A comparatively few men act as leaders, frame platforms, and shape legislation. It is quite difficult to find even this small number who are qualified for leadership. Nearly all our political and social reform movements are asking for a Moses, or a Luther, or a Lincoln, to lead them to victory. Some organizations of labor are officered by foreign born leaders who are ignorant and out of sympathy with the moral ideas and principles that have shaped our national life. There is a large number of imperfectly equipped men in all professions and in social movements, presuming to act as leaders, who might well be replaced by disciplined and cultured men, able to grapple with modern social problems, and to conduct the people to higher thought and nobler action. Men who are to become leaders and gain a strong hold on society must have a good foundation of general knowledge, and be trained to think on complicated questions. The man of thorough training, whether literary, scientific, or practical, has an immense advantage in leadership.
It is the prerogative of the college, in its aim to serve the people, to extend such educational opportunities to youth as will equip them for true leadership in every vocation of life.
The American college student should be sent forth with a purpose even stronger than that of the Greek youth, who took the oath of citizenship in these words:
"I will transmit my fatherland [its institutions, its civilization, its system of education, its people], not only not less, but greater and better, than it was committed to me."
V.
STUDENT LIFE IN COLLEGE.
Admission to college is dependent upon the mental and moral fitness of the student. If the student has completed the work of an advanced high school, or that of an academy, he may in many colleges pass immediately into the Freshman year without examination. The student is generally required to have, as a necessary preparation to gain admission to the Freshman class, three years of Latin and two of Greek, or an amount of modern languages equivalent to the Greek, besides mathematics, history, and English. In some cases the qualifications of the candidate must be such as to enable him to read at sight either Greek, Latin, French, or German. An essay in English must be correct in composition, spelling, grammar, expression, and division into paragraphs.
Some favor admitting the student on trial, and giving him an opportunity to show his fitness and worth by application to study. Certainly the best test of the student's knowledge is the ability to pursue advantageously the prescribed course of study.
After admission to college the student has at least fifteen hours per week of class room work. He may select, within a limited range, his studies. This selection is done under the guidance of the professors, and depends largely on the acquirements or deficiencies of the student. About three-fourths of the Freshman and Sophomore years are devoted to the classics and mathematics. A large share of the work in the Junior and Senior years may be devoted to specialization in science, language, mathematics, history, sociology, or philosophy. In some cases elocution, music, and the fine arts rightly receive a fair share of attention on the part of a large number of students throughout the college course.
The advantages of a college education do not consist alone in the training of the faculties and the acquisition of knowledge, but one of its chief advantages grows out of the incidental noble and generous associations and influences.