A higher ideal came from Germany,--that of erudition. The German scholar
knows some one thing thoroughly. He may be rude or uncultured, he may not
know how to use his knowledge, but whatever this knowledge is, it is sound
and genuine. Thoroughness of knowledge gives the scholar self-respect; it
makes possible a broad horizon and clear perspective. From these sources,
English and German, the American University is developing its own essential
idea,--that of personal effectiveness. The American University of to-day
seeks neither culture nor erudition as its final end. It values both as
means to greater ends. It looks forward to work in life. Its triumphs in
these regards the century will see clearly. It will value culture and
treasure erudition, but it will use both as helps toward doing things. It
will find its inspiration in the needs of the world as it is, and it is
through such effort that the world that is to be shall be made a reality. A
great work demands full preparation. It takes larger provision for a cruise
to the Cape of Good Hope than for a trip to the Isle of Dogs. For this
reason the century will ask its men to take a college education.

It will ask much more than that,--a college education where the work is
done in earnest, students and teachers realizing its serious value, and
besides all this, it will demand the best special training which its best
universities can give. For the Twentieth Century will not be satisfied with
the universities of the fifteenth or seventeenth centuries. It will create
its own, and the young man who does the century's work will be a product of
its university system. Of this we may be sure, the training for strenuous
life is not in academic idleness. The development of living ideals is not
in an atmosphere of cynicism. The blase, lukewarm, fin-de-siecle young man
of the clubs will not represent university culture, nor, on the other hand,
will culture be dominated by a cheap utilitarianism.