Froude's Essays in Literature and History eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 423 pages of information about Froude's Essays in Literature and History.

Froude's Essays in Literature and History eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 423 pages of information about Froude's Essays in Literature and History.
college discipline, even if it extend not beyond college duties, is a perpetual remembrancer of the high moral end for which the student is placed within its precincts.  His only allurement to extravagance is the desire of vying with those who make a greater display than himself, or else it arises from, if possible, a less defensible motive, namely, that of becoming himself an object of emulation to others.  It is not the duty of the college authorities to compensate by their watchfulness the effects of a weak understanding, or that lax principle, or the want of self-command, of which the neglect of the parent or guardian has been the cause.  If the freshman is destitute of self-dependence and self-restraint he must suffer from the consequences.  Not only in the navy and army is youth exposed to temptations very far beyond the collegian, but in the inns of court young men are left to take care of themselves, in the midst of a great capital, without any surveillance whatever.  From these youths arise excellent men of business.  Most assuredly under the surveillance of a college in smaller cities, and where many heads of expense are from the nature of their position wholly out of the question, it does seem singular that such complaints should arise.  It is true, display is the vice of modern society among the old as well as the young, and in both cases most dishonest means are had recourse to sustain those appearances, which are all the world looks to.  It is possible, therefore, that little efforts have been made to initiate youth, prior to entering the universities, in that path of self-denial and high-mindedness which are the safeguard from vicious prodigality.  They bring with them the vices of their caste, whatever that caste may be.  Youth is imitative, and seldom a clumsy copyist, of the faults of its elders, provided those faults are fashionable faults, however unprincipled.  However this may be, I must protest against the universities being made answerable for these doings.  Attempts have been made, and failed, in respect to manners and to credit; and have failed clearly because they were impracticable, and, more than that, better left alone.  The university ought not to be answerable in such cases, any more than the benchers for the Temple students.  It cannot be expected that the noble quadrangles of our colleges are to become something like poor-law prisons, and the regulations of the night be extended over the day.  The very existence of the collegian, as such, implies something like freedom, both mental and bodily.  Learning that is converted into a tyranny will never bring forth good fruit.  It is the duty of parents and schoolmasters to impress upon the mind of youth that a seat of learning is the home of an easy frugality rather than of prodigal rivalry; that the university will only give degrees and honours where there is industry and good moral conduct.  It is to be feared that youth, quitting the discipline of the school, looks upon the university as the place where he may indulge in his own wayward will, and be as idle and indolent as he please.  If this be the case the university is not to blame for such lapses, but a bad prior apprehension of duty, and a defective, ill-directed education.

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
Froude's Essays in Literature and History from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.