Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume I Part 24

Besides this course in arts, in which cla.s.sical studies were especially prominent, there were established courses in science, in literature, and in philosophy, differing from each other mainly in the proportion observed between ancient languages, modern languages, and studies in various sciences and other departments of thought. Each of these courses was laid down with much exactness for the first two years, with large opportunity for choice between subjects in the last two years. The system worked well, and has, from time to time, been modified, as the improvement in the schools of the State, and other circ.u.mstances have required.

In proposing these courses I was much influenced by an idea broached in Herbert Spencer's ''Treatise on Education.'' This idea was given in his discussion of the comparative values of different studies, when he arrived at the conclusion that a subject which ought to be among those taught at the beginning of every course is human physiology,--that is to say, an account of the structure, functions, and proper management of the human body, on which so much depends for every human being. It seemed to me that not only was there great force in Spencer's argument, but that there was an additional reason for placing physiology among the early studies of most of the courses; and this was that it formed a very good beginning for scientific study in general. An observation of my own strengthened me in this view. I remembered that, during my school life, while my tastes were in the direction of cla.s.sical and historical studies, the weekly visits to the school by the surgeon who lectured upon the human eye, ear, and sundry other organs, using models and preparations, interested me intensely, and were a real relief from other studies. There was still another reason.

For the professors.h.i.+p in this department Professor Aga.s.siz had recommended to me Dr. Burt Wilder; and I soon found him, as Aga.s.siz had foretold, not only a thorough investigator, but an admirable teacher. His lectures were not read, but were, as regards phrasing, extemporaneous; and it seemed to me that, mingled with other studies, a course of lectures given in so good a style, by so gifted a man, could not fail to be of great use in teaching our students, incidentally, the best way of using the English language in communicating their ideas to their fellowmen.

I had long deplored the rhetorical fustian and oratorical tall-talk which so greatly afflict our country, and which had been, to a considerable extent, cultivated in our colleges and universities; I determined to try, at least, to subst.i.tute for it clean, clear, straightforward statement and ill.u.s.tration; and it seemed to me that a course of lectures on a subject which admitted neither fustian nor tall-talk, by a clear-headed, clear-voiced, earnest, and honest man, was the best thing in the world for this purpose.

So was adopted the plan of beginning most courses with an extended course of lectures upon human physiology, in which to real practice in investigation by the cla.s.s is added the hearing of a first-rate lecturer.

As regards the course in literature, I determined that use should be made of this to promote the general culture of students, as had been done up to that time by very few of our American universities. At Yale in my day, there was never even a single lecture on any subject in literature, either ancient or modern: everything was done by means of ''recitations'' from text-books; and while young men read portions of masterpieces in Greek and Latin, their attention was hardly ever directed to these as literature. As regards the great fields of modern literature, nothing whatever was done. In the English literature and language, every man was left entirely to his own devices. One of the first professors I called to Cornell was Hiram Corson, who took charge of the department of English literature; and from that day to this he has been a center from which good culture has radiated among our students. Professor H. B. Sprague was also called; and he also did excellent work, though in a different way.

I also added non-resident professors. My original scheme I still think a good one. It was to call James Russell Lowell for early English literature, Bishop Arthur Cleveland c.o.xe for the literature of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods, Edwin Whipple for the literature of Queen Anne's time, and George William Curtis for recent and contemporary literature. Each of these men was admirable as a scholar and lecturer in the particular field named; but the restricted means of the university obliged me to cut the scheme down, so that it included simply Lowell for early and Curtis for recent literature. Other lectures in connection with the instruction of the resident professors marked an epoch, and did much to remove anything like Philistinism from the student body. Bayard Taylor's lectures in German literature thus supplemented admirably the excellent work of the resident professors Hewett and Horatio White. To remove still further any danger of Philistinism, I called an eminent graduate of Harvard,-- Charles Chauncey Shackford,--whose general lectures in various fields of literature were attractive and useful. In all this I was mainly influenced by the desire to prevent the atmosphere of the university becoming simply and purely that of a scientific and technical school. Highly as I prized the scientific spirit and technical training, I felt that the frame of mind engendered by them should be modified by an acquaintance with the best literature as literature. There were many evidences that my theory was correct. Some of our best students in the technical departments developed great love for literary studies.

One of them attracted much attention by the literary excellence of his writings; and on my speaking to him about it, and saying that it seemed strange to me that a man devoted to engineering should show such a taste for literature, he said that there was no greater delight to him than pa.s.sing from one of the studies to the other--that each was a recreation after the other.

The effort to promote that element in the general culture of the student body which comes from literature, ancient and modern, gained especial strength from a source usually unpromising--the mathematical department.

Two professors highly gifted in this field exercised a wide and enn.o.bling influence outside it. First of these was Evan William Evans, who had been known to me at Yale as not only one of the best scholars in the cla.s.s of 1851, but also one of its two foremost writers. Later, he developed a pa.s.sion for modern literature, and his influence was strongly felt in behalf of the humanities. His successor was James Edward Oliver, a graduate of Harvard, a genius in his chosen field, but always exercising a large influence by virtue of his broad, liberal, tolerant views of life which were promoted by study of the best thoughts of the best thinkers of all times.

The work of organizing and developing the general courses was comparatively easy, and the stimulus given at the outset by the non-resident professors rendered it all the more so. But with the technical departments and special courses there were grave difficulties. The department of civil engineering, of course, went easily enough; there were plenty of precedents for it, and the admirable professor first elected was, at his death, succeeded by another who most vigorously and wisely developed it: Estevan Fuertes, drawn from the most attractive surroundings in the island of Porto Rico to the United States by a deep love of science, and retained here during the rest of his life by a love, no less sincere, for American liberty--a rare combination of the virtues and capabilities of the Latin races with the best results of an American environment. I may mention, in pa.s.sing, that this combination came out curiously in his views of American citizens.h.i.+p. He was wont to marvel at the indifference of the average American to his privileges and duties, and especially at the lack of a proper estimate of his function at elections. I have heard him say: ''When I vote, I put on my best clothes and my top hat, go to the polls, salute the officers, take off my hat, and cast my ballot.''

It may be worth mentioning here that, at the election of the first professor in this department, a curious question arose. Among the candidates was one from Harvard, whose testimonials showed him to be an admirable acquisition; and among these testimonials was one from an eminent bishop, who spoke in high terms of the scientific qualifications of the candidate, but added that he felt it his duty to warn me that the young man was a Unitarian.

At this I wrote the bishop, thanking him, and saying that the only question with me was as to the moral and intellectual qualifications of the candidate; and that if these were superior to those of other candidates, I would nominate him to the trustees even if he were a Buddhist. The good bishop at first took some offense at this; and, in one of the communications which ensued, expressed doubts whether laymen had any right to teach at all, since the command to teach was given to the apostles and their successors, and seemed therefore confined to those who had received holy orders; but he became most friendly later, and I look back to my meetings with him afterward as among the delightful episodes of my life.

The technical department which caused me the most anxiety was that of agriculture. It had been given the most prominent place in the Congressional act of 1862, and in our charter from the State in 1865. But how should agriculture be taught; what proportion should we observe between theory and practice; and what should the practice be? These questions elicited all sorts of answers.

Some eminent agriculturists insisted that the farm should be conducted purely as a business operation; others that it should be a ''model farm''--regardless of balance sheets; others still that it should be wholly experimental.

Our decision was to combine what was best in all these views; and several men attempted this as resident professors, but with small success. One day, after a series of such failures, when we were almost desperate, there appeared a candidate from an agricultural college in Ireland.

He bore a letter from an eminent clergyman in New York, was of pleasing appearance and manners, gave glowing accounts of the courses he had followed, expatiated on the means by which farming had been carried to a high point in Scotland, and ventured suggestions as to what might be done in America. I had many misgivings. His experience was very remote from ours, and he seemed to me altogether too elegant for the work in hand; but Mr.

Cornell had visited English farms, was greatly impressed by their excellence, and urged a trial of the new-comer.

He was duly called; and, that he might begin his courses of instruction, an order was given for a considerable collection of English agricultural implements and for the erection of new farm-buildings after English patterns, Mr. Cornell generously advancing the required money.

All this took time--much time. At first great things were expected by the farmers of the State, but gradually their confidence waned. As they saw the new professor walking over the farm in a dilettantish way, superintending operations with gloved hands, and never touching any implement, doubts arose which soon ripened into skepticism. Typical were the utterances of our farm manager. He was a plain, practical farmer, who had taken the first prize of the State Agricultural Society for the excellence of his own farm; and, though he at first indulged in high hopes regarding the new professor, he soon had misgivings, and felt it his duty to warn me. He said: ''Yew kin depend on 't, he ain't a-goin' to do nothin'; he don't know nothin' about corn, and he don't want to know nothin' about corn; AND HE DON'T BELIEVE IN PUNKINS!

Depend on 't, as soon as his new barn is finished and all his new British tackle is brought together, he'll quit the job.'' I reasoned that, to a farmer brought up among the glorious fields of Indian corn in western New York, and accustomed to rejoice in the sight of golden pumpkins, diffusion of other cultures must seem like treason; but, alas! he was right. As soon as the new buildings and arrangements were ready for our trial of British scientific agriculture, the young foreign professor notified me that he had accepted the heads.h.i.+p of an agricultural college in Canada. Still, he met with no greater success there than with us; nor was his reputation increased when, after the foul attacks made upon Mr. Cornell in the legislature, he volunteered to come to the investigation and testify that Mr. Cornell was ''not a practical man.'' In this the career of the young agriculturist culminated.

Having lost his professors.h.i.+p in Canada, he undertook the management of a grocery in the oil-regions of western Pennsylvania; and scientific British agriculture still awaits among us a special representative. Happily, since that day, men trained practically in the agriculture of the United States have studied the best British methods, and brought us much that has been of real use.

Fortunately I had found three men who enabled us to tide our agricultural department over those dark days, in which we seemed to be playing ''Hamlet'' with Hamlet left out. The first of these was the Hon. John Stanton Gould, whom I called as a lecturer upon agriculture. He had been president of the State Agricultural Society, and was eminent, not only for his knowledge of his subject, but for his power of making it interesting. Men came away from Mr. Gould's lectures filled with intense desire to get hold of a spade or hoe and to begin turning the soil.

So, also, the steady work of Professor George C. Caldwell, whom I had called from the State College of Pennsylvania to take charge of the department of agricultural chemistry, won the respect of all leaders in agriculture throughout the State, and, indeed, throughout the country.

And with especial grat.i.tude should be named Dr.

James Law of the British Royal Veterinary College, whom I had found in London, and called to our veterinary professors.h.i.+p. Never was there a more happy selection.

From that day to this, thirty-six years, he has been a tower of strength to the university, and has rendered incalculable services to the State and Nation. His quiet, thorough work impressed every one most favorably. The rudest of the surrounding farmers learned more and more to regard him with respect and admiration, and the State has recently recognized his services by establis.h.i.+ng in connection with the university a State veterinary college under his control.

The work of these three men saved us. Apart from it, the agricultural department long remained a sort of slough of despond; but at last a brighter day dawned. From the far-off State Agricultural College of Iowa came tidings of a professor--Mr. J. I. P. Roberts--who united the practical and theoretical qualities desired. I secured him, and thenceforward there was no more difficulty. For more than twenty years, as professor and lecturer, he has largely aided in developing agriculture throughout the State and country; and when others were added to him, like Comstock and Bailey, the success of the department became even more brilliant. Still, its old reputation lasted for a time, even after a better era had been fully ushered in. About a year after the tide had thus turned a meeting of the State ''Grange'' was held at the neighboring city of Elmira; and the leading speakers made the university and its agricultural college an object of scoffing which culminated in a resolution denouncing both, and urging the legislature to revoke our charter. At this a bright young graduate of Cornell, an instructor in the agricultural department, who happened to be present, stood up manfully, put a few pertinent questions, found that none of the declaimers had visited the university, declared that they were false to their duty in not doing so, protested against their condemning the inst.i.tution unheard and unseen, and then and there invited them all to visit the inst.i.tution and its agricultural department without delay. Next day this whole body of farmers, with their wives, sons, and daughters, were upon us.

Everything was shown them. Knowing next to nothing about modern appliances for instruction in science and they were amazed at all they saw; the libraries, the laboratories, and, above all, the natural-science collections and models greatly impressed them. They were taken everywhere, and shown not only our successes but our failures; nothing was concealed from them, and, as a result, though they ''came to scoff,'' they ''remained to pray.'' They called a new session of their body, pledged to us their support, and pa.s.sed resolutions commending our work and condemning the State legislature for not doing more in our behalf. That was the turning-point for the agricultural department; and from that day to this the legislature has dealt generously with us, and the influence of the department for good throughout the State has been more and more widely acknowledged.

Of the two technical departments referred to in the origi- nal act of Congress, the second--specified under the vague name of ''Mechanic Arts''--went better, though there was at first much groping to find just what ought to be done.

First of all, there was a danger which demanded delicate handling. This danger lay in Mr. Cornell's wish to establish, in vital connection with the university, great factories for the production of articles for sale, especially chairs and shoes, thus giving large bodies of students opportunities for self-support. In discussing this matter with him, I pointed to the fact that, in becoming a manufacturing corporation we were making a business venture never contemplated by our charter; that it was exceedingly doubtful whether such a corporation could be combined with an educational inst.i.tution without ruining both; that the men best fitted to manage a great factory were hardly likely to be the best managers of a great inst.i.tution of learning; that under our charter we had duties, not merely to those who wished to support themselves by labor, but to others; and I finally pointed out to him many reasons for holding that such a scheme contravened the act of Congress and the legislation of the State. I insisted that the object of our charters from the State and Nation was not to enable a great number of young men to secure an elementary education while making shoes and chairs; that for these the public schools were provided; that our main purpose must be to send out into all parts of the State and Nation thoroughly trained graduates, who should develop and improve the main industries of the country, and, by their knowledge and example, train up skilful artisans of various sorts and in every locality. Mr. Cornell's conduct in this matter was admirable. Tenacious as he usually was when his opinion was formed, and much as it must have cost him to give up what had become a darling project, he yielded to this view.

New questions now opened as to this ''Department of Mechanic Arts.'' It was clear to me, from what I had seen abroad, that not all the models I had sent from Europe would be sufficient to give the practical character which such a department needed; that its graduates must have a direct, practical acquaintance with the construction and use of machinery before they could become leaders in great mechanical enterprises; that they must be made, not only mathematicians and draftsmen, but skilled workmen, practically trained in the best methods and processes.

A very shrewd artisan said to me: ''When a young mechanical engineer comes among us fresh from college, only able to make figures and pictures, we rarely have much respect for him: the trouble with the great majority of those who come from technical inst.i.tutions is that they don't know as much about practical methods and processes as we know.''

I felt that there was truth in this, but, as things were, hardly dared tell this to the trustees. It would have scared them, for it seemed to open the door to great expenditures demanded by a mere theory; but I laid my views before Mr. Cornell, and he agreed with me so far as to send to us from his agricultural works at Albany sundry large pieces of old machinery, which he thought might be rebuilt for our purposes. But this turned out to be hardly practicable. I dared not, at that stage of the proceedings, bring into the board of trustees a proposal to buy machinery and establish a machine-shop; the whole would have a chimerical look, and was sure to repel them. Therefore it was that, at my own expense, I bought a power-lathe and other pieces of machinery; and, through the active efforts of Professor John L. Morris, my steadfast supporter in the whole matter, these were set up in our temporary wooden laboratory. A few students began using them, and to good purpose. Mr. Cornell was greatly pleased. Other trustees of a practical turn visited the place, and the result was that opinion in the governing board soon favored a large practical equipment for the department.

On this I prepared a report, taking up the whole subject with great care, and brought it before them, my main suggestion being that a practical beginning of the department should be made by the erection and equipment of a small building on the north side of the university grounds, near our main water-power. Then came a piece of great good fortune. Among the charter trustees of the university was Mr. Cornell's old friend and a.s.sociate in telegraphic enterprise, Hiram Sibley of Rochester; and at the close of the meeting Mr. Sibley asked me if I could give him a little time on the university grounds after the adjournment of the meeting. I, of course, a.s.sented; and next morning, on our visiting the grounds together, he asked me to point out the spot where the proposed college of mechanic arts might best be placed. On my doing so, he looked over the ground carefully, and then said that he would himself erect and equip the building. So began Sibley College, which is to-day, probably, all things considered, the most successful department of this kind in our own country, and perhaps in any country. In the hands, first of Professors Morris and Sweet, and later under the direction of Dr. Thurston, it has become of the greatest value to every part of the United States, and indeed to other parts of the American continent.

At the outset a question arose, seemingly trivial, but really serious. Mr. Sibley had gone far beyond his original proposals; and when the lecture-rooms, drafting- rooms, modeling-rooms, foundries, shops for ironwork, woodwork, and the like, had been finished, the question came up: Shall our aim be to produce things having a pecuniary value, or shall we produce simply samples of the most highly finished workmans.h.i.+p, having, generally, no value? Fortunately, Professors Morris and Sweet were able to combine both these purposes, and to employ a considerable number of students in the very best of work which had a market value. The whole thing was thereby made a success, but it waited long for recognition. A result followed not unlike some which have occurred in other fields in our country. At the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, an exhibit was made of the work done by students in Sibley College, including a steam-engine, power-lathes, face-plates, and various tools of precision, admirably fin- ished, each a model in its kind. But while many mechanics praised them, they attracted no special attention from New England authorities. On the other hand, an exhibit of samples of work from the School of Technology of Moscow, which had no merchantable value,--many of the pieces being of antiquated pattern, but of exquisite finish and showily arranged,--aroused great admiration among sundry New England theorists; even the head of the Ma.s.sachusetts Inst.i.tute of Technology, in enthusiastic magazine articles, called the attention of the whole country to them, and urged the necessity of establis.h.i.+ng machine- shops in connection with schools of science. The fact that this had already been done, and better done, at Cornell, was loftily ignored. Western New York seemed a Nazareth out of which no good could come. That same straining of the mind's eye toward the East, that same tendency to provincialism which had so often afflicted Ma.s.sachusetts, evidently prevented her wise men in technology from recognizing any new departure west of them.

At a later period I had occasion to make a final comment on all this. Both as commissioner at the Paris Exhibition and as minister to Russia, I came to know intimately Wischniegradsky, who had been the head of the Moscow School of Technology and afterward Russian minister of finance. He spoke to me in the highest terms of what original American methods had done for railways; and the climax was reached when the Moscow methods, so highly praised by Boston critics, proved to be utterly inadequate in training mechanical engineers to furnish the machinery needed in Russia, and men from the American schools, trained in the methods of Cornell, sent over locomotives and machinery of all sorts for the new Trans-Siberian Railway, of which the eastern terminus was that very city of Moscow which enjoyed the privileges so lauded and magnified by the Boston critics!

Time has reversed their judgment: the combination of the two systems, so ably and patiently developed by Director Thurston, is the one which has happily prevailed.

Few days in the history of Cornell University have been so fraught with good as that on which Thurston accepted my call to the heads.h.i.+p of Sibley College. At the very outset he gained the confidence and grat.i.tude of trustees, professors, students, and, indeed, of his profession throughout the country, by his amazing success as professor, as author, and as organizer and administrator of that department, which he made not only one of the largest, but one of the best of its kind in the world. The rapidity and wisdom of his decisions, the extent and excellence of his work, his skill in attracting the best men, his ability in quieting rivalries and--animosities, and the kindly firmness of his whole policy were a source of wonder to all who knew him. And, at his lamented death in 1903, it was found that he had rendered another service of a sort which such strong men as he are often incapable of rendering-- he had trained a body of a.s.sistants and students worthy to take up his work.

Another department which I had long wished to see established in our country now began to take shape.

From my boyhood I had a love for architecture. In my young manhood this had been developed by readings in Ruskin, and later by architectural excursions in Europe; and the time had now arrived when it seemed possible to do something for it. I had collected what, at that period, was certainly one of the largest, if not the largest, of the architectural libraries in the United States, besides several thousand large architectural photographs, drawings, casts, models, and other material from every country in Europe. This had been, in fact, my pet extravagance; and a propitious time seeming now to arrive, I proposed to the trustees that if they would establish a department of architecture and call a professor to it, I would transfer to it my special library and collections. This offer was accepted; and thus was founded this additional department, which began its good career under Professor Charles Babc.o.c.k, who, at this present writing, is enjoying, as professor emeritus, the respect and grat.i.tude of a long series of cla.s.ses which have profited by his teachings, and the cordial companions.h.i.+p of his colleagues, who rejoice to profit by his humorous, but none the less profound, observations upon problems arising in the university and in the world in general.

As regards this ill.u.s.trative material, I recall one curious experience. While on one of my architectural excursions through the great towns of eastern France, I arrived at Troyes. On visiting the government agent for photographing public monuments, I noticed in his rooms some admirably executed pieces of stone carving,--capitals, corbels, and the like,--and on my asking him whence these came, he told me that they had been recently taken out of the cathedral by the architect who was ''restoring''

it. After my purchases were made, he went with me to this great edifice, one of the finest in Europe; and there I found that, on each side of the high altar, the architect had taken out several brackets, or corbels, of the best mediaeval work, and subst.i.tuted new ones designed by himself. One of these corbels thus taken out the government photographer had in his possession. It was very striking, representing the grotesque face of a monk in the midst of a ma.s.s of foliage supporting the base of a statue, all being carved with great spirit. Apart from its architectural value, it had a historical interest, since it must have witnessed the famous betrothal of the son and daughter of the English and French kings mentioned in Shakspere, to say nothing of many other mediaeval pageants.

On my making known to the photographer the fact that I was engaged in founding a school of architecture in the United States, and was especially anxious to secure a good specimen of French work, he sold me this example, which is now in the museum of the Architectural Department at Cornell. I allude to this, in pa.s.sing, as showing what monstrous iniquities (and I could name many others) are committed in the great mediaeval buildings of Europe under pretense of ''restoration.''

CHAPTER XXII

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF UNIVERSITY COURSES--1870-1872

In close connection with the technical departments were various laboratories. For these, place was at first made here and there in cellars and sheds; but at last we were able to erect for them buildings large and complete, and to the opening of the first of these came Mr. Cleveland, then Governor of New York, and later President of the United States. Having laid the corner-stone of the Memorial Chapel and made an excellent speech, which encouraged us all, he accompanied me to the new building devoted to chemistry and physics, which was then opened for the first time. On entering it, he expressed his surprise at its equipment, and showed that he had seen nothing of the kind before. I learned afterward that he had received a thorough preparation in cla.s.sics and mathematics for college, but that, on account of the insufficient means of his father, he was obliged to give up his university course; and it was evident, from his utterances at this time, as well as when visiting other colleges and universities, that he lamented this.

Out of this laboratory thus opened was developed, later, a new technical department. Among my happiest hours were those spent in visiting the various buildings, collections, and lecture-rooms, after my morning's work, to see how all were going on; and, during various visits to the new laboratory I noticed that the majority of the students were, in one way or another, giving attention to matters connected with electricity. There had already been built in the machine-shops, under the direction of Professor Anthony, a dynamo which was used in lighting our grounds, this being one of the first examples of electric lighting in the United States; and on one of my visits I said to him, ''It looks much as if, with the rapid extension throughout the country of the telegraph, telephone, electric lighting, and electric railways, we shall be called on, before long, to train men for a new profession in connection with them.'' As he a.s.sented to this, I asked him to sketch out a plan for a ''Department of Electrical Engineering,'' and in due time he appeared with it before the executive committee of the trustees. But it met much opposition from one of our oldest members, who was const.i.tutionally averse to what he thought new-fangled education, partly from conservatism, partly from considerations of expense; and this opposition was so threatening that, in order to save the proposed department, I was obliged to pledge myself to become responsible for any extra expense caused by it during the first year. Upon this pledge it was established.

Thus was created, as I believe, the first department of electrical engineering ever known in the United States, and, so far as I can learn, the first ever known in any country.

But while we thus strove to be loyal to those parts of our charter which established technical instruction, there were other parts in which I personally felt even a deeper interest. In my political reminiscences I have acknowledged the want of preparation in regard to practical matters of public concern which had hampered me as a member of the State Senate. Having revolved this subject in my mind for a considerable time, I made, while commissioner to the Paris Exposition of 1878, a careful examination of the courses of study in political and economic science established in European universities, and on my return devoted to this subject my official report.

Like such reports generally, it was delayed a long time in the Government Printing-office, was then d.a.m.ned with faint praise, and nothing more came of it until the following year, when, being called to deliver the annual address at the Johns Hopkins University, I wrought its main points into a plea for education in relation to politics.

This was widely circulated with some effect, and I now brought a modest proposal in the premises before our trustees. Its main feature was that Mr. Frank B. Sanborn, a graduate of Harvard, Secretary of the Board of Charities of the State of Ma.s.sachusetts and of the Social Science a.s.sociation of the United States, should be called to give a course of practical lectures before the senior cla.s.s during at least one term,--his subjects to be such as pauperism, crime (incipient and chronic), inebriety, lunacy, and the best dealing of modern states with these; also that his instructions should be given, not only by lectures, but by actual visits with his cla.s.ses to the great charitable and penal inst.i.tutions of the State, of which there were many within easy distance of the university.

For several years, and until the department took a different form, this plan was carried out with excellent results.

Professor Sanborn and his students, beginning with the county almshouse and jail, visited the reformatories, the prisons, the penitentiaries, and the asylums of various sorts in the State; made careful examinations of them; drew up reports upon them, these reports forming the subject of discussions in which professor and students took earnest part; and a number of young men who have since taken influential places in the State legislature were thus instructed as to the best actual and possible dealings with all these subjects. I still think that more should be done in all our universities to train men by this method for the public service in this most important and interesting field, and also in matters pertaining generally to State, county, and city administration.

Closely connected with this instruction was that in political economy and history. As to the first of these, I had, some years before, seen reason to believe that my strong, and perhaps bigoted free-trade ideas were at least not so universal in their application as I had supposed.

Down to the time of our Civil War I had been very intolerant on this subject, practically holding a protectionist to be either a Pharisee or an idiot. I had convinced myself not only that the principles of free trade are axiomatic, but that they afford the only means of binding nations together in permanent peace; that Great Britain was our best friend; that, in desiring us to adopt her own system, she was moved by broad, philosophic, and philanthropic considerations. But as the war drew on and I saw the haughtiness and selfishness toward us shown by her ruling cla.s.ses, there came in my mind a revulsion which led me to examine more closely the foundations of my economical belief. I began to attribute more importance to John Stuart Mill's famous ''exception,''

to the effect that the building up of certain industries may be necessary to the very existence of a nation, and that perhaps the best way of building them up is to adopt an adequate system of protective duties. Down to this time I had been a disciple of Adam Smith and Bastiat; but now appeared the published lectures of Roscher of Leipsic, upon what he called ''The Historical System'' of political economy. Its fundamental idea was that political economy is indeed a science, to be wrought out by scientific methods; but that the question how far its conclusions are adapted to the circ.u.mstances of any nation at any time is for statesmen to determine. This impressed me much. Moreover, I was forced to acknowledge that the Morrill protective tariff, adopted at the Civil War period, was a necessity for revenue; so that my old theory of a tariff for revenue easily developed into a belief in a tariff for revenue with incidental protection. This idea has been developed in my mind as time has gone on, until at present I am a believer in protection as the only road to ultimate free trade. My process of reasoning on the subject I have given in another chapter.

At the opening of the university there was but little instruction in political economy, that little being mainly given by our professor of moral philosophy, Dr. Wilson, a man broad in his views and strong in reasoning power, who had been greatly impressed by the ideas of Friedrich List, the German protectionist. But lectures were also given by free-traders, and I adopted the plan of having both sides as well represented as possible. This was, at first, complained of; sundry good people said it was like calling a professor of atheism into a theological seminary; but my answer was that our university was not, like a theological seminary, established to arrive at certain conclusions fixed beforehand, or to propagate an established creed; that, political economy not being an exact science, our best course was to call eminent lecturers to present both sides of the main questions in dispute. The result was good. It stimulated much thought, and doubtless did something to promote that charity to opposing economical opinions which in my own case had been, through my early manhood, so conspicuously lacking.

The second of these departments--history--was the one for which I cared most. I believed then, and later experience has strengthened my conviction, that the best of all methods in presenting every subject bearing on political and social life is the historical. My own studies had been mainly in this field, and I did what I could to establish historical courses in the university. The lectures which I had given at the University of Michigan were now developed more fully and again presented; but to these I constantly added new lectures and, indeed, new courses, though at a great disadvantage, since my administrative duties stood constantly in the way of my professorial work. At the same time I went on collecting my historical library until it became, in its way, probably the largest and most complete of its kind in the possession of any individual in the United States. Gradually strong men were drawn into the department, and finally there came one on whom I could lay a large portion of the work.

The story is somewhat curious. During the year 1877- 1878, in Germany and France, I had prepared a short course of lectures upon the historical development of criminal law; and while giving it to my senior cla.s.s after my return, I noticed a student, two or three years below the average age of the cla.s.s, carefully taking notes and apparently much interested. One day, going toward my house after the lecture, I found him going in the same direction, and, beginning conversation with him, learned that he was a member of the soph.o.m.ore cla.s.s; that he had corresponded with me, two or three years before, as to the best means of working his way through the university; had followed out a suggestion of mine, then made, in that he had learned the printer's trade; had supported himself through the preparatory school by means of it, and was then carrying himself through college by setting type for the university press. Making inquiries of professors and students, I found that the young man, both at school and at the university, was, as a rule, at the head of every cla.s.s he had entered; and therefore it was that, when the examination papers came in at the close of the term, I first took up his papers to see how he had stood the test.

They proved to be masterly. There were excellent scholars in the senior cla.s.s, but not one had done so well as this young soph.o.m.ore; in fact, I doubt whether I could have pa.s.sed a better examination on my own lectures. There was in his answers a combination of accuracy with breadth which surprised me. Up to that time, pa.s.sing judgment on the examination papers had been one of the most tedious of my burdens; for it involved wading through several hundred pages of crabbed ma.n.u.script, every term, and weighing carefully the statements therein embodied.

A sudden light now flashed upon me. I sent for the young soph.o.m.ore, cautioned him to secrecy, and then and there made him my examiner in history. He, a member of the soph.o.m.ore cla.s.s, took the papers of the seniors and resident graduates, and pa.s.sed upon them carefully and admirably-- better than I should have ever had the time and patience to do. Of course this was kept entirely secret; for had the seniors known that I had intrusted their papers to the tender mercies of a soph.o.m.ore, they would probably have mobbed me. This mode of examination continued until the young man's graduation, when he was openly appointed examiner in history, afterward becoming instructor in history, then a.s.sistant professor; and, finally, another university having called him to a full professors.h.i.+p, he was appointed full professor of history at Cornell, and has greatly distinguished himself both by his ability in research and his power in teaching.

To him have been added others as professors, a.s.sistant professors, and instructors, so that the department is now on an excellent footing. In one respect its development has been unexpectedly satisfactory. At the opening of the university one of my strongest hopes had been to establish a professors.h.i.+p of American history. It seemed to me monstrous that there was not, in any American university, a course of lectures on the history of the United States; and that an American student, in order to secure such instruction in the history of his own country, must go to the lectures of Laboulaye at the Collge de France. Thither I had gone some years before, and had been greatly impressed by Laboulaye's admirable presentation of his subject, and awakened to the fact that American history is not only more instructive, but more interesting, than I had ever supposed it. My first venture was to call Professor George W. Greene of Brown University for a course of lectures on the history of our Revolutionary period, and Professor Dwight of Columbia College for a course upon the const.i.tutional history of the United States. But finally my hope was more fully realized: I was enabled to call as resident professor my old friend Moses Coit Tyler, whose book on the ''History of American Literature'' is a cla.s.sic, and who, in his new field, exerted a powerful influence for good upon several generations of students. More than once since, as I have heard him, it has been borne in upon me that I was born too soon. Remembering the utter want of any such instruction in my own college days, I have especially envied those who have had the good fortune to be conducted by him, and men like him, through the history of our own country.[6]

[6] To my great sorrow, he died in 1900.--A. D. W.

In some of these departments to which I have referred there were occasionally difficulties requiring much tact in handling. During my professorial days at the University of Michigan I once heard an eminent divine deliver an admirable address on what he called ''The Oscillatory Law of Human Progress''--that is, upon the tendency of human society, when reacting from one evil, to swing to another almost as serious in the opposite direction. In swinging away from the old cast-iron course of instruction, and from the text-book recitation of the mere dry bones of literature, there may be seen at this hour some tendency to excessive reaction. When I note in sundry university registers courses of instruction offered in some of the most evanescent and worthless developments of contemporary literature,--some of them, indeed, worse than worthless,--I think of a remark made to me by a college friend of mine who will be remembered by the Yale men of the fifties for his keen and pithy judgments of men and things. Being one day in New Haven looking for a.s.sistant professors and instructors, I met him; and, on my answering his question as to what had brought me, he said, ''If at any time you want a professor of HORSE SENSE, call ME.'' I have often thought of this proposal since, and have at times regretted that some of our inst.i.tutions of learning had not availed themselves of his services.