learned languages, and made quotations 
 from classical authors, seems like pedant- 
 ry, unless we remember that they thought 
 in and spoke those languages, and that 
 
2O The University Library 
 
 classical writers were then as well under- 
 stood by them as any authors they had. 
 The manner in which they acquired such 
 a familiarity with the ancient tongues has 
 a bearing on the question now under con- 
 sideration. They wrote many books which 
 have come down to us, and their corre- 
 spondence has been sacredly preserved. 
 Hence we know much of their domestic 
 life and literary habits. Of none of them 
 do we know more than of the Mather 
 family, who, for four generations and for 
 a hundred years, had no rivals in New 
 England as men of influence and intel- 
 lectual power. From 1643 to 1723, eight 
 members of the family were graduates of 
 Harvard College, and the average age at 
 which they entered college was twelve 
 years and ten months. Richard, the senior 
 Mather, arrived in Boston in 1635, and 
 four of his sons were graduated at Har- 
 vard when one of the essential requisi- 
 tions for entrance was the speaking of 
 
and University Curriculum 21 
 
 Latin. He was an Oxford student and 
 was the principal of a public school in 
 England when he was fifteen years of age. 
 His two elder sons, Samuel and Nathaniel, 
 entered Harvard at thirteen, and gradu- 
 ating went to England, where they settled 
 and were eminent ministers. Eleazar, the 
 third son, entered Harvard at fifteen, and 
 Increase, the youngest, at thirteen. The 
 latter became the president of Harvard 
 College. We know the method by which 
 Increase taught his own children, and we 
 may presume it was the same by which 
 his father had taught him. He had three 
 sons graduate at Harvard : Cotton, Nath- 
 aniel and Samuel. Cotton Mather de- 
 scribes the method by which he and his 
 brothers and sisters learned Greek, Latin 
 and Hebrew. They heard these languages 
 spoken in the family from their earliest 
 childhood. In his book entitled " Manu- 
 ductio ad Ministerium; Directions for 
 a Candidate of the Ministry," 1726, he 
 
22 The University Library 
 
 says that Hebrew words were among the 
 first upon his lips, and that, as a spoken 
 language, Hebrew is " with very little dififi- 
 " culty attained unto. Even our little dam- 
 "sels make nothing of coming at this un- 
 " common ornament." His own daughter, 
 Katharine, spoke Hebrew at twelve years 
 of age. With regard to Latin, his advice 
 to the candidate for the ministry is, that 
 he^be " able not only to write, but to speak 
 it with fluency as well as purity." " In- 
 " deed," he says, " I cannot but wish that a 
 " knowledge of the Syriac may come in as 
 " an appendix to your knowledge of the 
 " Hebrew ; and having got the Hebrew 
 "you will find the Syriac easily come-at- 
 " able." He at that time wrote in seven 
 languages. 
 
 When Cotton Mather entered Harvard 
 College, at the age of eleven years and 
 six months, he spoke Hebrew, Greek and 
 Latin. He had composed many Latin 
 treatises, had read Cicero, Ovid, Virgil 
 
and University Curriculum 23 
 
 and Terence ; had finished the Greek New 
 Testament, and had read portions of Ho- 
 mer and Isocrates. His brother Nathan- 
 iel, who, when he entered college seven 
 months older than Cotton, was quite as 
 much of a scholar. Besides the usual 
 Greek and Latin classic authors, he had 
 read through the Old Testament in He- 
 brew and the New Testament in Greek, 
 and had developed a taste for mathemat- 
 ics and astronomy. When he graduated 
 at sixteen years of age, he delivered an ora- 
 tion in Hebrew, and about that time said 
 that he was so familiar with Hebrew as a 
 spoken language that he could use it for 
 any purpose required. At the age of fif- 
 teen he published the " Boston Ephem- 
 " eris," or Almanac, for 1685, having made 
 the mathematical calculations himself, 
 and the next year he published the " Eph- 
 " emeris for 1686." Another brother, Sam- 
 uel, entered Harvard before he was twelve 
 years old, and was a scholar of similar 
 attainments. 
 
24 The University Library 
 
 It may be said that such training of 
 children leaves them no time to do or 
 learn anything else. With the Mather 
 family, as with John Stuart Mill, the 
 reverse was true. It gave them time for 
 everything else. The learning of lan- 
 guages which, by the modern methods, 
 becomes such a labor and weariness later 
 in life, and is so imperfectly done, was 
 accomplished by them in childhood as a 
 play and recreation, and in a practical and 
 thorough manner. The amount of read- 
 ing and writing they did as boys, and the 
 study they gave to scholarly subjects, 
 were simply amazing. Samuel appeared 
 in print as an editor at fourteen years of 
 age ; Nathaniel was an author and mathe- 
 matician at fifteen, and Cotton began to 
 write books and to preach at sixteen, and 
 was ordained a settled minister at nine- 
 teen over the North Church in Boston, 
 where, as the leading preacher in New 
 England, he remained forty-six years and 
 
and University Curriculum 25 
 
 until his death. Nathaniel died at nineteen 
 years of age. His memoir was printed in 
 Boston and reprinted in London. On his 
 grave-stone, in the burying ground at Sa- 
 lem, is this inscription : "An aged person 
 "who had seen but nineteen winters in 
 " this world." His biographer, having 
 spoken of his learning and the enormous 
 work he had done, says : " Besides all 
 " this, in the vast field of theology, both 
 " didactic and polemic, it is hardly credible 
 " how little of it his travel had left un- 
 " known. Rabbinic literature he had like- 
 " wise no small measure of." 
 
 The mental activity of this family, so 
 far as I know, has no counterpart in our 
 day. More than six hundred of their 
 books were printed, and at a time when 
 there were no publishers, and all books 
 were issued by subscription. This fact 
 shows their immense contemporary popu- 
 larity. Their books are now eagerly sought 
 for by libraries and collectors, in Europe 
 
26 The University Library 
 
 as well as America, and, although they 
 are dead books, in the sense that Greek 
 and Latin are dead languages, their cost 
 in the markets of the world exceeds that 
 of the writings of any other five families 
 which have ever lived in America. 
 
 What is the explanation of this record ? 
 That they were men of unusual natural 
 abilities cannot be questioned ; but in 
 my judgment, the explanation, in a large 
 measure, is found in the fact that they 
 were educated by methods of teaching 
 now lost sight of, and in the early years 
 of childhood which are now allowed to 
 run to waste. If our boys were prepared 
 for college by the old and natural method, 
 there would be ample time and room for 
 making bibliography a feature in the uni- 
 versity curriculum. 
 
 The second name which appears on the 
 Harvard Triennial is that of George Down- 
 ing. He was a Salem boy, and was grad- 
 uated in the first class of 1642, at the age 
 
and University Curriculum 27 
 
 of seventeen. The next year he was a 
 tutor in the College, and at the age of 
 twenty went over to England to enlist in 
 the parliamentary army. He rose rapidly, 
 and at the age of twenty-five he was a 
 confidential member of Oliver Cromwell's 
 staff. He was transferred to the State 
 department, and was employed in secret 
 negotiations with foreign governments. 
 On one of these missions he had a two 
 hours' conference with Cardinal Mazarin, 
 the prime minister of Louis XIV., con- 
 cerning the persecution of the Waldenses. 
 He was successful in his mission and had 
 the promise that the persecutions should 
 cease. The conference was conducted in 
 Latin, and with one of the most brilliant 
 and scholarly men of that period. Where 
 and how did George Downing, later Sir 
 George, learn his Latin ? It was certainly 
 not picked up in the army, and was doubt- 
 less the same that he brought away from 
 Harvard College. The qualifications then 
 
28 The University Library 
 
 required for admission to the College, and 
 for taking the first degree, will show what 
 that training was. The curriculum of the 
 College in 1642 has been preserved. No 
 one was admitted who was not " able to 
 " understand Cicero, or such like Latin 
 "author, extempore, and to make and 
 " speak true Latin, in verse and prose, suo 
 " ut ainnt Marte" The candidate for the 
 first, or bachelor's degree, was required to 
 " render at sight the Hebrew Old Testa- 
 " merit and Greek New Testament into the 
 " Latin tongue, . . . and to resolve them 
 " logically." He was required, also, to write 
 a thesis in one of the ancient languages on 
 some scholarly subject, and to deliver and 
 defend it successfully at a public exercise 
 attended by the governor, magistrates, 
 ministers, and all persons of quality in the 
 Colony, at which no word of English was 
 spoken. A great variety of subjects, 
 other than those pertaining to the classical 
 languages were studied in the College and 
 
and University Curriculum 29 
 
 treated in theses. The small amount of 
 Latin instruction which appears in the 
 curriculum is noticeable ; and is explained 
 by the fact that Latin had been thoroughly 
 learned as a written and spoken language 
 before the students entered College. They 
 were also required to speak Latin in the 
 class room, at commons, and on the Col- 
 lege grounds. Hebrew, Chaldee and 
 Syriac were taught on Thursdays; and 
 Fridays were, by all the classes, given up 
 to rhetoric and English composition. The 
 significance of the work on Fridays will 
 later appear. 
 
 There are two classes of persons who 
 will naturally oppose a return to the 
 natural methods of learning the classical 
 languages ; (i), the teachers in preparatory 
 schools who cannot speak the languages 
 they teach, and who say these languages 
 are not to be spoken because they are 
 dead languages. The purpose of teach- 
 ing them, they further say, is to discipline 
 
3O The University Library 
 
 the minds of the pupils, to strenghten 
 their memories, to cultivate their discrim- 
 ination and critical faculties, and to train 
 them in grammar and general philology, 
 in order that they may the better under- 
 stand English and acquire facility in its 
 use. They have not time, they assert, to 
 give their pupils a familiarity with Greek 
 and Roman literature. The second class 
 of opponents, usually belated college 
 graduates, would banish Greek and Latin, 
 as well as the higher mathematics, from 
 the College curriculum, and supply their 
 places with modern languages and more 
 of the natural sciences. Mr. Charles 
 Francis Adams, ten years ago, expressed 
 this popular hostility to classical studies 
 in his Phi Beta Kappa address at Cam- 
 bridge, which he entitled "A College 
 Fetich. " It was a special attack on 
 Greek; but was equally applicable to 
 Latin. "How," he said, " did Harvard 
 " College prepare me and my ninety-two 
 
and University Curriculum 31 
 
 "classmates for our work in life ? The poor 
 " old College prepared us to play our parts 
 " in the world by compelling us to acquire 
 "a superficial knowledge of two dead 
 " languages." He confessed that, having 
 devoted five years to the study of Greek, 
 he, twenty-seven years after graduation, 
 when he opened his Homer, could not 
 read the Greek characters. The address 
 was received with much popular favor; 
 for it appealed to the experience of a 
 multitude of graduates who, like himself, 
 had forgotten Greek and Latin and who 
 hoped and expected that they would soon 
 disappear from the College curriculum. 
 The result, however, of the lively discus- 
 sion which the address brought on, has 
 pointed in the opposite direction. A 
 reaction soon took place, and the classics 
 are now more appreciated and firmly 
 established at Harvard than at any other 
 period in modern times. The singular 
 feature in this reactionary movement 
 
32 The University Library 
 
 was, that the conservative element was 
 not the faculty nor corporation, but was 
 the students themselves who seemed to 
 have an instinctive impression that the 
 knowledge of the ancient classics lies at 
 the basis of a liberal education. 
 
 This unrest at Cambridge concerning 
 the classics and higher mathematics, of 
 which Mr. Adams's address was the latest 
 outcropping, has existed for more than 
 seventy years. In 1825 the Corporation 
 yielded to it and made a rule that stu- 
 dents could pursue any study as much 
 or little of it as they chose but could 
 take no degree without completing the 
 full curriculum. Students declined to 
 take that sort of an education, and the 
 scheme was a failure. 
 
 In 1838 the discussion revived against 
 the mathematics; and it was provided that 
 they should be made an optional at the 
 end of freshman year. The professor of 
 mathematics regretted the change, for he 
 
and University Curriculum 33 
 
 could think of only one student who was 
 likely to continue the study through the 
 course. When the change was made, 
 only seven, out of a class of fifty-four, 
 dropped mathematics at the end of fresh- 
 man year; and eleven took the higher 
 four-years' course, which left the study in 
 a higher position than before the change 
 was made. 
 
 In 1841, the " modernists" as Mr. 
 Adams termed himself and his alleged 
 reformers renewed their attack on the 
 study of the classical languages, and the 
 corporation again yielded, by making 
 them optional at the end of freshman 
 year. President Quincy in his report on 
 the subject, said: "A desire to open the 
 " University to a larger class of persons 
 " has long been the wish of the friends of 
 " the institution. The amount of Greek 
 " and Latin exacted as a condition for a 
 " degree prevents many parents from send- 
 " ing their sons to the College, because 
 
 
 
34 The University Library 
 
 " they regard such studies a waste of time 
 " and labor." The result of the experiment 
 was the same as the preceding one. The 
 real scholars pursued their classical stu- 
 dies as optionals; and the stupid and lazy 
 students took something which was easier. 
 The old idea, therefore, of what a liberal 
 education means, has for the last half cen- 
 tury, and has to-day notwithstanding the 
 poor methods of instruction a stronger 
 hold upon the students than it has upon 
 the faculties and corporations of our col- 
 leges. 
 
 Although the modern method of teach- 
 ing Greek and Latin fails in its most im- 
 portant feature of giving the pupil a prac- 
 tical familiarity with these languages and 
 knowledge of their literatures, the drill in 
 philological gymnastics and grammatical 
 pyrotechnics is an intellectual exercise 
 in some respects beneficial to students. 
 It does not, however, inspire in them the 
 love of the classic languages and litera- 
 
and University Curriculum 35 
 
 tures which they may carry into active 
 life and be to them a perpetual diversion 
 and recreation. Any system of instruc- 
 tion is faulty which leaves out of view the 
 making of enthusiastic, genuine scholars 
 who will educate themselves after they 
 leave college ; and, while they live, will 
 never cease to be students. It may be 
 said that very few of the whole number 
 of college graduates, ever become, or ex- 
 pect to become, scholars. So much the 
 worse for their instructors. If the pupils 
 were properly taught and inspired, they 
 would become scholars. 
 
 " Formerly/' said Prof. Bowen of Cam- 
 bridge, " we studied grammar in order to 
 " read the classics ; now-a-days the classics 
 "are studied as a means of learning gram- 
 " mar. Surely, a more effective means 
 " could not have been invented of render- 
 " ing the pupil insensible to the beauties of 
 " the ancient poets, orators, and historians, 
 " of inspiring disgust alike with Homer 
 
36 The University Library 
 
 " and Virgil, Xenophon and Tacitus, by 
 " making their words mere pegs on which 
 "to hang long disquisitions on the latest 
 "refinements of philology." 
 
 President Porter, of Yale, wrote fifteen 
 years ago as follows : " It must not be 
 " denied that the confidence of many of 
 " our best students in the value of classical 
 " studies, as pursued in our colleges, 
 " has of late, been seriously impaired. The 
 " protraction of the school method, the 
 " imposition of difficult authors, the con- 
 " finement of the attention for many 
 " years to refined grammatical subtleties, 
 " and the failure to encourage the reading 
 " of easy authors in large quantities, are in 
 " part the explanation^ of this decay of 
 " enthusiasm for classical study as a liter- 
 "ary discipline. We desire to see the 
 " literary advantages of a classical course 
 " reinforced by an inspiring love of the 
 " best classical authors, and an enthu- 
 " siastic desire to read them fluently. Let 
 
and University Curriculum 37 
 
 " the classics be so studied that they shall 
 " be loved and admired as literature, and 
 "they will need no argument for their 
 "vindication/' 
 
 Prof. Gildersleeve, of Johns Hopkins 
 University, regarded as one of the best 
 classical scholars in the country, says : 
 " Latin and Greek are to be studied pri- 
 " marily for the knowledge of the life of 
 " the Roman and Greek people as mani- 
 " fested in language and literature; and 
 " not because Latin and Greek are con- 
 " venient vehicles for the communication 
 " of a certain amount of linguistic phi- 
 " losophy or comparative grammar. Such 
 " matters are entirely out of place in the 
 " early stages of study. The beginner 
 " has to do with results, not processes. . . . 
 " It is a capital mistake to introduce a 
 " student into the maze of hypotheses in 
 "which the formation of a language is 
 " involved, before he has any practical 
 "acquaintance with the language itself, 
 
38 The University Library 
 
 " before he has any insight into the liter- 
 ature for the sake of which chiefly the 
 " language is to be learned. . . . The 
 " less the mastery of the subject on the 
 " part of the teacher, the greater seems to 
 " be the desire to make the treatment 
 " 'scientific', and so, in the plastic age of 
 " study, the golden opportunity of appro- 
 " priating the peculiar value of the classic 
 " languages, is thrown away." 
 
 It is apparent that the cause of the 
 whole deficiency in modern classical 
 education arises from the fact that the 
 teachers in preparatory schools and col- 
 leges have so little practical knowledge of 
 Greek and Latin as languages. Language 
 is " human speech, the expression of 
 " ideas by the voice." It is not grammar, 
 rules of syntax, nor philology it is some- 
 thing spoken. The teachers who fit our 
 boys for the Universities are unable to 
 speak these languages, or, with any facil- 
 ity or accuracy, give expression to their 
 
and University Curricuhim 39 
 
 thoughts in writing ; and hence they are 
 incompetent to teach Greek and Latin. 
 The remedy is to find teachers who know 
 the ancient languages as modern teachers 
 know French and German. If they are 
 not to be found, they must be educated 
 as Melanchthon and Mill were educated. 
 What would be thought of a German 
 teacher who should have pupils under his 
 care for several years, and then they 
 could not speak or write German, nor 
 understand it when spoken ? It would be 
 a poor compliment to him to say that his 
 pupils were grounded in German gram- 
 mar and well up in general philology. 
 
 While it is now generally admitted that 
 the modern and protracted method of 
 teaching in academies and preparatory 
 schools is practically a failure, so far as 
 giving the pupils a knowledge of Latin 
 and Greek literatures is concerned, it is 
 claimed that the grammatical drill is useful 
 in training pupils to understand the struct- 
 
40 The University Library 
 
 ure and use of the English language, or, 
 in other words, to make them good writ- 
 ers. On the other hand, do the facts 
 show that this has been the result ? An 
 interesting expose of the fallacy of the 
 theory recently appeared in a " Report to 
 "the Board of Overseers of Harvard Col- 
 " lege by a Committee on English Com- 
 " position and Rhetoric;" and also in ar- 
 ticles on the same subject in the Harvard 
 Graduates Magazine. An article in the Jan- 
 uary (1893) issue of the latter, is entitled 
 " Education in the Preparatory Schools." 
 The writers were Mr. Charles Francis 
 Adams, the chairman of the Committee 
 which reported to the Overseers, and Wil- 
 liam W. Goodwin, the senior professor of 
 Greek. The investigation of the ques- 
 tion : " How much do college freshmen 
 " know of the English language ? " was be- 
 gun by the Boston Herald in 1890, by 
 offering college scholarships for the best 
 two compositions written under condi- 
 
and University Citrriculum 41 
 
 tions similar to those of the Harvard 
 entrance examinations. There were two 
 hundred and twenty competitors, all of 
 whom held certificates that they were to 
 take examinations that summer for en- 
 trance to the College. No one could com- 
 pete who was not a resident of Massa- 
 chusetts, or of two other New England 
 States. The contest showed that the 
 young men, whose average age was more 
 than nineteeen, had a colossal incapacity 
 for writing English. Only twenty-three 
 of the papers were found worth sending 
 to the Committee which was to make the 
 award ; and they were sternly condemned 
 by the judges. These startling facts 
 waked up the Overseers, and hence their 
 examination and report which was based 
 on about five hundred compositions 
 written by students in the freshman 
 class, and on the examination papers con- 
 taining translations into English from 
 advanced Latin and Greek, made by can- 
 
42 The University Library 
 
 didates who offered themselves for admis- 
 sion to the College in June 1892. The 
 Committee print selections from these 
 papers and facsimiles of the handwriting, 
 with the blots, bad spelling, erasures, 
 and interlineations. They make a droll 
 exhibit. The assistance of an educated 
 lady was called in to aid the Committee 
 in the dreary examination, who later com- 
 plained that she had suffered lasting intel- 
 lectual deterioration in consequence of 
 her well-meant efforts. In the case of 
 one school, represented by an unusual 
 number of candidates, she had, in conse- 
 quence of mental stupefaction, been un- 
 able to distinguish one paper from an- 
 other, except as her attention was drawn 
 to the original orthography of these 
 papers, and especially to that of one 
 young man who spelt Jupiter with two 
 ps. Only one paper she found which 
 seemed in every respect penmanship, 
 expression, and correctness of rendering 
 
and University Curriculum 43 
 
 up to the level which might well have 
 been insisted upon for all. 
 
 Prof. Goodwin comments on the report 
 as follows: " The report of the Over- 
 " seers' Committee on English contains 
 " nothing that is new to those who have 
 " long known the low standard in English 
 Composition which the College feels com- 
 " pelled to accept for admission. Indeed, 
 " to many of those best acquainted with 
 " this standard, the papers now published 
 " by the Committeee seem unexpectedly 
 "good. . . . The present evidence, how- 
 " ever, establishes one important point be- 
 " yond question : there is no conceivable 
 "justification for using the revenues of 
 " Harvard College, or the time and 
 " strength of her instructors, in the vain 
 "attempt to enlighten the Egyptian 
 " darkness in which no small portion of 
 " our undergraduates are sitting. The 
 " college must do something to redeem 
 " herself from disgrace, and to put the 
 
 
 UHIVE 
 
44 The University Library 
 
 " disgrace where it belongs; but she must 
 "no longer spend time, strength, and 
 " money on the hopeless task which she 
 " has recently undertaken. Many good 
 " people who read the Committee's report 
 " will believe that our mother tongue is 
 " singled out for neglect and contempt by 
 "the preparatory schools. The low stand- 
 "ard in English is only one of the many 
 " results of the deplorable condition of 
 "our lower education. . . . It is now a 
 " familiar truth to most of us that stud- 
 " ents come to Harvard College at nine- 
 " teen, in most cases badly prepared to 
 "pass an examination which boys of six- 
 " teen and seventeen would find easy work 
 " in England, Germany, France and 
 "Switzerland. Most of these young men 
 "have spent the preceding three, four or 
 " five years in doing boy's work which 
 " they should have finished before they 
 "were sixteen." 
 
 Professor Goodwin further says : 
 
and University Curriculum 45 
 
 " Though these extracts are given to 
 " show the bad English, they are equally 
 " astounding for the ignorance of Latin 
 " and Greek which they disclose. - It will 
 " hardly be believed that Nos. 6 and 8 
 " [which he prints in parallel columns] 
 " profess to be translations of the same 
 " passage in the Iliad. . . . Although 
 " no thorough reform can be expected 
 " until more time is gained for all the pre- 
 " paratory studies, . . . the college still 
 " has a plain duty to perform without 
 " delay." 
 
 Erasmus, Luther, Melanchthon, Mon- 
 taigne, the Mathers, and Mill, gained the 
 time for all the preparatory studies by 
 learning the classical languages in early 
 childhood. 
 
 The boys, whose accomplishments in 
 English composition have here been so 
 sternly criticised, did not represent the 
 preparatory schools of the country at 
 large ; but only twelve of the most popu- 
 
46 The University Library 
 
 lar schools and academies in Boston and 
 the vicinity. They were the Public Latin 
 Schools of Boston, Cambridge, and Wor- 
 cester, Andover Phillips Academy, Exeter 
 Phillips Academy, Adams Academy of 
 Quincy, and six well-known private pre- 
 paratory schools. The western boys were 
 not given a chance to appear in this roll 
 of honor. 
 
 The headmasters of seven of these pre- 
 paratory schools print replies to the Com- 
 mittee's report in the April issue of the 
 Harvard Graduates Magazine, and the 
 papers make interesting reading. The 
 main facts alleged by the Committee on 
 English they do not deny, nor seek to 
 justify ; but, on the other hand, deplore 
 them, and undertake to lay a portion of 
 the responsibility on the College itself 
 whose instructions and customs they have 
 sought to follow. The first reply begins 
 thus : " The unsatisfactory results of the 
 "training in preparatory schools is too 
 
and University Curriculum 47 
 
 " well known to admit contradiction. To 
 " make an accurate diagnosis of the 
 " trouble, to locate it, and then to treat 
 " it, is our first duty/* 
 
 There is time to indicate only a few 
 points made by the headmasters. They 
 say the quality of training in the common 
 schools has deteriorated ; and " the in- 
 " creasing immaturity of boys of ten years 
 "of age an increase very perceptible 
 "during the last twenty years is one of 
 "the chief obstacles with which teachers 
 " of preparatory schools have to contend. 
 " Pupils come to the preparatory schools 
 " unwisely and unequally trained, and at 
 " such an age that only by unremitting 
 " pressure, with an eye ever on the College 
 " examination, at eighteen or nineteen 
 " years of age, they drop over the College 
 "threshold, exhausted, without reserve 
 " power, not trained to think or to work, 
 " crammed, and having missed the great 
 " end of school life." One of the princi- 
 
48 The University Library 
 
 pals says that " the fault does not lie in 
 "the preparatory schools, but in the Col- 
 "lege itself; for the schools are doing 
 " what the College itself was doing in the 
 " Freshman and Sophomore years fifty 
 "years ago, and the College has not 
 "changed its requisitions for admission." 
 Entrance examinations as now con- 
 ducted, some of them say, are a menace 
 to the thorough preparatory training a 
 boy should receive. Education for its 
 own sake is lost sight of in order to attain 
 another end, that of passing the College 
 examination, which one master character- 
 izes as abounding in puzzles and conun- 
 drums that may test what the Creator has 
 done for the boy, but not what the boy 
 himself and his teachers have done for 
 him. Who has a better knowledge of a 
 boy's fitness for college than his instruc- 
 tors? They recommend that the conven- 
 tional entrance examination be abolished, 
 and that students be admitted on proba- 
 
and University Curriculum 49 
 
 tion by certificate from the headmaster. 
 Candidates are frequently admitted by 
 examination who could not have had a 
 certificate from the principal. The master 
 of the Cambridge Latin School said that 
 recently Harvard College would have lost 
 several excellent foot-ball players if can- 
 didates from his school were admitted by 
 his certificate alone. 
 
 It will be seen from this rapid survey 
 
 t ~ 
 
 that there is a confessed and radical de- 
 fect running through the entire system of 
 modern education the public schools. 
 the private schools, the preparatory 
 schools, the colleges and universities. 
 Each grade, while admitting the fact, has 
 a disposition to assign the responsibility 
 
 for the defect to those, pf a higher nr 
 
 lower rank than its own, when probably 
 all are equally responsible. 
 
 I am happy, in concluding this address, 
 to return to the more cheerful strain with 
 which I set out. 
 
50 The University Library 
 
 To those of us who graduated thirty, 
 forty, or more years ago, books, outside 
 of the text-books used, had no part in our 
 education. They were never quoted, 
 recommended, nor mentioned by the in- 
 structors in the class-room. As I remem- 
 ber it, Yale College Library might as well 
 have been in Weathersfield or Bridgeport 
 as in New Haven, so far as the students 
 in those days were concerned. The col- 
 lege societies, however, supported and 
 managed wholly by the undergraduates, 
 had good libraries, and here was where 
 the students, and the professors besides, 
 found their general reading. I was fortu- 
 nate in being connected with one of those 
 libraries, and there I began the study of 
 bibliography ; but never had the slightest 
 assistance from any member of the 
 faculty. There were then no elementary 
 books on the subject, and hence by grop- 
 ing alone through the book shelves, I 
 picked up some knowledge of books and 
 
and University Curriculum 51 
 
 acquired a taste which I have not 4 been 
 able to throw off to this day. How much 
 easier could I have made the journey, if 
 I had found blazed trees along the way, 
 and a guide who had traveled the path 
 before me. 
 
 During the past twenty years there has 
 been a great advance in the study of 
 bibliography in the leading universities. 
 Among these may be especially mentioned 
 Johns Hopkins, Yale, Harvard, Cornell, 
 and Michigan. Good work is also being 
 done in other institutions. None of the 
 universities named have as yet quite 
 come up to the high standard of having 
 a professor of bibliography ; but they are 
 moving in that direction. In several uni- 
 versities the librarians give lectures on 
 bibliography, and instruction to classes in 
 the use of books. The development al- 
 ready reached is seen in the rapid increase 
 of these libraries in the accession of the 
 latest and best works on all the subjects 
 
52 The University Library 
 
 taught in the university ; by the profes- 
 sors citing these books, calling attention 
 to them, taking them into the class-rooms, 
 and by this method encouraging the stu- 
 dents to make for themselves an indepen- 
 dent and original investigation of any 
 subject. As the work has been going on, 
 money has been liberally contributed by 
 the friends of the institutions for erecting 
 suitable library buildings, procuring the 
 necessary books, and conducting Univer- 
 sity Extension lectures. 
 
 Nothing more readily appeals to the 
 popular sympathy than work of this kind, 
 or forms a firmer bond of fraternity be- 
 tween the university and the community 
 at large. The great universities which 
 keep their hands on the popular pulse, 
 are those which receive the great endow- 
 ments from private munificence. On 
 some special subjects of universal interest 
 no libraries in the land have such com- 
 plete collections of recent books as some 
 
and University Curriculum 53 
 
 of the university libraries. Writers, who 
 would have access to the most abundant 
 materials, must visit these libraries. By 
 what other means can a great university 
 exert a more beneficent influence and re- 
 tain the affection and sympathy of the 
 public and of its own graduates ? 
 
 The popularity of a university once de- 
 pended wholly upon the professional repu- 
 tation of its instructors. Now the leading 
 questions relate to the size, character and 
 value of its library. The presence of a 
 large body of post-graduate students is an 
 inspiring feature of university life, and to 
 the public a guaranty of the high scholar- 
 ship and superior educational advantages 
 of the institution. These students cannot 
 be secured and retained unless they have 
 access to a large and well-furnished library. 
 
 One of the most interesting features of 
 modern beneficence is, that so much of it 
 has been devoted to the endowment and 
 support of libraries ; and yet the univer- 
 
54 The University Library 
 
 sity libraries of the West have not as yet 
 had their due share. The Northwestern 
 University Library, through the generos- 
 ity of the venerable Vice-President of the 
 Board of Overseers, has received a library 
 fund which in the near future, it is 
 hoped, will yield considerable income ; and 
 he has also given $50,000 towards the con- 
 struction of the Orrington Lunt Library 
 Building to cost double that sum ; but still 
 the library wants are not supplied. There 
 should be a further and large endowment 
 for the purchase of books of history, liter- 
 ature, natural science, political and social 
 science, the arts, and of other departments, 
 which will enable the professors and stu- 
 dents of the University to keep abreast of 
 the latest development of literary and 
 scientific progress, and will attract schol- 
 ars and literary men to visit, and many 
 to reside near, the University. The larger 
 the endowment the better. If I should 
 name the sum I thought was necessary, it 
 
and University Curriculum 55 
 
 would probably be thought extravagant; 
 but it would not be larger than the friends 
 of the University can easily bestow. Let 
 us hope that the completion of the new 
 library building will be the beginning of a 
 larger development of the resources and 
 usefulness of the Northwestern University 
 Library. 
 
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