College

( French collège , Italian collegio , Spanish colegio )

The word college , from the Latin collegium , originally signified a community, a corporation, an organized society, a body of colleagues, or a society of persons engaged in some common pursuit. From ancient times there existed in Rome corporations called collegia , with various ends and objects. Thus the guilds of the artisans were known as collegia or sodalica; in other collegia persons associated together for some special religious worship, or for the purpose of mutual assistance. This original meaning of the word college is preserved in some modern corporations, as the College of Physicians, or the College of Surgeons (London, Edinburgh ). There were in Rome other, more official bodies which bore the title collegium , as the Collegium tribunorum , Collegium augurum , Collegium pontificum , etc. In a similar sense the word is now used in such terms as the College of Cardinals (or the Sacred College ), the College of Electors, the College of Justice (in Scotland ), the College of Heralds (in England ).

From the fourteenth century on the word college meant in particular "a community or corporation of secular clergy living together on a foundation for religious service". The church supported on this endowment was called a collegiate church, because the ecclesiastical services and solemnities were performed by a college, i.e. a body or staff of clergymen, consisting of a provost, or dean, canons, etc.; later, the term "collegiate" or "college church" was usually restricted to a church connected with a large educational institution . Some of these institutions, besides carrying out the Divine service in their church, were required to take charge of an almshouse, or a hospital, or some educational establishment. It is here that we find the word college introduced in connexion with education, a meaning which was to become the most prominent during succeeding centuries. It seems that in the English universities the term was first applied to the foundations of the so-called second period, typified by New College, Oxford, 1379; from these the name gradually spread to the earlier foundations (Merton, Balliol) which originally were designated by the term aula or domus; then it was taken by the foundations of the third period, the colleges of the Renaissance. As used in educational history, college may be defined, in general, as "a society of scholars formed for the purposes of study or instruction"; and in particular as "a self-governing corporation, either independent of a university, or in connexion with a university, as the College of the Sorbonne in the ancient University of Paris , and the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge". In some instances, where in a university only a single college was founded or survived, the terms "college" and "university" are co-extensive and interchangeable. This is the case in Scotland and, to a great extent, in the United States. Although in the United States many small institutions claim the ambitious title of university, it is more appropriate to apply this term to those institutions which have several distinct faculties for professional study and thus resemble the universities of Europe. They differ, however, from the continental universities in one important point, namely, in the undergraduate department which is connected with the university proper. In some places, as in Harvard, the term "college" is now in a special sense applied to the undergraduate school. This is the most common and most proper acceptation of the term: an institution of higher learning of a general, not professional, character, where after a regular course of study the degree of Bachelor of Arts, or, in recent years, some equivalent degree, e.g. Bachelor of Philosophy, or Bachelor of Science, is given. (See ARTS, BACHELOR OF, and DEGREES, ACADEMIC.) It is this meaning of college which will be treated in this article; all professional schools called colleges are excluded, such as teachers' colleges (training schools for teachers), law and medical colleges, colleges of dentistry, pharmacy, mechanical engineering, agriculture, business, mines, etc. Nor will colleges be included which are divinity schools or theological seminaries, as the numerous colleges in Rome, e.g. the Collegium Germanicum, Collegium Latino-Americanum, Collegium Græcum, or the English, Irish, Scotch, North-American Colleges, and many other similar institutions.

As the origin and evolution of the college, or of its equivalent, have not been the same in different countries, it will be necessary, in order to avoid confusion, to treat separately of the colleges peculiar to England. These deserve special attention for the further reason that the American college is an outgrowth of the English college. Even at the present day the distinguishing characteristic of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge is the existence of the colleges. Nothing like it is to be found in any other country, and the relation between these colleges and the university is very puzzling to foreigners. The colleges are distinct corporations, which manage their own property and elect their own officers; the university has no legal power over the colleges, although it has jurisdiction over the individual members of the colleges, because they are members also of the university. Mr. Bryce has used the relation between the university and the colleges as an illustration of the relations between the Federal Government and the separate States of the American Union. But one great difference has been pointed out by Mr. Rashdall: "in place of the strict limitation of spheres established by the American Constitution, the jurisdiction of both University and College, if either chose to exercise them, is legally unlimited. Expulsion from a College would not involve expulsion from the University, unless the University chose so to enact; nor could expulsion from the University prevent a man from continuing to be a member or even a Fellow of a College. The University's monopoly of the power of granting degrees is the only connecting link which ensures their harmonious co-operation" (Universities of Europe, II, 793). The professors at Oxford are university officials; tutors and lecturers are college officials; these two bodies form two different systems. The majority of students receive the greater part of their education from the tutors and lecturers. (For further details see "The University of Oxford " in "Ir. Eccl. Rec.", Jan., 1907.)

Although at the present day the collegiate system is peculiar to the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, it was not so formerly, nor can England claim the honour of having had the first colleges. This distinction belongs to the University of Paris, the greatest school of medieval Europe. To understand the origin of the colleges and their character, it is necessary to know the social conditions in which the medieval students lived. Large numbers of youths flocked to the famous university towns; there may have been 6000 or 7000 students at Paris, 5000 at Bologna, 2000 at Toulouse, 3000 at Prague, and between 2000 and 3000 at Oxford. Writers of the latter part of the Middle Ages have, it is true, asserted that in preceding centuries Paris had over 30,000, and Oxford from 20,000 to 30,000 students; some popular writers of our days have repeated these statements, but the foremost historians who have dealt with this subject, as Rashdall, Brodrick, Paulsen, Thorold Rogers, and many others, have proved that these fabulous numbers are gross exaggerations (Rashdall, op. cit., II, 581 sqq.). Still the numbers were large, many students very young, some not more than fourteen or fifteen years old; many lived in private houses, others in halls or hostels; the discipline was lax, and excesses and riots were frequent; above all, the poorer students were badly lodged and badly fed, and were at the mercy of unscrupulous and designing men and women. Generous persons, inspired by the spirit of active charity, which was very pronounced during these centuries, sought to alleviate the lot of the poor students. The result was the foundation of the "houses of scholars", later called colleges. Originally they were nothing but endowed hospicia , or lodging and boarding-houses for poor students; the idea of domestic instruction was absent in the early foundations. The first Parisian colleges were homes for ecclesiastical students, "academical cloisters specially planned for the education of secular clergy ". About 1180 the College of the Eighteen was founded (so called from the number of students); then Saint-Thomas de Louvre (1186), and several others in the first half of the thirteenth century. The most famous of the colleges in Paris was the Sorbonne (see SORBONNE, COLLEGE OF THE) founded about 1257, and intended for sixteen, later for thirty-six, students of theology. In succeeding centuries the Sorbonne came to stand for the whole theological faculty of the University of Paris. In the course of time the university set aside the original autonomy of the colleges and gained complete control over them; in this the colleges of Paris differed widely from the English colleges. Another difference lay in the fact that most English colleges admitted students for faculties other than the theological. The first English college, Balliol, founded about 1261, at Oxford, was largely an imitation of the earlier foundations of Paris, and differed from the general type of English colleges. The real beginning of the English college system was the foundation of Walter de Merton, who afterwards became Bishop of Rochester. Merton College, established 1263 or 1264, became the archetype of the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge. The scholars were to begin the study of the arts, and then to proceed to theology, a few to the study of canon and civil law. Besides the thirteen full members of the society (the socii , or Fellows), a number of young boys were to be admitted (twelve at first), as "secondary scholars", who were to be instructed in "grammar" until they were enabled to begin the study of arts.

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The foundation of the secular colleges was greatly stimulated by the presence of the regular colleges, i.e. the establishments of the religious orders in connexion with the universities. The religious orders early profited by the advantages offered in these educational centres, and in their turn had a considerable share in the further development of the universities, particularly the Dominicans and Franciscans. (See UNIVERSITY.) The Dominicans established a house of study in the University of Paris in 1218, the Franciscans 1219, the Benedictines 1229, the Augustinians in 1259. At Oxford the Dominicans opened a house 1220, the Franciscans 1224. Their example was followed by the Benedictines, who founded Gloucester Hall and Durham College. These religious houses formed each a miniature Studium in the midst of a great university. The young members of the orders lived in well-organized communities which gave freedom from cares and favoured quiet study, whereas other students were left to contend with the many hardships and temptations which surrounded them on all sides. It was natural that men who realized the advantages of such a well-regulated life should endeavour to adapt this system to the needs of students who had no intention of entering religious communities. "The secular college would never perhaps have developed into the important institution which it actually became but for the example set by the colleges of the mendicants " (Rashdall, op. cit., I, 478). An erroneous view has been expressed by some writers, viz., that the foundation of the colleges was a symptom of the growing opposition to ecclesiastical control of education, and especially a sign of hostility to the religious orders. The majority of secular colleges were founded by zealous ecclesiastics, in England especially by bishops, most of whom were very friendly to the religious orders. Mr. Bass Mullinger admits that Trinity Hall, Cambridge, seems to have been founded with the intention of furthering "Ultramontane interests" (Hist. of Un. of Cambridge, 41). Hugh de Balsham, a Benedictine, was the founder of Peterhouse, the first college at Cambridge (1284); the third Cambridge college, Pembroke Hall, was founded in 1347 by Marie de Valence, a friend of the Franciscans ; one of two rectors was to be a Friar Minor, and the foundress adjured the fellows to be kind, devoted, and grateful to all religious, "especially the Friars Minor ". Gonville hall, Cambridge, was founded in 1350 by Edmund Gonville, an equally warm friend of the Dominicans, for whom he made a foundation at Thetford. The same can be shown with regard to Oxford. To give an instance, according to the statutes of Balliol, one of the outside "procurators" was to be a Franciscan. The indirect influence of religious institutions is discernible also in the semi-monastic features of colleges, some of which have survived to our own times, as the common life and obligatory attendance at chapel. With regard to the latter point it is surprising to learn that the earlier colleges enjoined attendance at Mass only on Sundays, Holy Days, and vigils. At Oxford, the statutes of New College are, as far as is known, the first which require daily attendance at Mass; towards the end of the fifteenth century this daily attendance was enforced also on the students living in the Halls (Rashdall, op. cit., II, 506, 651).

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The members of a college were one another's socii or "Fellows". In the beginning the terms "Scholars" and "Fellows" were interchangeable, but gradually the term "Fellows" was restricted to the senior or governing members, the term "Scholars" to the junior members. The Senior Scholars or Fellows were largely employed in looking after college business, in later times particularly in teaching the Junior Scholars. In the early foundations it was understood that the inmates should receive most of their instruction outside the walls of the college; but where younger members were admitted, it was necessary to exercise supervision over their studies, and give some instruction supplementing the public lectures. This supplementary teaching gradually became more prominent; although it is not known exactly when this important educational revolution took place, it seems to belong chiefly to the fifteenth century; finally the colleges practically monopolized instruction. The number of students living in the colleges was small at first; most statutes provided only for between twelve and thirty or forty, a few for seventy or more. Most of the students continued to live outside the colleges in licensed halls or private lodgings. The lodging-house system was checked in the fifteenth century, and later the colleges absorbed most of the student population. But from the first the colleges reacted favourably on the whole student body and exercised a most salutary influence on the manners and morals of the university towns. As Cardinal Newman has said: "Colleges tended to break the anarchical spirit, gave the example of laws and trained up a set of students who, as being morally and intellectually superior to other members of the academical body became the depositaries of academical power and influence" (Hist. Sketches, III, 221). Thus the university itself was largely benefited by the colleges; it derived from them order, strength, and stability. It is true, at a much later date, the university was sacrificed to the colleges, and the colleges themselves became inactive; contrary to the intention of the founders, who had established them for the maintenance of the poor, they were occupied by the wealthy, especially after the paying boarders, "commoners", or "pensioners", became numerous. They were at times sinecures and clubs rather than places of serious study.

William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, founded the first college outside a university, namely Winchester College, in 1379, for seventy boys who were to be educated in "grammar", i.e. literature. Grammar colleges had indeed existed before, in connexion with universities and cathedrals ; but Winchester was the first elaborate foundation for grammatical education, independent of either a cathedral or a university. From Winchester College the students were to enter New College, Oxford founded by the same patron of education. The example of Winchester was imitated in the foundations of Eton (1440), and in the post-Reformation schools of Harrow, Westminster (both on older foundations), Rugby, Charterhouse, Shrewsbury, and Merchant Taylors. These institutions developed into the famous "public schools ". During this period, as for a long time after there was no such hard and fast line between the higher and more elementary instruction as exists at the present day. Many grammar schools of England did partly college work. Contrary to the common opinion, as voiced by Green, Mullinger, and others, the number of grammar schools before the Reformation was very great. Mr. Leach states that "three hundred grammar schools is a moderate estimate of the number in the year 1535, when the floods of the great revolution were let loose. Most of them were swept away either under Henry or his son; or if not swept away, they were plundered and damaged" (English Schools at the Reformation, 5-6). Be it remembered that the term "grammar school " is used in the sense common in England, denoting a higher school where the classical languages form the staple subject of instruction.

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A most powerful influence on the further development of the colleges was exercised by the humanistic movement. It cannot be denied that during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the study of the classics had been comparatively neglected, as men's minds were absorbed in scholastic studies. John of Salisbury and Roger Bacon complained bitterly about the neglect of the study of the languages. (Cf. Sandys, Hist. of Class. Scholarship, 568 sqq.) This was completely changed when the enthusiasm for the ancient classics began to spread from Italy throughout Western Christendom. The "new learning" gradually made its victorious entry into the old seats of learning, while new schools were established everywhere, until, about the year 1500, " Catholic Europe presented the aspect of a vast commonwealth of scholars" (Professor Hartfelder, in Schmid's "Geschichte der Erziehung", II, ii, 140). The schools of Vittorino da Feltre, "the first modern schoolmaster", and of Guarino da Verona , became the models for schools in other countries. English scholars had early come in contact with Italian humanists and schools ; Grocyn, Linacre, William Latimer, William Lily, Dean Colet were humanists, and tried to introduce the new learning into the English schools. The influence of the Renaissance is most clearly noticed in St. Paul's School, founded by Dean Colet in 1512, and in the statutes of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 1516, where greater stress is laid on the study of Latin and Greek than in any previous foundation. When humanism had gained the day, largely through the encouragement and influence of men like Bishop John Fisher, Thomas More, and Cardinal Wolsey, English college education had assumed the form and character which were to remain for centuries. The medieval curriculum of the trivium and quadrivium (see ARTS, THE SEVEN LIBERAL) had not been entirely abandoned; it survived in the new scheme of education, but greatly changed and modified. Henceforth the classical languages were the principal subject of instruction, to which mathematics formed the most important addition. "Letters" were the essential foundation; the rest were considered accessory, subsidiary. This humanistic type of schools lasted longer in England than in any other country.

In the medieval universities outside of France and England there existed colleges, but nowhere did they obtain the importance and the influence which they gained in Paris, and most of all in Oxford and Cambridge. The colleges in the German universities,e.g. at Prague, Vienna, Cologne, as well as the Scotch colleges, were primarily intended for the teachers, and only secondarily, if at all, for the students. For the students hostels, called bursœ , were established which were merely lodging-houses. The colleges of the Netherlands, especially those of Louvain, came nearer the English type. The most famous college was the Collegium Trilingue at Louvain, founded in 1517 by Busleiden, after the model of the College of the Three Languages at Alcalá, the celebrated foundation of Cardinal Ximenes for the study of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. At present, there is, on the European continent, no exact equivalent of the English colleges, but as far as the subjects of instruction are concerned, the French lycée and collège , the German gymnasium , and similar institutions, in their higher classes, resemble the English colleges. Many celebrated gymnasia of Teutonic countries developed from pre-Reformation schools. In Schmid's "Geschichte der Erziehung" (V, i, 50 sqq.) there is a long list of such schools which grew out of medieval institutions, e.g. the Elbing gymnasium ( Protestant ), established in 1536, which developed from a Senatorial school founded in 1300; the Marienburg gymnasium, from a Latin school established by the Teutonic Knights in the fourteenth century; the Berlin gymnasium (1540), formerly St. Peter's School (1276); the Mary Magdalen Gymnasium of Breslau, a Protestant school (1528), which grew out of City School (1267); the Gymnasium Illustre of Brieg (1569), a combination of the ancient Cathedral School and the City School; the Lutheran school of Sagan (1541), originally a Franciscan school (1294). During the Renaissance and Reformation period a few institutions of this kind went by the name of Collegium , but more were styled Gymnasium , Lyceum , Athenœum , Pœdagogium , or Academia , although these names in some cases were given to schools which were rather universities. Institutions of collegiate rank were also termed Studia Particularia , to distinguish them from a Studium Generale , or university. In its character the gymnasium was a humanistic school, the classical languages being the main subject of instruction. Not only the Catholic colleges of the post-Reformation period, but also the Protestant school systems, were based on the pre-Reformation schools, particularly those of the Netherlands. The famous school of Zwickau in Saxony was organized between 1535 and 1546 by Plateanus, a native of Liège, on the model of the school of the Brethren of the Common Life in Liège. John Sturm had studied in the same school at Liège, in the Collegium Trilingue at Louvain, and in the University of Paris, and from these schools he derived most of the details of his gymnasium at Strasburg, which was one of the most typical and most celebrated of early Protestant schools. Sturm's ideas in turn largely influenced another class of German institutions, the famous Fürstenschulen of Grimma, Pforta, etc. Again, Melanchthon, honoured by the title of "founder of the German gymnasium", based his system on the educational principles of Erasmus and other humanists.

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Many features of college life are legacies of the past; some have already been pointed out, namely attendance at chapel and the common life in the great boarding-schools. Various forms of distinctly academical dress have grown out of college practices; no particular form of garment was prescribed by university authority in medieval institutions, but in colleges they soon began to wear a "livery" of uniform colour and material. The modern viva voce examination is the successor of the former oral disputation, the examiners now taking the place of the "opponents" of olden times. As has been shown, the support of poor and deserving scholars was the root idea of the foundation of colleges; the scholarships in English and American schools, the bursarships and stipendia in the schools of Germany and other countries, have sprung from, and perpetuate, the same idea. In the provision for the Senior Scholars, in the fellowships of the medieval colleges, and in the practice of endowing professorships with prebends, there was an early systematic attempt at solving the question of professors salaries. In these and other features, modern college systems are intimately linked with the Catholic past.

THE AMERICAN COLLEGE

The continuity of educational ideals, and the diversity of their application, according to national needs and characteristics, is well illustrated by the American college. As regards its origin, it is an outgrowth of the English college, in particular of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where John Harvard had been educated. In more than one respect, especially in the fundamental idea of liberal training as the proper preparation for the higher or professional studies, it perpetuates the educational traditions which spread from Paris, and later from the humanistic schools of Italy, to Oxford and Cambridge, and thence were transplanted to the New World. However, the elements derived from Europe were modified from the very beginning and have been still more changed since the foundation of Harvard, so much so that at present there is no exact counterpart of the American college in any other country. There are at present (1908) in the United States over four hundred and seventy institutions which confer degrees and are called universities or colleges, not counting those which are for women exclusively. In some cases, as has well been said, the name "university" is but a "majestic synonym for college", and some of the colleges are only small high schools. Before the American Revolution 11 colleges were founded, chief among them Harvard (1636), William and Mary (1693), Yale (1701), Princeton (1746), University of Pennsylvania (1751), Columbia (1754), Brown (1764), Dartmouth (1770); from the Revolution to 1800, 12, one of them Catholic, at Georgetown, District of Columbia ; 33 from 1800 to 1830; 180 from 1830 to. 1865; and about 240 from 1865 to 1908. The older foundations in the East are independent of State control, but possess charters sanctioned by legislation. Many of the more recent foundations, especially in Western and Southern States, are supported and controlled by the State; on the other hand, denominational control has largely disappeared from the old colleges and is excluded from most new foundations. At present about one-half of the colleges are registered as non-sectarian. From the early part of the nineteenth century efforts were made to offer to women the same educational opportunities as to men. Mount Holyoke Seminary, Massachusetts (1837), and Elmira College (1855), were nearly equivalent to the colleges for men. Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York (1865), however, has been styled the "legitimate parent " of the colleges for women, as it established the same standard as that of colleges for men. Vassar College, Wellesley College (1876), Smith College (1875), Mount Holyoke College (1893), Bryn Mawr (1885), and the Woman's College, Baltimore (1885), are the most important women's colleges in the United States. Others are affiliated with colleges or universities for men, as Radcliffe, with Harvard. Many Western and Southern colleges are co-educational.

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The American college has been the main repository of liberal education, of an advanced education of general, not technical or professional, character. The "old-fashioned" college had a four-year course of prescribed studies: Latin and Greek, the inheritance of the humanistic period, and mathematics, to which had been added in the course of time natural sciences, the elements of philosophy, and still later, English literature. Modern languages, especially French, were taught to some small extent. Since the Civil War changes have been introduced which are truly revolutionary. Some colleges have grown into universities with different faculties after the model of European, especially German, universities ; these institutions have two principal departments, the university proper, for graduate, or professional work, and the collegiate department in the stricter sense of the word. But this very collegiate course has undergone a far-reaching transformation; the line of separation between university and college proper has been largely effaced, so that the college is a composite institution, of a secondary and higher nature, giving instruction which in Europe is given partly by the secondary schools, partly by the universities. the causes of this and other changes are manifold. The nineteenth century saw the extraordinary development of the "high school ", a term, which in the United States means a secondary school with a four-year course between the elementary (public) school and the college. In 1900, there were over 6000 public and nearly 2000 private schools of this grade with over 630,000 pupils, more than one-half of these being female students. Part of the work of these schools was formerly done in the college. The result of this separation and development of the secondary schools was, first, an increase of the age of applicants for college, and, secondly, higher entrance requirements. In consequence of the increase of age, many students now pass directly from the high school to professional studies, as few professional schools require a college diploma for admission. On the other hand, in order to gain a year or two, some colleges have shortened the course from four to three years (Johns Hopkins); others have kept the four-year college course, but allow the students to devote the last year, or even the last two years partly to professional work (Harvard, Columbia).

A second cause of the modifications mentioned, and one that affected the college seriously was the excessive expansion of the college curriculum, the pressure of many new subjects for recognition, some of which pertain rather to professional schools. The advance in, and enthusiasm for, the natural sciences during the nineteenth century effected changes in the schools of all civilized countries. In many quarters there was a clamour for "practical" studies, and the old classical course was decried as useless, or merely ornamental; its very foundation, the theory of mental or formal discipline, well expressed in the term gymnasium for classical schools in Germany, has been vigorously assailed, but not disproved. At present the pendulum seems to swing away from the utilitarian views of Spencer and others, and the conviction gains ground that the classics, although they can no longer claim the educational monopoly, are after all a most valuable means of liberal culture and the best preparation for professional studies. To meet the difficulty arising from the multitude of new studies and the growing demand for "practical" courses, the elective system was introduced. This system, in its more extreme form, is by many regarded as detrimental to serious work; few students are able to make a wise choice; many are tempted to choose subjects, not for their intrinsic value, but because they are more easy or agreeable; they follow the paths of least resistance and avoid the harder studies of greater educational value. To avoid these evils a compromise has been invented in some colleges in the form of a modified election, the group system, which allows the choice of a certain field of studies, of groups of subjects regulated by the faculty. Some choice in certain branches has been found profitable, but it is now a very general opinion that the elective system can be employed in the college only with many limitations and safeguards, and that certain valuable literary, or "culture" studies in the best sense of the term, should be obligatory. American educators of the highest repute have come to regard early specialization as a dangerous pedagogical error, and they maintain that the elective principle has its proper place in the university. Another result of the encroachment of the university on the college is the disappearance of the old-fashioned teacher with a good general knowledge and practical skill as an educator; his place is taken by the specialist, who more resembles the university professor, who lectures rather than teaches, and comes little in contact with the individual student; the classes are broken up, and courses take their place. This means the loss of an important educational factor, namely, the personal influence of the teacher on the pupil. The larger colleges are particularly exposed to this danger; in the smaller colleges there is more personal intercourse between the faculty and the students, generally also stricter discipline.

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The American college is, at the present time, in a state of transition, in a condition of unrest and fermentation. The questions of the length of the college course, of the proper function of the college, of its relation to university work, of the elective system, of the relative value of classics and modern languages, natural and social sciences — all these are topics of general discussion and matters of vital importance and, at the same time, questions beset with great difficulties. Hence it is not surprising to find prominent educators ranged on different sides, some advocating far-reaching changes, others, more conservative, warning against hazardous experiments. Modern conditions undoubtedly demand changes in the college; it would be most desirable if the old literary curriculum and instruction in sciences and other new subjects could be combined into a harmonious system. The present tendency of the college seems to be to undertake too much in subjects and methods, instead of remaining the culmination of secondary training, the final stage of general education.

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