{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_32608/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_32608","id":"gutenberg_32608","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/32608","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - American","Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","World War I","World War, 1914-1918"],"text":"E-text prepared by Barbara Kosker and the Project Gutenberg Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images\ngenerously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries\n(http://www.archive.org/details/americana)\n\n\n\nNote: Images of the original pages are available through\n      Internet Archive/American Libraries. See\n      http://www.archive.org/details/somewartimelesso00kepprich\n\n\n\n\n\nSOME WAR-TIME LESSONS\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nCOLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS\nSALES AGENTS\n\nNEW YORK\nLEMCKE & BUECHNER\n30-32 EAST 20TH STREET\n\nLONDON\nHUMPHREY MILFORD\nAMEN CORNER, E.C.\n\nSHANGHAI\nEDWARD EVANS & SONS, LTD.\n30 NORTH SZECHUEN ROAD\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\nSOME WAR-TIME LESSONS\n\nThe Soldier's Standards of Conduct\nThe War As a Practical Test of American Scholarship\nWhat Have We Learned?\n\nby\n\nFREDERICK PAUL KEPPEL\n\nThird Assistant Secretary of War\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\nNew York\nColumbia University Press\n1920\n\nAll rights reserved\n\nCopyright, 1920\nBy Columbia University Press\n\nPrinted from type, January, 1920\n\nPrinted at\nThe Plimpton Press\nNorwood Mass U S A\n\n\n\n\nTO\n\nNEWTON D. BAKER\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n                                                          PAGE\n\n   I. THE AMERICAN SOLDIER AND HIS STANDARDS\n      OF CONDUCT                                            9\n\n  II. THE WAR AS A PRACTICAL TEST OF AMERICAN\n      SCHOLARSHIP                                          36\n\n III. WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED?                                66\n\n\n\n\nSOME WAR-TIME LESSONS\n\nTHE AMERICAN SOLDIER AND HIS STANDARDS OF CONDUCT[1]\n\n\nPerhaps the greatest laboratory experiment in human conduct in the\nhistory of the world has been the development of our Army during the\npast two years. Under the provisions of the Selective Service Law, this\nArmy has represented a cross section of American male humanity--even\nmore representative indeed than was intended; for in the efforts of the\nLocal Boards to send men who could best be spared, many found their way\ninto the ranks who were handicapped from the start by low mentality or\ndisease. What were the guiding forces which operated upon this body of\nnearly four million men?\n\nIn the first place, our country entered the war with a great moral\npurpose, untinged by any trace of national or individual selfishness.\nWe really have to go back to the Crusades to find the like. And, as\nthen, each man supplemented this great basal impulse with whatever was\nto him the strongest incentive--religion, patriotism, pride of family or\nstate or regiment, the desire to excel in what all were attempting.\n\nIn the second place, thanks primarily to the vision and determination of\none man, the individual appeal to each soldier as to his personal share\nin the great enterprise was upon the highest plane. We were fortunate in\nhaving at the head of the War Department a man peculiarly sensitive to\ncommunity problems and with no small experience in their solution.\nThrough the centuries men had come to the belief that if their soldiers\nwere only valiant and disciplined in arms, it would not do to inquire\ntoo curiously into their personal standards of conduct in other\nmatters--that a considerable wastage in military strength from\ndrunkenness and disease was inevitable. And as we all know, this wastage\nhas in the past sapped, not only the strength of the Army, but\nafterwards the very life of the nation to which the soldier must sooner\nor later return.\n\nThe Secretary of War and his lieutenants, chief among whom in this field\nshould be placed the Chairman of the Committee on Training Camp\nActivities, Raymond B. Fosdick, approached this problem neither in the\nfatalistic spirit that what has always been must continue to be, nor in\na spirit of what, for want of a better term, I may call doctrinaire\nidealism. They faced the fact that among the hundreds of thousands of\nyoung men who were to be called to the colors, there would be many whose\nears would be deaf to any abstract appeal, and many others to whom such\nan appeal might be made under normal conditions, but who in fatigue or\nthe let-down following the strain of conflict, could not be depended\nupon to stand in the hour of temptation. As a result the whole field of\npreventive measures was thoroughly studied and vigorous treatment was\napplied. The Army regulations as to prophylaxis and the introduction of\nintoxicants into camps were strictly and honestly enforced. The Army saw\nto it that state and local laws as to liquor and prostitution were\nproperly carried out, and if these were lacking, they were promptly\nenacted. The so-called Zone Law was adopted for the purpose of placing\nthe immediate vicinity of camps under Federal control. In some cases\nwhere the community showed signs of regarding the Army policy in this\nregard as a _beau geste_ and nothing more, it was made to realize that\nwhile the War Department could not compel the community to mend its\nways, it could and would move the camp in twenty-four hours to a more\nwholesome environment. I am proud to say that it was necessary in only a\nvery few instances to bring forward this aspect of the situation, but\nwhen it was necessary the Department spoke in no uncertain tone.\n\nAs a result of this general policy, in which the Navy shared, many a\nwide-open town received a thorough house cleaning for the first time in\nits career; in all between 120 and 140 red light districts were closed\nand kept closed; and the underlying sordidness of many a smug\nself-satisfied village was brought to light and remedied.\n\nThe men who came to the camps tainted with venereal disease or broken by\ndrink or morphine--and the number of these was great enough to shock our\nnational complacency (and incidentally to explode the national\nassumption that the country is primarily the abode of virtue as the\ncity is of vice)--these men were salvaged by the tens of thousands and\nturned into useful self-respecting soldiers and citizens.\n\nThe lesson of clean living was taught by the spoken word, by the moving\npicture, by the printed page, by the doctor with a scientific\nthoroughness and by the layman with a frankness and sometimes a\ncolloquialism which would for once have rendered Mrs. Grundy speechless.\nAs an instrument of virtue, the tract is, of course, of time-honored\nusage, but the name of George Ade in the list of tract writers is a new\nand significant one.\n\nMore important than all this, however, in my judgment, was the\nrealization by the Army of the great truth that the soldier--or any one\nelse for that matter--goes astray in only the rarest instances from\ninnate depravity. What he seeks primarily is relaxation and amusement.\nAnd so wholesome relaxation and amusement were placed at his disposal to\ntake the place of the unwholesome. The whole nation rose to help in this\nwork of substituting the clean for the unclean. It poured its money by\nthe hundreds of millions into the coffers of the great welfare\nsocieties, the Red Cross, The Young Men's Christian Association, Knights\nof Columbus, Jewish Welfare Board, and later in recognition of its work\nabroad, the Salvation Army. All of these vied with one another in a\nrivalry which was sometimes embarrassing in its intensity. The American\nLibrary Association supplied books and other reading matter, and the War\nCamp Community Service made sure that, to the towns and villages\nsurrounding it, a cantonment presented an opportunity for service rather\nthan for exploitation. Not the least important factor in the superb\nshowing which our troops made in France was the spirit with which the\nmen and women of these same towns inspired the men from the training\ncamps whom they took into their homes and their hearts.\n\nWithin the fabric of the Army the chaplains were doing their share, as\nwere the athletic leaders and song leaders and dramatic coaches. They\nwere seconded by the officers of the line, most of whom, it should be\nsaid, saw the military usefulness of the whole program from the first,\nmany of the experienced regulars having always done what they could with\nthe limited means at their command along the same lines. Other officers,\nhowever, had to be shown--and were shown--the military importance of\nthe truth that the merry heart goes all the day, and the sad one tires\nin a mile.\n\nThe work of planning and coordination was in the hands of the civilian\nCommission on Training Camp Activities, of which Mr. Fosdick has been\nfrom the first the Chairman. The work of this Commission has been\ncharacterized from the outset by a courage and resourcefulness for which\nno praise can be too high. The theatre for example has not always been\nlooked upon by the American people as a moral agency, but the Commission\nsaw its place in the scheme of things and no fewer than thirty-seven\ngreat playhouses have been erected at the camps and the audiences have\nrun literally into the millions. Boxing likewise was encouraged, even\nthough some of the contests which resulted were not of the most gentle.\nCantonment towns were persuaded to open the \"Movies\" on Sunday, the only\nday on which most soldiers could leave the Camp--the outcries of the\n_unco guid_ to the contrary notwithstanding.\n\nFor more than a year the Commission and the welfare organizations were\nthe only organized forces in this general field, but since last summer\ntheir work has been supplemented by the establishment within the Army\nitself of a Morale Branch of the General Staff, in the formation of\nwhich the Department was not too proud to take a leaf--perhaps one\nshould say a Blatt--from the Germans, who had already developed this\ntype of organization to a high degree, under the direct supervision of\nGeneral Ludendorff.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI have spoken of the work of prevention, of the more important work of\nsubstitution, and I now come to the most important of all--the spirit of\nconfidence which extended from top to bottom of the huge organization\nthat the great mass of our men would go straight for the sake of going\nstraight. We all instinctively couple the two words, \"officer\" and\n\"gentleman.\" In the great Army which is now being disbanded, its work\nhaving been so gloriously done, we find a new and enlarged conception,\nthat of the soldier and gentleman. It was, I am certain, the preliminary\nassumption that an American soldier was also an American gentleman in\nall the fundamentals of that much-abused term, which was the great\nfactor in keeping down the number of those who proved the contrary to so\nnegligibly small a total.\n\nA few figures from the official records will show what the result of\nthis all has been. In 1909, for instance, there were in the Army, in\nround numbers, 5500 court-martial convictions of enlisted men, out of a\ntotal of 75,000. For the fifteen months ending July 1, 1918, there were\n11,500 convictions out of a total of 2,200,000 enlisted men, the\npercentage in the twelve months of peace being 7.3 and in the fifteen\nmonths of war, .53, about one-fourteenth as great. The significance of\nthese later figures cannot be appreciated without some knowledge of the\nunderlying circumstances. One case I remember was that of a man who got\ndrunk, spent his money and that of some fellow soldiers, and stayed\nabsent without leave to earn money enough to repay his fellow soldiers\nand then returned to camp to take his medicine. What on the surface\nappears to be the cowardly crime of desertion was, in several instances\nof which I have personal knowledge, a misguided effort to get to the\nfront, through enlistment under another name in some branch of the\nservice which seemed to have an earlier prospect of getting over. In\nFrance there were many cases of desertion, but nearly all were from the\nrear to the front. The progressive success of the policy of keeping the\nsoldier from strong drink, by the way, stands out in the figures, which\nshow that early in the war one out of every twelve offenses charged\nincluded drunkenness, but that this proportion dropped until the final\nfigures were less than one in each thirty offenses, this including\nsoldiers in France, where the soldier had to stand on his own feet\nunprotected by prohibition laws.\n\nThe welfare program was, from the nature of the case, most effective\namong the men of the National Army, where it was possible to take the\nsoldiers in hand from the first. If we analyze the court-martial\nrecords, we find that the proportion of court-martials was distinctly\nlowest in this group. The records as of June 30, 1918, show that the\nnumber of court-martials among the Regular Army was a little less than\none per cent, to be accurate 8/10 of one per cent; in the National Guard\nthe proportion was about 9/10 of one per cent; and in the National Army\nit was less than 2/10 of one per cent, the exact figure being .143 per\ncent, one-fiftieth of the percentage ten years ago.\n\nAnother check on the efficiency of the program is found in the records\nas to venereal disease in the Surgeon General's Office. It is hard to\nget comparative figures because of constantly changing conditions, but\nit has been shown beyond all doubt that the health conditions in the\nArmy have been far, far better than in the community at large. While the\nlatter are not so bad as the alarmists have implied, they are serious\nenough in all conscience, when in no fewer than seventeen of the states,\nsixty or more of every thousand men who appeared at the mobilization\ncamps were found to be infected. Taking a typical month before the\nsigning of the armistice, we find that the proportion of cases coming to\nthe camps from the civil community was fifteen times as great as the\nproportion among our soldiers in France, even including the soldiers in\nthe port towns, where most of our difficulties there were found. The\ncomparison with the records of the cantonments in this country is even\nmore striking.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAs to the purely religious appeal and its influence on the men it is\nhard to speak with any degree of certainty. A visiting British general\nin Washington, shortly after our entry into the war, was asked as to\nconditions in England, and is reported to have replied, \"Upon my soul,\nif you ask me, I should say that with us the dear old Church has rather\nmissed the bus.\" In this country the organized religious forces have by\nno means missed the bus, but if we are honest with ourselves we must\nface the fact that since the last great national test, the Civil War,\nother appeals to higher standards of conduct have both actually and\nrelatively been tremendously strengthened, and our religious leaders\nmust address themselves, in the light of experience during these past\ntwo years, to a clearer understanding of these other forces and to a\ncloser cooperation with them. We cannot to-day close our eyes to the\ntruth that many of our finest men played their splendid parts quite\nuntouched by a religious motive or appeal--or at least doctrinal appeal;\none hesitates to call their attitude a non-religious one. It must always\nbe remembered, however, that their standards, no matter how unconscious\nthey may have been of the fact, were fundamentally based upon the\ndevelopment of a Christian civilization.\n\nIf thus far I may have seemed to measure soldier conduct by two\nstandards only, by his relation to drink and to women, it is because the\nresults of the policy of the Army in these two matters are measurable,\nthe records are outstanding. The Army and its experience however would\nfurnish but a poor guide to the Churches and the other civilian forces\nfor righteousness if its lessons were limited to the negative virtues,\nimportant as they are, of sobriety and continence.\n\nThe real contribution, what we have learned as to the positive virtues,\nis harder to describe and impossible to measure, but the lessons are\nworth looking for and may be learned from the letters and from the lips\nof our men. Perhaps I can best indicate what the men themselves regard\nas vital by telling the experience of a friend who started one of the\ncustomary practical talks before an audience of our men behind the lines\nin France. His homily didn't seem to be \"getting across\" and he was\ninspired to ascertain just what to their minds were the most serious\noffenses. He asked each man to write down what he regarded as the three\nvery worst faults against which a soldier should be on his guard. When\nthe answers were collected, one word appeared on practically every slip\nof paper, _cowardice_; the second was not so nearly unanimous, but\nappears on a strong majority of the papers, _selfishness_; and the third\nwas evidently _conceitedness_, though the defect was worded in\ndifferent ways, as _big head_, _crust_, and the like.\n\nIn other words, the virtues which the soldier most admires and regarding\nwhich he had evidently learned the most valuable lessons, are courage,\nunselfishness or cooperativeness, and modesty.\n\nThe record of our soldiers has proved beyond a doubt that once you get\nmen into groups with a common and a worth-while purpose, courage--both\nthe reckless courage that comes by instinct and that higher type, the\ncourage of the man who recognizes his danger--can no longer be assumed\nto be a rare virtue. It is a very common virtue. Cowardice is infinitely\nrarer. The citations and the casualty records, for instance, have\ncompletely rehabilitated the Jew as a fighting man, and the faithful\nneed no longer go back to Josephus for their war legends.\n\nNot all the courage and fortitude was shown on the field of battle. We\nmust not forget that last fall we suffered from by far the most serious\nepidemic in the history of America, and, in the dark days in our\ntraining camps, opportunities were offered, and gladly accepted, for a\ndisplay of heroism and devotion of the highest type.\n\nIn the realm of fortitude, if not of physical courage, the war certainly\ntapped new sources of determination and provided a kind of stimulus\nwhich would keep a man to whom no personal glory or conspicuousness\ncould possibly come, some poor devil sentenced to a swivel chair,\nlaboring in that same chair day and night for the purpose of making some\nsingle improvement in nut or bolt, or perhaps filing card. Given the\nimpetus of a great common purpose, our possibilities for industry are\nlimitless.\n\nOne thing that mankind should have learned long since is that, broadly\nspeaking, selfishness as a guiding motive is essentially negative--the\nabsence of something better--the man is a rare exception who does not\nlose himself and his self-interest in the conception or the ambition of\nthe group, the squad or battalion or regiment, the division, the army or\nthe nation. An interesting side-light upon this is the fact that\ntwo-thirds of the men who get into trouble in the Army, or at any rate\nwho get into sufficiently serious trouble to land them in Fort\nLeavenworth, are markedly of the ego-centric type; in other words, are\nmen for whom the group cannot overcome the individual bias.\n\nThat our soldiers as a whole possess the virtue of modesty, though it is\noften overlaid by a veneer of innocent swagger, is beyond dispute, as\nany one who has had to do with them can testify. And underlying\nand inspiring their whole conduct have been the qualities of\nwhole-souledness and determination and an indomitable cheerfulness.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe must learn the lessons which the soldiers have to teach us in the\nlarge just as we must grasp their accomplishments in the large. There is\na morning after for nations as well as for individuals, and we seem just\nnow to be in danger of losing our conception of the greatness of the\nenterprise, and its essential soundness, through the intrusion of the\ninstances, relatively very few, where things did not go right; where\nhuman nature did not reach the heights, or having reached them, failed\nto remain upon them.\n\nIt has, I think, been definitely proved that the mixing up of the\nso-called welfare work with the special function of the clergymen or\nother religious adviser, in order that the latter may be made more\npalatable to the soldier, has an effect exactly the reverse of what was\nintended. The policy of interpolating a prayer meeting, or a\nheart-to-heart talk, between the third and fourth reels of the moving\npicture play, and I grieve to say that such a policy was actually\nfollowed for a while, is of course a fantastic example, but it shows\nexactly how we ought not to do it.\n\nThe soldiers are peculiarly sensitive to any feeling that what is done\nfor them is done for some other purpose than the ostensible one,\nentirely apart from how worthy such other purpose may be. Let me quote\nfrom a letter written by an officer of the Army who had been visiting a\nnumber of camps:\n\n\"The Camp Library to my mind fulfills one of the most vital needs of the\ncamp. It is a place where our men can get relaxation and mental\nstimulus, and where they can feel at ease without the 'God-bless-you'\natmosphere of the other welfare organizations.\"... \"It is the one place\nin camp where you can go and have a chance to meditate or read in peace\nand quiet without a piano jangling in your ears or the imminent\npossibility of a prayer meeting.\"\n\nThe chaplain or the lay religious worker to whom a man instinctively\nturned at the moment when he needed spiritual help was the one whom he\nhad learned to respect for courage and devotion and dignity, the man who\nhad helped to bury his dead friend, to comfort and amuse his wounded\nfriend, and to advise his misguided friend in the guard-house; not the\none whose ill-timed ministrations he had learned to avoid. I understand\nthat the story of the chaplain who entirely forgot that he was to appear\nat a review for the purpose of receiving a medal and delayed the entire\nproceedings while he was sought for and found in his customary post in\nthe connecting trench, is absolutely authentic.\n\nThe man who could forget his denomination in his devotion to the great\ncommon mission was the man whom the soldier learned to love and to trust\nand who could do the most in the day of battle. The most popular tales\namong the chaplains are the tales of unorthodoxy: The Catholic priest\nwho baptized a group of his men before action in a shell hole with water\nwhich was not only unblessed, but I fear unsanitary, and who simply\nreferred to Philip and the Eunuch when reproved; the Methodist and\nBaptist, and I think the Episcopalian, who in the absence of their\nPresbyterian colleague, solemnly and quite illegally received a\nyoungster into the Presbyterian fold before he went overseas, and\nconfessed the next morning to the Presbyterian Board; the Wesleyan\nchaplain in the British Army who carried a crucifix to comfort the dying\nCatholics on the battlefield when no priest of their faith was near, and\nwho administered the last rites to them as best he could. There are\nhundreds of such stories.\n\nThe appeal of any denomination as such, or of the Y, or the\ncorresponding societies of other faiths, as such, was always mistaken.\nIt was the united appeal of all the doers of good deeds which counted.\nIf we never knew before, we know now the truth of the fable of the\nbundle of fagots. Personally, I believe the united drive for welfare\nwork last fall, during which Protestant, Catholic and Jew, and men of no\nformal religion whatever, appealed from the same platform for the same\ngreat purpose, was an event of the greatest importance in our nation,\nand it will go ill with us if we forget the lesson that it has to teach.\n\nThe appeal must be not only disinterested, but it must be simple and\ndirect. This, and the careful selection of its personnel, had much, if\nnot most, to do with the extraordinary success of the Salvation Army.\nThere are times in a soldier's life when the sewing on of a button at\nsome vital spot will do more to \"get\" him than anything else in the\nworld.\n\nOut of this spirit of general helpfulness, there were developed at\nalmost every point the most beautiful and sympathetic adjustments to\nimmediate conditions. For example, take the plan of showing moving\npictures upon the ceilings of hospital wards, so that the very ill may\nenjoy them without the strain even of raising their heads. This small\npiece of thoughtfulness to me represents the standard of thinking a\nproblem through which we will have to maintain if we are to hold what we\nhave gained, and what we have gained includes, or should include, a\nrealization that active and willing loving-kindness furnishes the\nkeenest of all pleasures.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThus far I have spoken mainly of the work of preparation in the United\nStates. Overseas our soldiers and their officers found new conditions\nand were forced to make new adjustments. We no longer could control the\nlaws and ordinances, and we found different standards of conduct--not\nnecessarily lower standards, but different standards. We could no longer\nenforce prohibition for example, but we did maintain a high average of\ntemperance. We showed our allies, some of whom I may say were honestly\nsceptical on the subject, that with our soldiers continence was the\nrule, and not the exception. When I was in France last year, I asked\nthose who were in a position to know upon this point and was told that,\ncomparatively speaking, very, very few of our men lowered in France the\nstandards of conduct which they held when they came into the Army, that\nmany more greatly improved those standards, either because of the\nlessons they had learned in our training camps, or because of the\nwholesome companionship of the women workers with whom they were daily\nbrought in contact, or because, and this was probably the most potent\nfactor of all, they were so desperately keen to get into the fighting\nline that they were taking no chances of being put out of commission\nbeforehand. Their morality was the morality of the team in training for\nthe big game, and it kept tens of thousands of boys straight. Indeed,\nuntil November 11, disciplinary problems may be said to have been\npractically non-existent among combat troops and almost negligible among\nthe others. After the armistice was signed, there was a let-down, this\nbeing after all a very human body of young men, and the first remedy\ntried by some of the old-time regulars did not help a bit. This was to\n\"give 'em plenty of drill and make 'em so tired they won't have energy\nto get into mischief,\" but as one returning artillery officer pointed\nout to me, when a battery a month before has fired 50,000 rounds of\nhigh-explosive at the Boche, and worked its guns over craters and\nthrough thickets, a drill with dummy ammunition on a parade ground is\nalmost a justification for mutiny. Wiser counsel soon prevailed and the\nwelfare work, which had slumped with the rest, was again brought up to\nconcert pitch. It was for the first time in France, properly coordinated\nunder Army control. The misfits and the workers who had worn themselves\nout were returned to this country and their places taken by fresh blood.\nI remember in this connection a paragraph tucked in the middle of the\nuncompromising officialdom of the daily departmental cable: \"Send over\nplenty of welfare workers and remember the best men you can send are the\nwomen.\"\n\nLet me take this chance to say a word about the criticisms we have been\nhearing of this welfare work abroad. In the first place, the success of\nthe work in this country among the men in training set up an expectation\nwhich it was humanly impossible to meet under the conditions overseas;\nin other words, the men who went over assumed standards as to the\nminimum amount of attention which it was their right to expect, the like\nof which had never been dreamed in the history of mankind. As a matter\nof fact, and taken as a whole, the treatment which they received was\nadmirable and the comparatively few who now doubt the truth of this\nstatement will come to realize it as time goes on. They will see that\nthe misfits, the over-wrought, stood out in their minds like men out of\nalignment at parade, that they simply did not notice the thousands of\nmen and women whose work for them was all that their own mothers could\nhave asked.\n\nThe following official cablegram records the state of educational,\nrecreation and welfare work at the end of April, 1919.\n\n\"Educational activities: Roughly there are 209,000 students embraced in\nthis scheme. Ten thousand are at A.E.F. University at Beaune, some 7,000\nare attending French universities. 3,000 attending British. There are\nroughly 130,000 men at Post Schools, which correspond to our elementary\nschools in United States. 55,000 are attending the Divisional\nEducational Schools, which correspond to our High schools. In addition\nthere are approximately 58,000 men in specialized vocational schools\nwhere they have full shop facilities of A.E.F.\n\n\"Athletic activities: Athletic activities increasing daily in scope and\npopularity. Figures for February show 6,500,000 individual participants\nin games. In addition to mass athletics, unit championships are being\nplayed in football, basketball, soccer, boxing, tennis, swimming, tug of\nwar, golf, track and field.\n\n\"Entertainment activities: Reports of entertainment officers show\nmonthly attendance for A.E.F. of between eight and ten million. Moving\npictures, professional talent from United States and particularly\nsoldier shows being utilized in all parts of army and have done much to\ntake care of leisure hours of troops. Horse shows have been held in\nnearly every division of A.E.F. and have proved very popular. Amount of\nall this work now being carried on is little short of stupendous.\"\n\nThe following paragraphs from a personal letter are particularly\nsignificant as coming from an officer of the regular army, who when he\nwas in command of one of the cantonments in the United States was\ngenuinely alarmed lest the War Department had not lost its sense of\nproportion, and was creating parlor ornaments instead of fighting men:\n\n\"I served in the Army of Occupation in the Philippines and in China\nafter the Boxer campaign, and I want to tell you that the discipline and\n_esprit de corps_ of these troops in Germany is incomparably better than\nanything I saw there.\n\n\"I think nothing has so contributed to this result as the welfare work\nand the educational work undertaken. We have every reason to be proud of\nthe fact that we had people in command of the army who had the vision to\nsee what result this work would bring.\n\n\"I took command of the --th Division in the Army of Occupation in\nDecember, and up until the present time I never worked with a happier or\nmore contented lot of men. Of course they all want to go home, and we\nwouldn't have much use for them if they didn't, but an intensified\nmilitary course of training in the morning, schools and athletics in the\nafternoon, and study and entertainment in the evening have made their\ndays so full that they have been perfectly contented to stay until their\nboat comes in June.\n\n\"This has been the experience of all the divisions up here in Germany,\nand their enthusiasm, I fear, when they get home, may be taken for\npro-Germanism.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe War Department has learned so much in this great laboratory\nexperiment in human conduct that the impious wish sometimes arises in\none's mind that we might promptly try it all over again for the chance\nof profiting by our mistakes. Thank God we can't do that, but in our\ndaily contact with these same men restored to their communities we can\nto a certain degree carry on the work, and in so doing we can learn much\nfrom the successes and failures of the Army.\n\nIn planning for the immediate future, there are some things which we\nmustn't forget. In the first place, we mustn't expect these young men\n(or any humans for that matter) to be capable of remaining at concert\npitch indefinitely.\n\nFor a while, in dealing with the soldier who has returned from overseas,\nreal ingenuity will be required to make much impression upon his mind.\nNot only will ordinary life seem tame but, frankly, he is likely to have\nbeen overhandled and overwelfared. If, however, we have erred in this\nregard, it has been on the right side.\n\nMay I venture still another suggestion, and that is to be careful and\nconsiderate of the soldier who, despite his earnest desire, failed to\nget across, and for the matter of that, of the young man who didn't get\ninto the Army at all. The morale of these two groups will need our\nparticular care.\n\nIn closing, however, we should not end upon a note of warning, but\nrather upon one of exultation; for the war has taught us, if it has\ntaught nothing else, that, given a great cause and a cross-section of\nour heterogeneous American population, the resulting revelation of the\npower of human endurance, human courage and human accomplishment comes\npretty near to proving objectively the divinity of man.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 1: An address delivered at the one hundredth anniversary of\nthe General Theological Seminary, New York, April 30, 1919.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE WAR AS A PRACTICAL TEST OF AMERICAN SCHOLARSHIP[2]\n\n\nIt is a difficult task to attempt to define the American scholar of\nto-day. If any of you doubt it, let him try it as I have tried.\nScholarship, like many another broad term, has no sharply marked edges.\nIt is hard to define anything that lacks definiteness; and, after all,\nthe task is relatively profitless, because we all of us recognize what\nis at the center of the concept. I think we all recognize that the\nscholar is an expert in some particular field or fields; but he is more\nthan the expert as such, in that he knows enough of other matters to see\nhis particular specialty in its relation to things in general. He must,\nto this degree at least, be a philosopher. This very general conception\nof scholarship is fairly constant, but the fields which the conception\nincludes are broadening day by day and almost hour by hour. We cannot\nto-day limit scholarship to the polite branches which were all that it\nembodied when this Society was founded or even when this Chapter was\nestablished. The scholar of the old-fashioned type must now accept as\nhis fellow the man who has helped to flatten the trajectory of the\n16-inch shell, or to control the birth rate of the cootie. Later on I\nshall suggest one other element which, in the light of the test which\nAmerican scholarship has undergone in the past two years, it seems to me\nshould now be included in our idea of the typical American scholar.\n\nWe Americans are proud of being called a nation of inventors; and most\nof us have made, or almost made, private discoveries of an inventional\nnature which, for some reason, have never come to fruition. The\nscientific boards in Washington during the war received more than sixty\nthousand suggestions in some mechanical field; and I am told by those\nwho ought to know that of all these not more than five of those coming\nfrom untrained minds were of any practical value. Even from the trained\nminds there came, I am told, no fundamental discovery in science as a\ndirect result of the war conditions. Suggestions of improvements in\ndetail and valuable suggestions there were in plenty, new applications\nof known principles, but application of a fundamentally new idea, no.\nThat is only to say what we already know, that discovery is not made to\norder. In each case the idea had already been born in the mind of some\nintellectual pioneer and worked out by him, and some man who had the\nidea in the front of his mind was at hand to apply it to the new\ncondition. And that means, I think, that if we met the test, we met it\nwith our scholars.\n\nWhen the test came, certain fields of scholarship naturally afforded a\nbetter chance for immediate service than others. The chemist, for\nexample, had a better chance a thousand-fold than the archaeologist. It\nis extraordinary, however, how many of the gifts which burned bright on\nthe national altar came from men with some out-of-the-way specialty.\nTake archaeology itself, if you will. The best trench helmet developed\nduring the war was designed by the expert in armor from our own academic\nfellowship. I am told that a very important element in the length of\ntime which it took to control the submarine menace was the fact that\nwhen war broke out the science of oceanography was almost wholly in the\nhands of the Germans. When the world's supply of cocoanut husks was\ntaken up for gas masks and we still needed charcoal, we had to turn for\nadditional sources to the tropical botanist, who might have been\nexpected to remain reasonably undisturbed. It remained for a scholar in\nperhaps the purest branch of pure science, astronomy, to recognize the\nwell known fact that it is the shape of the tail of any and every moving\nobject, motor car or boat or what you will, and not the shape of the\nhead, which is the factor of chief importance in design, and to apply\nthis recognition to artillery problems. The re-designing of our\nartillery shells under the direction of this astronomer added miles to\ntheir range. Another astronomer applied his experience in studying the\nmovement of comets to solving certain problems of long-range artillery\nfire where the projectile in its flight rises into the circumambient\nether.\n\nIn proving the case for the American scholar, as I think we can prove\nit, we should not be beguiled into the pleasant task of recording the\ndeeds of scholars and gentlemen when the deeds were those of the gallant\ngentleman rather than of the scholar _per se_. We have one here in our\nown academic family whose lieutenant's bars I should be as proud to wear\nas the stars of any of our generals. Nor need we, I think, cite the\ninstances where the rigorous training of the scholar clearly laid the\nfoundation for great accomplishment in some general field of\nadministration. The man whom we can thank perhaps more than any other\nfor the brilliant conduct of our war finance was seventeen years ago\neditor-in-chief of the _Columbia Law Review_. We may well turn with\npride, but we don't need him to prove our point, to the scholar of this\nuniversity, formerly president of this Chapter, who, from his own\ntalents and experience and his alert sense of scholarship in others, has\nearned the place which he now holds as educational director of the\nlargest university in the world, the A.E.F. University at Beaune.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOur case rests, as I say, upon the direct applications of scholarship,\nand not only upon their quality, but on their range. A single division\nof the National Research Council, in its report for 1918, showed work of\nnational significance by the scholars in physics, mathematics, and\nallied fields toward the solution of no fewer than sixty-eight\ndifferent problems, every one of which needed for its solution men with\ntraining and knowledge and vision. At the outset, who among us had the\nslightest conception of the complexity of the adaptations to warfare of\nwhat was known to modern scholarship? We knew that the war was mounting\ninto the air, but who had any realization of the adjustments which this\ninvolved? Fifteen fundamental problems based on pure physics promptly\narose with reference to instruments for airplane operation. For example,\nat night and in the clouds, the aviator must have before his eyes a dial\nwhich will indicate the slightest deviation from his course. Seven\nproblems had to do with airplane photography. As the art of camouflage\nadvanced, for instance, color filters had to be devised for its\ndetection from above. Seven additional problems had to do with factors\nof construction and maintenance, as fuel efficiency. Nine others\naffected ballooning; and the balloon, as the war developed, came to be\nof greater and greater importance. Eleven studies were in signalling:\none, for example, a device for secret daylight signalling, with a range\nof five miles or more. And please remember that all these were the task\nof one branch of one organization within the field of pure science. By\ncommon consent, the dullest branch of physics was held to be acoustics,\nbut since 1914 the whole question of sound-ranging has been in the hands\nof experts in acoustics. A device developed by American physicists gave\nour men nineteen seconds in which to take cover from cannon fired four\nmiles away. The most brilliant work in this field was that of a former\nstudent of the Columbia School of Mines.\n\nIf I were to pick out one field in which the scholarly attitude has been\nmost brilliantly rewarded, it is that of medicine. If our army surgeons\nand sanitarians had been confined to the practical family doctors, who\ncannot be bothered with all this new-fangled stuff, our men would have\ndied like flies from disease, as they did in the Spanish-American War.\nIt was the laboratory man, the theorist, the highbrow if you like, who\nmade our health record a matter of national pride and congratulation. It\nwas the knowledge of a scholar, coupled with his instinctive\nunderstanding of the human heart--neither could have accomplished the\npurpose alone--which sent hundreds of shell-shocks, as they came to be\ncalled (people used to call the condition by an uglier, if not a\nshorter, term) back into the lines with self-respect and nerve renewed.\n\nTo turn to another field, it was a real scholar, even if he were also a\ndean, who, in spite of the best efforts of his practical associates to\ndeter him, brought order out of chaos in the most important of our war\nboards through the collection and skillful presentation of statistical\ndata.\n\nIn many cases it was the scholar whom we must thank for the pointing out\nof the obvious. The early drafts rejected thousands of excellent\npotential soldiers because our existing height regulations were drawn\nfor men of the northern European races; and the minimum height limit was\nwell within the normal variation of the men of southern European\nancestry, which has been so large an element in our recent immigration.\nSimilarly, men of science have pointed out that the length of the\nmarching step depends not alone on the length of the legs, but even more\non the width of the hips, a simple fact which is of real military\nsignificance. The scholars in the Forest Products laboratories knew how\nto make boxes that would not break and spill their contents on the\nwharves at Hoboken or St. Nazaire, and, equally important, they knew\nhow to educate the quartermasters to use them.\n\nThe fact that in many fields we reached the limits of available\nman-power meant a wonderful stimulation to the study of certain problems\naffecting human welfare. Take for example the physiological aspects of\nindustrial fatigue. In this field an excellent theoretical start had\nbeen made before the war, but the appeal was limited to those interested\nin the individual worker. With the war, however, and the shortage of\nlabor, came a new and, I fear, a more potent appeal--the interest in the\nproduct and its prompt production. The worker who collapsed could not be\nreplaced. Long hours or unsanitary surroundings meant spoiled material\nand broken-down machinery and resultant delay. And when there was a\nscholar at hand to show why this was so, you may be sure he had his day\nin court.\n\nThe work of the scholar has not wholly been in getting things done.\nPerhaps an equally important side was in keeping impossible or\nunprofitable things from being attempted. When time was of the very\nessence of the whole program, the man who could say \"No\" and prove the\nvalidity of his objection, performed a positive work of great value.\nOne of our associates at Columbia had a leading share in devising tests\nfor candidates for the flying school, which, by rejecting the unfit at\nthe outset, saved many lives from the time of their adoption and many,\nmany thousands of dollars; for the training of a flyer who cannot be\nused when the time comes is a very costly piece of national extravagance\nin both money and men.\n\nOur scholars did not confine their activities to the battle of\nWashington. Not only as engineers and doctors, but as geologists and\ngeographers, as meteorologists and sanitarians, they went with the\ntroops to the front, and their counsel as to actual military operations\nwas welcomed and followed. One of them, a bachelor and doctor of this\nUniversity, died in the service in France. The scholar, like the\nsoldier, stood ready to step forward to fill the gap in the ranks as he\nsaw it, regardless of whether something more dignified might be found\nfor him to do. Our own Barnard, Professor of Education, took what he was\npleased to call his vacation in applying his scholarship to organizing\nan educational program for the wounded men in our hospitals, as a\ntherapeutic measure. Being a scholar and not merely an expert, he saw\nthe broad human aspect of his specialty; that the first thing to do with\nthe man who is blinded, or otherwise maimed, is to make him realize that\nit is worth while to get well; that he can have a life which is worth\nliving; that if his old job is no longer possible, there are others for\nwhich he can be trained. One of America's most distinguished\nphilosophical chemists settled down to the humble but very essential\nproblem of making mixed flours rise and bake with a crust--and solved\nit. The war services of a past President of this Chapter, now, alas, no\nlonger with us, and those of our present President have been as useful\nas they have been inconspicuous.\n\nThe need for the scholar was not only qualitative, but quantitative. But\nfor the general distribution of chemical knowledge in France and\nEngland, and the presence of men capable of promptly applying that\nknowledge to combat the gas attacks launched by the Germans, the war\nwould have been lost before we could possibly have rendered the\nslightest assistance; and on our side of the Atlantic when the armistice\nwas signed, there were two thousand trained chemists engaged in the\nproblems of gas warfare alone. Our country, in a word, needed not only\nto have some men with the requisite training, but men enough to meet\nsimultaneously many needs in many fields, and these men were drawn in\nlarge measure from our academic faculties. While one must not press the\nidentity between the scholar and the professor too hard--for a number of\nreasons--the fact remains that the teaching profession provided the main\nreservoir from which the country drew. One of my friends in the Chemical\nWarfare Service has summarized the relation between the academic scholar\nand that branch of the army activity. Both chiefs of the Chemical\nService Station were college professors, one of them a member of this\nChapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Of the fourteen heads of the Research\nDivision, eight were college professors. It was the college professors\nwho made fundamental improvements in gas masks on the one hand, and who\ndevised new gases to test the German masks on the other.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAs a nation, we did not realize at the outset, as Germany did, the\nimportance of the man who knows, and of knowing who he is and where he\nis; and here, perhaps, lay our most fundamental unpreparedness. What\nthis cost us may be judged from a single instance. A code message from\nGermany directing the dismantling of the German ships lying in our ports\nwas intercepted. If we had known that there was a professor of English\nin the University of Chicago who, in the pursuit of his medieval\nresearches, had developed the power of reading ciphers almost at sight,\nthat cable from Germany could have been promptly deciphered, we could\nhave forestalled the sabotage, and something like six months in the use\nof these ships for the transport of our troops and munitions could have\nbeen gained.\n\nThe job of getting the man who knew into the right niche was not an easy\none. The scholars could not all be spared; for, after all, education and\nresearch are essential industries, and, fortunately for our institutions\nof learning, for our reviews and scientific agencies, and fortunately\nfor the country as a whole, all of our scholars did not rush immediately\ninto government work. The less thrilling task of keeping the lamps\nburning in our lighthouses was never more important than during the\nstormy days which we have just gone through. Furthermore, the scholar is\na modest person, though he has his human vanities, as we all know who\nhave seen our colleagues in uniform; but usually some one had to know\nabout him and invite him to his place, a very sharp contrast to the\nbusiness men and lawyers who came down to Washington by the trainload to\nimpress us with their capacity to do any job which involved a commission\nof properly high degree.\n\nIn general, I should say that the individuals in the universities met\nthe test better than the institutions themselves. The latter did not, it\nseems to me, as institutions, grasp the situation. Very few studied the\nquestion of the assignment of their specialists as a problem in\nconservation as well as in publicity; and as far as the use of their\nfacilities in the training of soldiers and sailors is concerned, the War\nDepartment and the Navy Department had literally to teach them how to\nmeet the war conditions. Such help as came from organized bodies of\nscholars came rather from the learned societies than from the academic\ngroups.\n\nThen there was a further difficulty, particularly among the younger men,\nthough not wholly among them. The expert's job, and hence inclusively\nthe scholar's job, is relatively safe so far as the immediate risk of\ndeath is concerned, though not the risk of shortening life through\noverwork. One Columbia man, well over the draft age, told me frankly\nthat he would gladly give up an important public office he held for the\nprivilege of fighting with his hands, but he could not be tempted by an\nopportunity to fight with his head. Through this same impulse many and\nmany a man attempted to conceal his special knowledge in order that he\nmight fight in the line. The Army Committee on Classification of\nPersonnel, which was in itself a beautiful example of scholarship in\npractical application, was able, however, in most instances to pluck out\nthe expert from the line and set him, whether he was willing or not, at\nthe task for which he was particularly adapted and particularly needed.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhat, from the point of view of the non-scholar, can be said as to the\ngeneral usefulness of the men and women (for the women did their share)\nwho came forward or were brought forward to take this trial by fire on\nbehalf of American scholarship? First of all, the scholar must be a real\nscholar; he must have the natural ability and the long and rigorous\ntraining necessary for accurate observation, and observation of the kind\nwhich, if I may be forgiven a most unscholarly metaphor, includes the\nability to distinguish the blue chips from the white; his deductions\nmust be relentless, and his inductions must be luminous. That is asking\na good deal, and it would be enough if his dealings were to be with\nother scholars or with scholars in the making. The papers of a leisurely\nrecluse can be dug out by others from the even more deliberately\npublished proceedings of learned societies, even as the author has dug\nout those of his predecessors, and ultimately the practical application\nof his discoveries will be made. In national emergency, however, this\nprocess will not suffice. The scholar must descend from his tower; he\nmust, if he is to serve effectively, learn to think to order and to do\nit rapidly, to deal with all sorts and conditions of men; he must bear\nwith their amazing ignorances and profit by their equally amazing\nknowledge of things of which he is ignorant. He must know the art of\nteam play. The war has brought out a new type of scholarship, or at any\nrate has developed it to such an extent that its implications are new,\nand that is the unselfish cooperation of experts to meet a given and\nusually an immediately pressing need. The development of the Liberty\nmotor furnishes a good example of the results of such cooperative\neffort. It seems to me that the most important single lesson which our\nscholars can learn from the experience of the two past years is the\nimportance of this team play in scholarship, and not only team play with\nother scholars, but team play with those who have the equally valuable\nand perhaps even rarer gift of getting things done, who perhaps deserve\nthe title of scholars in the control of time and space. The scholars who\nmade good were those who had had not only the training and temperament\nfor research, but the training and temperament for working with other\npeople. The scholarship of the man who from self-centeredness or from a\nmistaken absorption in his specialty lacked the art of dealing with his\nfellow men was likely to prove a sterile scholarship, and in most cases\na useless scholarship in the day of national need.\n\nOne of the most dramatic things about the war was the speeding up of\nsupply and transport under the strong hand of the man who had brought\nthe Panama Canal to completion. General Goethals was no administrative\ntheorist. He was willing to try anything and anybody once, but he was\nprompt in rejecting what did not promptly accomplish his purpose. An\nengineer of General Goethals' distinction can be regarded as a scholar\nin his particular field; but the point I want to make is that during his\nservice as Quartermaster-General, when officers of the regular army and\nover-night majors, as they were called, presidents of manufacturing\nplants, bankers and lawyers, were passing in what seemed to be an almost\nunbroken procession through his office, he retained just two men in his\ninner circle from first to last, and both were academic persons. Herbert\nHoover surrounded himself with scholars, entomologists, statisticians\nand public health men. He did not always use them for their specialties,\nbut he evidently liked the type. The great welfare societies did the\nsame, and the list of academic men whom they used makes an impressive\ntotal.\n\nThese instances are typical of a very general success among scholars in\ncooperating effectively and helpfully with eminently practical men. This\nmay be because the scholar has been trained in a form of competition\nwhich the so-called practical man lacked. He is used to having his work\nwiped out by some discovery of a rival, and having to begin afresh. He\nis used to a checking of his work by his fellows which, if of a\ndifferent nature, is no less relentless than the war-time check in the\ntoll of human lives. The man of high reputation in business often failed\nbecause he had learned to measure success and his own competence only in\nterms of dividends, and in the new test he found his measuring-rod worse\nthan useless.\n\nOur scholars of the cooperative type not only pursued their researches,\nbut they got their military associates into the habit of thinking in\nterms of scholarship. One of their most useful accomplishments,\ninitiated by a Doctor of Philosophy of this University, was the\norganization of Thursday evening conferences for the discussion of the\nnew scientific and technical problems facing the Army and Navy. This\nfurnished a nucleus for the exchange of ideas between the different\nresearch groups, both here and abroad; for scholarship was mobilized and\nutilized in France, England, and Italy, as well as here, and our Allies\nlaid their scientific discoveries before us with the greatest loyalty.\nAt these conferences their reports were discussed and digested and\napplied, instead of being pigeon-holed at the War College, as I fear\nmight have been otherwise the case. It was as a result of one of these\nconferences that a member of this Chapter, acting on a hint which came\nfrom a French report, was largely instrumental in developing a method of\nsubmarine detection through sound-waves of a particular type, which,\nthough it came too late to be of service in the war, may serve in peace\nto relieve the greatest terror of the mariner, the danger of collision\nin darkness or fog with sister vessel or iceberg or derelict. A potent\nfactor in breaking down the barriers and delays of departmental\njealousies and bureaucratic tradition all along the line was the\nfree-masonry of the company of scholars in Washington.\n\nIt must not be forgotten that our scholar in war worked under two\npowerful stimuli, neither of them operative under ordinary conditions.\nAlthough he was out of his accustomed setting, working with strange\npeople and at strange tasks, nevertheless the realization of the\nnational need and the joy of feeling an identification with the forces\nfacing the adversary tended to produce that fine frenzy which enables a\nman to do better than he knows how. Then, for the first time in history,\nthe scholar had unlimited funds. It is an interesting subject for\nspeculation as to how he can ever go back to the limits of academic\nappropriations. It is to be feared that in many cases he will not, but\nwill turn to industrial enterprises instead. If, however, there was an\nunlimited supply of funds, there was a corresponding deficiency in time,\nand the scholar who could not speed up to meet the new conditions had\nlittle chance to make his mark. The men who failed in war because they\ncould not grasp the significance of the time factor may, however, still\nbe eminently useful in peace. On the other hand, the training which some\nof our scholars received in meeting another war-time condition is likely\nto have an important influence upon the relation of scholarship to\nindustry. Many a scholar found for the first time that to meet a given\ncondition a beautiful laboratory solution may be no solution at all,\nthat the answer, to be effective, must meet the peculiar condition of\nquantity production.\n\nThe merit of the Liberty engine, of which I have already spoken, lies\nnot alone in the excellence of its design, admirable as that is, but in\nthe fact that it is so constructed that we could produce fifteen hundred\nof them in a single week. Or, to take another example, in 1914 we made\nall together eighteen hundred field glasses in this country. Last\nwinter, thanks to the cooperation of the scholars in the chemistry of\nglass and in the field of optics on the one hand, and of the experts in\nquantity production on the other, we were making thirty-five hundred\npairs of field glasses each week. There are many other adaptations of\nscholarship to industry that are awaiting similar practical solutions.\nOne of our most distinguished scholars in physics has said publicly that\nthe day is past when one can defend any distinction between pure and\napplied science. One might as well try to distinguish between pure and\napplied virtue.\n\nI said at the outset that I would venture later on an enlargement of the\nconception of the American scholar, in the light of what the past two\nyears have made so clear. The scholar himself as well as those of us who\nare not scholars, needs, I think, to get a somewhat broader conception\nof the term; to develop it from its present popular connotation so that\nthe attributes which come to one's mind will no longer be the static and\nselfish, but rather the dynamic and social. Emerson, in his essay on the\nAmerican Scholar, seems to have some prophetic glimpse of this broader\nconception. He says, for example, that \"action is with the scholar\nsubordinate, but it is essential; that without it, he is not yet man;\nthat the true scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by, as\na loss of power\"; and elsewhere, \"that a great soul will be strong to\nlive, as well as strong to think.\" The old idea of the scholar was the\nrecluse, the individual; the new, it seems to me, should be one of a\ncompany of builders, each bringing to the common task, for the general\nwelfare, his training and craft, his knowledge and ideas, to combine\nthem with the gifts which his fellows are bringing.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThus far almost all my modern instances have been taken from the realms\nof natural science. I need not remind you, however, that although\nscience has tremendously broadened the range of scholarship,\nnevertheless the scholarship which is a practical asset is not and never\nwill be limited to natural science. The record of the past two years has\nmany an example of the essentially important work of scholars in other\nfields. The records are not so clear-cut, the results are perhaps more\noften negative; but the work was done and it counted. In the field of\npublic information our American scholars in the political sciences did\nexcellent work under the direction of a Doctor of Philosophy of this\nUniversity, and their record for fairness and sanity makes an enviable\ncontrast with the pathetic propaganda of the German intellectuals.\nSimilarly, the work of our Columbia scholars of the Legislative Drafting\nBureau proved of great value in formulating and, perhaps more important,\nin discouraging legislation.\n\nIn general, however, I think we ought to face the fact squarely that our\nscholarship in man's relations with his fellow men, in his understanding\nof himself and his fellows as contrasted with his mastery of physical\nthings, cannot claim so clear-cut a decision. Even in science we should\nnot set too great store by ourselves. Professor, late Colonel, Millikan\nwrites: \"The contribution of the United States in research and\ndevelopment lines was less, far less in proportion to our resources and\npopulation, than that of England or France, and this in spite of the far\nheavier strain under which they were laboring.\" And yet, with us,\nscience was better mobilized, better equipped, and can make a better\nshowing than the humanities. Part of this can be readily explained by\nthe statement that preparation for war is after all engineering on a\nhuge scale. But we must not prove too much if we are to profit by the\nlesson. For example, the war found us utterly unprepared in\nforeign-language knowledge; and we are still unprepared. How many real\nAmericans, I don't mean recent immigrants, but men and women with our\ntraditions and our point of view, can speak Russian? How many can speak\nthe languages of the Near East or Far East?\n\nExcellent work has been done by individual philosophers, economists, and\nsociologists in labor questions, in welfare work, on the war-time trade\nand industrial boards; but as a whole our scholars in these fields did\nnot dominate the situation as did the men of science in theirs. Of\ncourse, their task was infinitely harder. For one thing, though we may\nbe ready to confess our ignorance of calculus or colloidal chemistry or\nthermo-dynamics, we all believe in the validity of our off-hand\njudgments in politics and morals, and indeed in all the springs of human\nconduct. Yet when all allowances are made, the fact remains that there\nis a scholarship in these matters and we have American scholars in them,\nbut that with distinguished exceptions these professionals permitted the\nman in the street or the man in the editor's chair, or in Congress, or\nin the Cabinet, to proclaim his amateur pronouncement and to get away\nwith it. Indeed, I will go further and say that not a few who know or\nought to know that it is not necessary to be intolerant in order to be\npatriotic seemed to set their knowledge upon this point at one side. In\nwar time it is a matter for the scholar's judgment and conscience to\ndecide whether it is wise to attempt a leadership which at the moment\nwill be misunderstood and probably ineffective, possibly even dangerous,\nbecause of the reaction, to the cause he has at heart; or to bide his\ntime in silence, awaiting a more suitable time to be heard. But I submit\nthat he is sinning against the light when he joins in the hue and cry of\nthe untrained and the half-trained. The war has given the natural\nscientist his chance, and he has profited thereby. In the years to come\nthe test will, I think, shift to the scholars in the human sciences. The\ncrises of the future will have to do with problems of human conduct\nrather than of the control of physical things; and, as these crises\ncome, our scholars in human relations should be more ready for the call\nto mobilize.\n\nIn practically every case the instances that I have given of the\nsuccessful tests of our scholarship involve the work of a member of Phi\nBeta Kappa or of the sister society, Sigma Xi; and I therefore may be\npermitted to say a word more directly to our younger members of the\nsociety of those seeking the philosophy of life, to our Columbia\nscholars in the making. In my time, which, by the way, was just\ntwenty-one years ago, a man who wanted to live the life of a scholar was\npractically limited to teaching as the means of making his living. The\nresult in the way of incompetent and halfhearted teaching we all know.\nLet me say to you of to-day that unless you want to teach, there is no\nreason under heaven why you should do so. There are plenty of other\nmeans of earning an honest living. The scholar is not nowadays limited\nto the academic halls. We have scholars of the first quality not only in\nspecial research institutions, but in government bureaus and in\nindustrial organizations. The men in government service who could be\nspared from their other responsibilities for war work made an excellent\nwar record. On the other hand, we want to remember that the real\nteacher, whether in the faculty or out of it, has a tremendous\nadvantage in the art of presentation. During the war the effectiveness\nof our scholar teachers was well tested by an entirely new set of\npupils, pupils sometimes with eagles or stars on their shoulders, or in\nthe civil field, captains of industry, clad in the glittering armor of a\nbig business reputation.\n\nNowadays one cannot be a scholar in general. One has to have some\nspecialty. As to what that specialty shall be in terms of usefulness to\nthe community, I think I have given you examples enough to show that the\nrange is almost unlimited. I had planned to sum up this by a brief\nrecord of the discovery and application to war purposes of helium; but I\nfind that one of my own students in Columbia College, now a member of\nthe Geological Survey, has beaten me out; and you can find the whole\nstory in the May issue of the _National Geographic Magazine_. I cannot\nresist, however, a summary of the steps. First, the astronomer, just\nabout the time this chapter was established, finds a new line in the\nsolar spectrum. Thirty years later, the geologist comes upon an unusual\nstone and turns to a great chemist for its analysis, with the consequent\nrecognition of helium as a mundane element. About the same time comes\nits identification as one of the newly recognized ingredients of the\nair, and the study of its properties. Then a Kansas chemist discovers\nits presence in some natural gas about which he was consulted because it\nwould not burn properly. Then comes the war with its incendiary bullet\nand the need of a non-inflammable content for balloons and dirigibles.\nThen the cooperation of physicist, engineer, and geologist--Canadian and\nAmerican--makes helium available for this purpose. Before these\nresearches helium cost $1700 a cubic foot and was obtainable only in\nGermany. The present price is 10 cents a cubic foot, and it is falling.\nThe importance of all this for peace is very great. In these days of\nairplane hops we are forgetting that a Zeppelin made the trip from\nBulgaria to what should have been German East Africa with medicines and\nammunition. The Germans having disappeared in the meantime, the Zeppelin\nturned around and came back, making a continuous voyage of several\nthousand miles.\n\nBut do not forget that not all scholars made good in the great test. Let\nme sum up what I have already said. In the first place, to be useful the\nscholarship must be sound. The near-scholar, the man who took the\nshort-cut in preparation, proved to be a positive danger. The mere\nexpert in some narrow field, the man who did not realize the\nimplications of what he knew, was relatively useless. A man to succeed\nhad to be intense without being narrow. Even among the sound scholars,\nthe men who really knew, the isolated and insulated individual could\nvery rarely make much headway. It was the open-minded scholar, the maker\nand keeper of friends, who got his chance, the scholar whose learning\nwas to him a living thing, not necessarily to be displayed in the market\nplace, and never for the sake of the display, but on the other hand\nnever wrapped in a napkin and buried in the earth.\n\nWill the scholar, now that his practical worth has been tested and\nproved, be content to slip back into relative obscurity; or will he, on\nthe other hand, be tempted too far into the limelight and thereby lose\nthose very qualities which gave him his value? Will he be satisfied with\npositions of leadership rather than leadership itself, which may be a\nvery different thing? It is largely for you young men and young women of\nthe rising generation of scholars to say.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 2: An address delivered before the New York Delta of Phi Beta\nKappa at Columbia University upon the fiftieth anniversary of the\nestablishment of the Chapter, June 3, 1919.]\n\n\n\n\nWHAT HAVE WE LEARNED?[3]\n\n\nI am going to try to select three or four general fields in which we\nAmericans have had a chance to learn lessons of permanent value as the\nresult of our war experience. Then I shall try to apply these to what\nseems to me the most typical specimen of the best in American life, a\ngreat American University; and finally, I shall try to apply them to the\nsituation which faces you young men and women of the graduating class as\nyou step out to take your places in the world. And in so doing I'm going\nto look deliberately on the bright side. There are troubles enough in\nthe world to worry and depress us, and we have to face them, but let us\nface them with a confidence that is justified in the light of the\nexamples of man's endurance, of his courage, of his possibilities of\naccomplishment, which it has been our privilege to witness within the\nlifetime of this academic generation.\n\nWhat have we learned? In the first place, we have learned that as a\nnation we possess the power to see a big job through, and we possess it\nbecause we have the qualities of youth--enthusiasm, learning capacity,\nenergy, elasticity, initiative--the pioneering spirit. We have the\nshortcomings of youth also--impatience, superficiality, improvidence,\ncock-sureness--but when the test came we managed to strengthen our\nvirtues and to a large extent to overcome our failings.\n\nThe various stocks that have emigrated to our shores have come as\nsuccessive waves of pioneers, of men to whom new and unfamiliar\nconditions serve as an incentive rather than a discouragement, and it is\nthe persistence of this pioneering spirit, essentially a youthful\nspirit, which has had much to do with our success.\n\nWhat single group made the finest impression in the great war? I think\nwe will agree that it was the American doughboy. As one saw him in\nFrance he was absolutely youth incarnate, and he is a cross section of\nour complex population. If anyone still doubts that all of these stocks,\nthe Teutonic included, have been willing to do their share even at the\nrisk or cost of life, let him read any of the lists of battle\ncasualties or the list of honors for heroic conduct and he will have the\nbest kind of proof. Let us remember in this connection that nearly\none-fourth of our drafted men couldn't speak and write English\nadequately when they entered the Army. In spite of a number of unsightly\npieces of slag, which are either floating on the surface or have sunk to\nthe bottom, the great national melting pot has evidently done its work\nwell.\n\nOur heterogeneous immigration, our enormous national resources, which\nhave tempted us to live on capital rather than on interest, our\nprosperity, have made us neither fat nor flabby. We now know that as a\npeople we don't really care about money or the money game if we are\nshown some other game better worth playing; that selfishness and luxury\ndrop away as if by magic when they interfere with the keener\nsatisfactions of giving one's self. Even for us stay-at-homes, the\nLiberty Loan people, Mr. Hoover, the Red Cross and other welfare workers\nwere on hand to show us how to play the better game. I don't need to\nremind you of the details, nor that in spite of human grumbling and talk\nof sacrifice, in the bottom of our hearts we all enjoyed the process.\n\nIn the second place, we have learned that to see the job through we need\nall of the nation, men and women, not merely the profession of arms and\nthe mysterious powers of finance--we need all of everyone. We need them\nnot as individuals but as a team, and we have learned that we can\ndevelop team play.\n\nOur easiest jobs were the raising of our men and our money; our hardest,\nthe moulding of the whole into an organic unity. Just as our young men\nby the millions took their place in the line when the bugle blew, older\nmen by the tens of thousands left their private affairs to get along as\nbest they might, and regardless of political affiliations or personal\nconvenience, found place for themselves in the administrative army. And\nthey were ably seconded by the women. Hundreds of men in key positions\nhave gladly borne witness to the share which their secretaries and their\nother women associates played in bringing about the needed results.\n\nThe first days of the war were days of whirling confusion, colored by\nglowing forecasts. Then followed months of experimentation, by trial and\nerror, of hope deferred by long delays, of well meant but none the less\nembarrassing internal rivalries, of sudden spurts. Later came the days\nof last autumn, when the whole great machine was throbbing rhythmically\nand steadily, with only a minor \"knock\" here and there--a sure\nindication to the watchful enemy, who had had more than a taste of what\nthe machine could produce, that the game was up; and finally the\neleventh of November and the order to reverse the engines.\n\nIt ought to be evident from our experience that for any great enterprise\nwe need all the young men and the young women, and all the older ones\nwho are still young in heart. We need to know who they are, where they\nare, what they can do, and we need to touch them at every point; for not\nonly do we need them all, but we need all of each one of them. We should\nnever again face a great national crisis with nearly one-third of our\nmen of military age unfit for hard physical work. We need campaigns of\nphysical education and social hygiene, and we need to apply the lessons\nin human salvage which the army has learned during the war. But we need\nmore than each individual and all of him. We must see to it that the\nindividual star, of whatever magnitude, is subordinated to the team play\nof the group. And team play means more than energy and \"pep.\" It means\na marshalling of the old fashioned and homely virtues of courtesy,\ndeference and consideration.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn the third place, we have learned that to accomplish a great result we\nneed the leadership of those who know and who know vividly and\nconstructively. Our experience has been that in certain fields, finance,\nscience, manufacturing in quantity production, medicine, we had a supply\nof those who knew. In other fields, in intimate knowledge of foreign\nconditions and foreign languages for example, we had not.\n\nAt first we didn't know where our leaders were, and in many cases we\nbegan by following false prophets. The value of one man with training,\nbrains and persistence can be shown by a single example: There was a man\nwho answered these qualifications connected with the Council of National\nDefence, not in a very exalted position. He was the first in all this\ncountry to see that the army program and the shipping program did not\nfit. It took him a long time to convince the two groups of overworked,\nharried officials that neither could play the game alone; that the\nclosest cooperation was necessary. He had no access to the records, but\nhe finally managed to build up a convincing statement out of the shreds\nof information which he gathered here and there, and at last he\nsucceeded in getting everyone concerned into the attitude of wanting to\nface the facts. Everyone would have had to face them sooner or later,\nbut without the devotion and leadership of this one man, it would have\nbeen only as the result of a very serious dislocation of function.\n\nOne field in which the right leadership has been most brilliantly\nrewarded is that of medicine. Just consider what we have done in this\nfield: The success of the anti-typhoid injections; the reduction in\ndysenteric diseases due to chlorination of drinking water; the\nencouraging fight against cerebro-spinal meningitis and pneumonia; the\nidentification of trench fever, and the practical freedom from typhus.\nAs to wounds, a tetanus antitoxin which has made lock-jaw almost a\nnegligible disease; a serum against gas gangrene; the Carrel-Dakin\nmethod of chemical sterilization of wounds; the splinting of fractures\non the battle field and overhead extension apparatus in the hospital. To\nquote Simon Flexner, \"The entire psychology of the wounded men was\naltered, the wards made cheerful and happy, pain abolished, infection\ncontrolled, and recovery hastened by means of the new or improved\nsurgical and mechanical measures put into common use.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe fourth lesson of which I wish to speak is that a high aim and ideal\nis what counts most of all, what lifts the individual up from\nselfishness and sloth. To bind the country together and to make the\ntransformation which still seems miraculous, we had a noble national\naim, a complete dedication to the task before us, an utter absence of\nany selfish or self-seeking factor in the whole enterprise. The conduct\nof our soldiers, their submission to a discipline to which most of them\nwere completely unused was, I think, in a very large measure due to the\nrecognition of this aim. We recognized it as a nation and we recognized\nit in one another. The standard of contact set by our soldiers during\nthe days of conflict is unique in military history. Whole divisions went\nfor months without a single court-martial. The reason was, more than\nanything else, the national assumption that they would give a good\naccount of themselves and the fact that they felt themselves in\ntraining for the championship, and no man wanted to miss his chance on\nthe battlefield for the sake of a selfish indulgence.\n\nSome of the experiments in conduct tried in the American Expeditionary\nForces were extraordinary in their success. The leave areas, an immense\nenterprise, were run on the basis of absolute freedom to the enlisted\nman. He lived in the best hotels in Europe and amused himself in casinos\nwhere crowned heads had been in the habit of gambling away the money of\ntheir subjects. He had no roll calls, no taps, no officers in sight, no\nmilitary machinery whatever. He arose when he pleased, either before or\nafter his breakfast; he ate and drank when he pleased, and he stayed out\nas late as he pleased. The physical and moral effect of this absolute\nchange from the military regime was a very interesting and instructive\nphenomenon, but that is not the point I wish to make. Out of the\nthousands and thousands of men who were sent to these leave areas, there\nwas hardly a single case in which a man abused the trust which was put\nupon him or failed to turn up on time to go back to the grind of\nmilitary duty. This could never have been done with soldiers of another\ntype, with soldiers lacking an ideal.\n\nSomeone has recently written that fine minds have been finely touched by\nthe war, and base minds basely. He might have added that wise minds have\nbeen wisely touched, and foolish minds foolishly. In general, I think it\nmay fairly be said that when the appeal was to the finest in a man's\ncharacter, the result was correspondingly fine.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThese, it seems to me, are the four main things we have learned, or at\nany rate we have had a chance to learn. First, that we are a real\nnation, potentially strong with the strength of youth. Second, that to\nfulfill our mission, every man and woman and all of every such\nindividual is an object of national concern; that we must be mobilized\nand we must continue our lessons in team play. We have still plenty to\nlearn in this field. Third, that we must have and must recognize the\nleadership of those who know, which, after all, is the great test of a\ndemocracy. Fourth, that to bring out the best that is in us, as\nindividuals and as a nation, we must have an aim, high, clear-cut and\nclearly understood. If, now, I attempt to apply these four lessons which\nwe have had a chance to learn, to educational conditions, and\nparticularly to university conditions, it will be for three reasons: The\nfirst is the general wisdom of confining one's remarks to things he\nknows something about. The second, that there is no single institution\nmore characteristic of the best in our American life than a great\nAmerican University. And there is this third reason, that if we had not\nhad a supply of young men with the stamp of the American college upon\nthem, we could never have met the call for officers, for nearly a\nquarter of a million of them. I am told that the Germans were prepared\nto admit and to discount our wealth in money, in materials and in man\npower, but they looked forward confidently to a complete failure on our\npart in training officers to lead our men in battle. Of course, all the\ncitizen officers who made good records were not college men, but the\ncollege trained citizens were the men who set the pace and made the\nstandard.\n\nIt was Pitt who said, \"The atrocious crime of being a young man I shall\nattempt neither to palliate nor to deny.\" Nor should a university seek\nto palliate or to deny the charge of being a place of resort for youth.\nA university, it seems to me, should be a place where the primary object\nis not the repression of youthful exuberance nor the correction of\nyouthful failings (though both may be necessary on occasion), but\nrather, a place for the encouragement of the great and vital qualities\nof youth--enthusiasm, energy, power of acquisition, sensitiveness of\nimpression. It is the place where the older members of the community\nhave the best chance to stay young. The university should be essentially\na company of enthusiasts, of pioneers. There is a frontier for every\nworker to clear--no matter how narrow or how wide his horizon may be. In\na university there is no proper place, among faculty or students, for\nthe disillusioned, the cynical, the defeatist.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNow we come to the application of the second lesson, the lesson of\nmobilization, of team play. In the first place, no university is alive\nwhere mobilization is limited to the Recorder's office. In a live\ninstitution, regent, professor, student, janitor, each is a part of the\ngame and must feel that he is. He must feel that in its administration\nthe institution has learned the great lesson of direct and human\npersonal contact. Science, among all its triumphs, cannot include any\ndevice for conveying a message from mind to mind or from heart to heart\nhalf so good as the human voice and the human eye. Within the faculty,\nthis element of human cooperation should be reflected by the vitality of\nthe organism rather than by the complexity of the organization, which\nmay not be vital at all. Each member must feel that the general repute\nis safeguarded by honest and intelligent standards, honestly and\nintelligently administered. The university, like the country at large,\nmust make itself responsible for all of each and every student, his\nbodily condition, for example, just as directly as his mental.\n\nIt will be recalled that one of my justifications for applying war\nexperiences to university conditions was the share which the college and\nuniversity men had in building up our supply of officers. If we study\nwhy the college men made good officers, and make allowance for the fact\nthat it is the kind of man who goes to college who is likely to make a\ngood officer anyway, and all the other allowances we can think of, we\ncan't dodge the conclusion that there is something outside of the\ncollege curriculum which has been an important factor in bringing about\nthe results. On the other hand, important as the other factors are, the\ncurriculum has had its share, and it is in my judgment a leading and\nnot always an adequately recognized share. The comfortable theory that\nonce he has settled down to something important the college\nne'er-do-well will suddenly blossom forth into a competent leader of men\ndidn't work out in practice. It may have happened here and there, but it\ndidn't happen as a general rule. In the fighting line, it was very\ngenerally the man with a sound academic record, not necessarily the Phi\nBeta Kappa lad, but the good scholar and active college citizen, the man\nwho had taken the trouble to learn things and learn people, who made the\nbest record. I naturally watched with particular interest the records of\nmy own old students at Columbia, and I know that this is so.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is a significant fact, however, for those of us who are interested in\nthe welfare of college boys and girls, that the United States government\ndeliberately built up what was to all intents and purposes an\nundergraduate college life for the young men of the army, with\nathletics, dances, dramatics, singing, and all the rest, even including\nopportunities for reading and study. Even the most hardened of regular\nofficers, who at the first, I fear, regarded this as some of the\ncivilian foolishness with which all soldiers have to contend, came to\nsee that the program was a vital factor in building up such a body of\nfighting men as they had never seen. And this is only another way of\nsaying that if you want to use the human machine for any purpose, you\nmust concern yourself with the whole of it. Human nature does not come\nin air-tight compartments.\n\nPresident Wilson coined a phrase which has thoroughly gone the rounds\nwhen he said that the side-shows of college life should not overshadow\nnor distract from the entertainment in the main tent. We all agree to\nthis. But I think we are more inclined than when the words were spoken\nto urge that the side-shows, properly and intelligently subordinated,\nshould be under the same management as the main tent. The army has tried\nthe experiment on a large scale and it has worked well. In February last\nthere were in France and on the Rhine six million and a half individual\nparticipants in athletic games, ten million attendants on\nentertainments, nearly a quarter of a million students.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNone of the lessons which the Army has learned are more significant\nthan those which have to do with mobilization and classification. The\nactivities of the Provost Marshal General, of the Committee on\nClassification and Personnel, in cooperation with the Committee on\nEducation, furnish the best record of large scale human engineering in\nthe new science of personnel of which we have any record, either in this\ncountry or, I think, elsewhere.\n\nA university like this one is an army, and not such a small army either,\njudging by peacetime standards. The United States found that it was\nworth while, indeed that it was absolutely necessary in organizing its\nforces, to find out everything it could about every man in the army,\nwhat he needed physically to increase his efficiency; what he needed to\nkeep him interested and out of mischief; what he should have in the way\nof training--based on what he knew already and based on careful mental\ntests--to make him of the greatest usefulness; whether he had the will\nto win, and if not, whether anything could be done to get it into him.\n\nIn a word, the United States wanted to know just what each man's\npossibilities were. Was he officer material or non-com material? Should\nhe go into the line or one of the special corps--or to the labor\nbattalion? As a result of this program, the Army succeeded in finding a\nplace that counted for 98 per cent of the drafted men.\n\nNow I realize that a university can't do all these things with its army\nin just the way the government can. It can't casually transfer a man\nfrom engineering to psychology, nor a girl from philosophy to\ncookery--or _vice versa_--no matter how desirable such a transfer might\nbe for the individual and the community. But it can do a great deal more\nthan it now does in finding out about all its members, informing them of\ntheir strength and weaknesses, in seeing that every student gets a\nchance to enjoy in so far as possible the high privileges of youth, and\nto get a helping hand over the bumps in the road, which also come with\nyouth. Every student ought to have the opportunity to round out his\ncharacter and his capacities. It ought not to be left to chance that any\nstudent gets the best personal contacts for him or her with faculty and\nfellow-students, the best opportunities for learning team play. Every\nstudent ought to leave with some definite aim in life, and if possible\nan aim high enough to be an ideal that is worth working for.\n\nA university is not doing its full duty if its athletics and social life\nare limited to those who need these the least; if its alumni are\nregarded merely as fillers of the grandstands or recipients of oratory,\nand possible sources of pecuniary support. The alumni are the best\npossible sources of keeping the faculty informed as to what the world\nreally wants in the way of trained men and women, and, for the students,\nof information, suggestions, and jobs, both temporary and permanent.\n\nI realize that many of these things are now done here and elsewhere, but\nin the light of what we have learned from the experience of the\nUniversity of Uncle Sam, I am sure that our American universities and\ncolleges have hardly scratched the surface of what they might do and\nwhat, I think, they will ultimately do in the realm of human\nengineering. Nearly all educational institutions merely follow what they\nfind the leaders are doing, and in this field there is an opportunity, I\nam sure, for real leadership.\n\nWe know now that men and women can be measured by impersonal tests and\nthat it is practicable to put aside the material which it is either\nimpossible to fashion in the academic mould, or for which, even if the\njob is possible, the expense in wear and tear is entirely beyond the\nvalue of the result to be obtained. To be specific, why shouldn't we\nhave an intelligence test of candidates for the degree of Doctor of\nPhilosophy, just as we had a physical and psychological examination for\ncandidates for the flying schools?\n\nI don't mean that we should leap from one illogical position clear\nacross the road into another. Mental measurements are not yet an exact\nscience, and a man of moderate ability, with a will to succeed, may be a\nbetter academic investment than his more brilliant brother who lacks\nthat quality; but, by pruning very sparingly (one does not have to chop\ndown a tree to prune it) the saving in time and energy will be enormous.\n\nFundamentally the human relationships are what count, the qualities\nleading to team play and cooperation, and away from isolation and its\nills. This means that if a faculty is to exercise its leadership, it\nmust know the student body, it must maintain and develop points of human\ntouch. Impersonal tests, impersonal records, all that modern practice\nand modern science can teach us we must have, but these must be used\nonly as the framework for what is after all the fundamental thing,\ndirect human contact between teacher and teacher, teacher and student,\nand student and student.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNow as to leadership, and in a university we can identify the leaders\nwith the teachers, there is no doubt, I think, that the teachers'\nprofession comes out of the war in a higher place than it went in, and\nthe scholar goes back to his work with a feeling of confidence in\nhimself in view of his record in competition and comparison with men in\nother callings. I venture to predict that we shall hear a good deal less\nfrequently in the future the old gibe that the man who could do things\ndid them and the man who couldn't, taught them. The teachers made good,\nnot only because of their scholarship, but because of their personality.\nI think this experience of the last two years is going to accelerate\ngreatly the movement which had already started of turning to the\nacademic world for the man who can do things and do them with other\npeople. Entirely apart from the contrasts in income, the sheer fun of\nexecutive work, with plenty of money to spend on what you want to get\ndone, is a pretty strong temptation for a man with a heavy teaching\nschedule and an annual department appropriation of say $75. Both the\nregular army officers who have made conspicuously good, and the scholars\nof the cooperative type who have made conspicuously good, are being\nactively bidden for by bankers and manufacturers and all sorts of\npeople. Neither profession can compete on the purely financial side with\nthese tempters and, in order to hold their first-rate men, they will\neach have to make some greater contribution in the things that money\nalone can't buy.\n\nBoth in the nation and in our republics of letters and science, we must\nlearn to distinguish more clearly between the power that comes with\nknowledge, and the ability to talk about things. It was very interesting\nto watch in Washington the gradual substitution of the man with the\nlatter quality by the man with the former in positions of\nresponsibility, and I am going to confess that, in the early days, some\nof the conferences which it was my privilege or my duty to attend,\nreminded me for all the world of certain faculty meetings, in which\ngentlemen without definite knowledge of the matter in hand were\ndiscussing at considerable length what they were pleased to call\nprinciples, but which were really off-hand impressions.\n\nI think that in their service to the university and to the nation, the\nscholars may well profit by the demonstration that it was not only the\nman who knew his subject, but the man who knew how to deal with his\nfellow men, who was likely to make his impression. Isn't there such a\nthing as academic provincialism, even within the walls of a man's own\nuniversity, certainly as between institution and institution, which can\nbe remedied by the encouragement of these social and cooperative sides\nof the scholar's character? It seems to me that we all should face a\nfundamental extension in the definition of a scholar, away from the\nindividual, the selfish, out to the social and constructive.\n\nIn our educational institutions scholarship has three functions: To\nbroaden the field of existing knowledge, and the war has shown us that\nevery field has its valuable practical applications; to train the coming\ngeneration of experts, and any country needs not only a handful of\ndistinguished leaders but a great body of well-trained men and women\nwho, when the emergency arises, stand ready to meet it; and last but not\nleast, to inspire a recognition of what scholarship is and a respect for\nit in the minds of the general students, few of whom, by the most\ngenerous stretch of the imagination, can be regarded as scholars\nthemselves, but whose influence in their generation throughout the\ncountry is a very important factor. Our nation needs a respect for\nexpert knowledge and it needs a respect for intelligence, and our\ncollege graduates can do more than any other group to develop this\nrespect.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe have taken up three of our four lessons as these affect the\nuniversity: the emphasis on youth, the need of mobilization and team\nplay, and the need of leadership. There remains the fourth factor, a\nhigh, clear-cut aim.\n\nThe most serious charge against the American undergraduate in the past\nhas been the lack of a sense of responsibility. We now know from their\nwar records that the sense of responsibility lay latent in thousands of\nthese boys and was only awaiting an impulse sufficiently strong to\narouse it.\n\nPresident Hibben of Princeton, who ought to know the American\nundergraduate if anybody does, said recently: \"Young men are capable of\nfar greater amounts of intensive work day in and day out than we had\ndreamed of; capable of greater concentration of mind upon their tasks.\nThey respond more quickly than we have conceived to the call of duty.\nThe sense of responsibility is there latent, and we teachers must\nendeavor to quicken and to appeal to it. We have seen that when the\noccasion comes these young men rise to meet it.\"\n\nWe can't very well stage a world war for the purpose, and I don't think\nwe need wait for any such crisis to bring it out. There is in every\nnormal, wholesome-minded student some motor nerve that can be touched in\nsuch a way as to release that type of coordinated energy which we call a\nsense of responsibility. This all goes back to knowing our men and women\nand establishing human contacts and human confidences.\n\nIn spite of individual disappointments, and as a college dean, I have\nhad my share, I am confident that the normal young American either\nalready possesses as a motive force some worth-while aim or that he can\nbe guided toward such an aim if approached in the right way.\n\nLet me quote a paragraph or so from the report of the War Department\nCommittee on Education:\n\n\"Because the war did completely organize the nation for a united drive\nand thus did expose a magnificent national morale, many are inclined to\nbelieve that war is necessary to call forth such consecration and\nself-forgetful service. Analysis of the war training, however, reveals a\npoint of view and a method of procedure that is definitely designed to\ndevelop team-play and to enhance morale whether there be war or not. If\nthese methods are applied to education in times of peace, they certainly\nwill produce some effect even though the result is not as profoundly\nstriking as it was during the war. Among the many significant features\nof war training, the following are mentioned as worthy of particular\nconsideration for transfer to school practice:\n\n\"As a primary policy, a nation at war is obliged to recognize that every\nindividual is an asset capable of useful service in some particular line\nof work of direct benefit to the country. In order to make the most\nefficient use of all its resources, it is necessary to make strenuous\nexertions to discover what each individual is best qualified to do and\nto train each to use his abilities in the most effective manner. Applied\nto education this fundamental attitude produces two results that are of\nimportance in the development of morale. The teacher's point of view\nshifts from a critical one, with attention focused on discovering\nwhether the individual measures up to the academic standards fixed by\nschool authorities, to one of friendly, not to say eager interest to\ndiscover what each individual really can do well. The student's spirit\nalso changes from one of discouragement and doubt of his ability ever to\nmake good, to one of interest and desire for achievement. Both of these\nresults are of large importance in releasing energy for both the teacher\nand the student. They also have an immediate bearing on the enhancement\nof morale.\"\n\nIn any place of campaign to this end within a college or university, the\nfirst thing to do is to build around that vague but very real emotion\ncalled college spirit, to supplement this by guiding our young people to\nenlist in worth-while, nation-wide or world-wide causes (we are\nsingularly provincial about this in America), and by ensuring better\nteaching and supervision and better coordination of work.\n\nThere is no question that we have underestimated both the American\nundergraduate's capacity for intellectual work and his real pleasure in\nit when he feels it worth while. One of my friends was telling me of\nhis experiences as commanding officer of one of the ground schools for\naviators, where a large proportion of the candidates were college\nundergraduates, and I asked him if he had had any troubles as to\ndiscipline. \"Yes indeed,\" he replied, \"night after night we'd catch some\nfellows studying with a peep-light under their blankets, after taps had\nsounded.\"\n\nAny doubts as to the instinctive reaction of the normal, healthy young\nAmerican toward educational opportunities were dispelled by the\nexperiences of the army in France after the armistice. The let-down,\nafter the terrific physical and emotional strain, the impatience\nregarding any delay as to return home, combined to make a pretty serious\nsituation as to the morale of our troops. After some misguided and\nnearly disastrous experiments as to the curative properties of heavy\ndrill and strict discipline, the A.E.F. recognized the necessity for a\nprompt and thorough stimulation of all the welfare activities, and a\nreal educational program; and it was straight, old-fashioned book-work\nmore than it was the movies, or athletics, more even than Miss Elsie\nJanis, which turned the corner for us. In all, more than 200,000 men\nvolunteered for the privilege of studying. The military order was often\nreversed and majors sat at the feet of the corporals or privates who had\nbeen selected as teachers. The reports as to the intensity of the work\nof teachers and students alike should put any of us professionals to\nshame.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJust now we are hearing a great deal about the benefits of discipline. I\nthink what the speakers are really talking about, though they don't\nrecognize it themselves, is the benefit of the state of mind which\naccepts and welcomes discipline. We are not, even as the result of the\nwar, a disciplined people in the sense that Germany is, or was, and we\ncan thank God for it. We shall never want in this country a general\nsubordination of the individual will and initiative to external control.\nDiscipline is a means and not an end. If discipline, as such, externally\nimposed, were so important a factor in success as many people seem to\nthink to-day, we could look through a list of ex-enlisted men in the\narmy and navy--I mean the men enlisted and discharged during peace\ntime--and find a relatively large number who made conspicuously good\nrecords after returning to civil life. As a matter of fact, we find\nnothing of the kind.\n\nWhat we do find is that not a few enlisted men who chose the army or the\nnavy as their permanent career have won commissions and made fine\nrecords. There were no better general officers in the war than men like\nHarbord of our army and Robertson of the British, both of whom rose from\nthe ranks. But isn't it fair to say that the discipline imposed on these\nmen was accepted gladly and accepted in the terms of their fundamental\ninterest, and that these men are not really exceptions to what I have\nsaid?\n\nI venture to predict that there will be a very different record to tell\nas to the success in civil life of those men now leaving the Army, who,\nbecause they believed in the cause and wished to participate to the full\nin the great enterprise, gladly submitted themselves to the discipline\nfor the purpose of increasing their efficiency.\n\nIn a month or so you can teach an enthusiastic man, who is fired by a\nbig idea, all the discipline he needs for carrying out his duties and\nprofiting by his opportunities, but you can't reverse the process and\nincite enthusiasms as a result of the application of discipline.\n\nDon't think that I want to minimize the merits of military discipline\nfor military purposes. Of course, coordination and subordination are\nabsolutely necessary in the handling of large bodies of men. Even the\nmen in France who deserted to the front, as many of them did, no matter\nhow much we may sympathize with their desire to get into the game, had\nto be disciplined. Someone had to stay behind and see to the supplies.\nThe point we are discussing is the carrying over of this principle of\nmilitary discipline intact into civilian life. So far as discipline\nbrings about regularity of life, of exercise, so long as it ministers to\nalertness, we can use it, but as between discipline on the one hand, and\ninitiative and team play on the other, to meet our academic or our\nnational needs, I am for initiative and team play.\n\nPlease don't misunderstand me. By reducing the present emphasis on\nexternal discipline, after childhood has been passed, I don't mean a\nlowering of standards. External discipline, it seems to me, is often\nreally imposed as a substitute for high standards; something supposed to\nbe just as good and more easy to keep in stock. The standards of the\nworth-while organization, and these are the outward expression of its\naims, its ideals, ought to be high enough and intelligently enough\nadministered to make sure that the men and women who are unable to\nprovide their own discipline, should in the general interest be\npainlessly but promptly removed from the group.\n\nHere is a _credo_ for the American people, from the pen of a regular\narmy officer. It's a pretty good one for an American University: \"To\nfoster individual talent, imagination and initiative, to couple with\nthis a high degree of cooperation, and to subject these to a not too\nminute direction; the whole vitalized by a supreme purpose, which serves\nas the magic key to unlock the upper strata of the energies of men.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nFinally, let me try to apply these lessons to you young men and women of\nthe graduating class.\n\nKeep in good physical shape. Overwork is usually a combination of bad\nair, bad feeding, and lack of exercise and sleep. See that you don't go\nstale. If you lack the zest of life, find out what the trouble is;\nwhether it is your teeth or your liver or your soul. Picture to yourself\nwhat Theodore Roosevelt got out of life.\n\nBe honest with yourself. Do your own thinking and do it straight. This,\nstrangely enough, is perhaps the thing which you will find hardest to do\nafter the undergraduate atmosphere. A student body is, or at any rate\nwas before the war, the most convention ridden group of which I have any\nknowledge. I am all for conventions, because they save a great deal of\ntime and worry, but only so far as we recognize them as conventions and\ndo not exalt them into principles or philosophical truths. Remember that\nthe public opinion of America is an infinitely more important thing to\nthe world than ever before, and that you are each to be a part of it.\n\nKeep your intellectual interests and your interest in your _alma mater_,\nnot in her athletics and her fraternities alone. Remember that as alumni\nof this University you are citizens of no mean city. Recruit men and\nwomen whom she ought to have and who ought to have her, remembering that\nthe danger to this country from the inside, and it is no inconsiderable\ndanger, is mainly due to the misdirected zeal of sincere people who lack\nknowledge and background. Take for example the employer who can't see\nbeyond the point of telling his men to \"take it or leave it,\" and the\nworkman whose sense of real or fancied injustice has brought him to what\nwith our children we know as the kicking and biting stage. It is too\nlate to do much with the present adult generation except by main\nstrength and awkwardness, but a recruit for higher education from either\nof these groups is a good national investment.\n\nKeep your human contacts. Don't be a \"glad-hander\" but do at least your\nshare. It takes two to make and keep alive a friendship, just as it does\na quarrel. There is something worth while in everyone. Give yourself a\nchance to find what it is. Practice following and, as the chance comes\nto you, practice leading, but above all, practice team play. Keep\nyourself ready to take the next step, whatever it may be. There is a\nstory of Marshal Joffre, of which I can at least say that it is good\nenough to be true. After the first battle of the Marne some enthusiast\nwas proclaiming him as a second Napoleon and laying it on pretty thick.\nThe old gentleman stood it as long as he could and then said: \"No,\nNapoleon would have known what to do next, and I don't.\"\n\nKeep your enthusiasms and your ideals. In other words, keep your youth.\nIn choosing your life work, get into something in which the policy and\npractice are such that you can throw your whole soul into the job. Don't\ntake yourself seriously, but take your opportunities for usefulness\nseriously. Find out the callings in which America is short. There are\nplenty of them, as the war has shown. Think over whether it isn't\npossible for you to be one of the men or one of the women who, from your\ntraining and momentum and vision, will be selected ten or fifteen or\ntwenty years hence, to take on some important job, with the nation as\nyour client, as the one person best qualified to fill it.\n\nWe no longer have to prove that it pays to know, to really know almost\nanything that is worth while. It pays in money, if that is what one\nwants; it pays in the more enduring satisfactions of life, in the\npleasure that comes from exact knowledge and intellectual pioneering, in\nthe almost unique joy of creation without the responsibilities of\npossession, and in the feeling of individual readiness to be of use in\nmeeting the problems which the years allotted to your generation will\nsurely bring forth.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 3: Commencement address delivered at the University of\nMichigan, June 26, 1919.]\n\n\n\n\n+-----------------------------------------------+\n|             Transcriber's Note:               |\n|                                               |\n| Typographical error corrected in the text:    |\n|                                               |\n| Page  52  centerdness changed to centeredness |\n+-----------------------------------------------+","title":"Some War-time Lessons: The Soldier's Standards of Conduct; The War As a Practical Test of American Scholarship; What Have We Learned?","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":19021}