Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 76.djvu/77

Rh days, when colleges neglected the physical welfare of students and devoted their attention so strenuously to intellectual work as to endanger the health of those entrusted to their care. This is hardly exact, for there never was a time in this country when the curriculum was so severe as to endanger any man's health; in any event, the study of alumni catalogues shows that in pre-athletic days college students were, as they are now, a selected class, with tendency to long life and were, on the average, excellent risks for life insurance. But whether or not the statement be true that colleges in former days neglected the physical welfare of students, the fact remains that they are doing little better now.

The plea for funds with which to purchase athletic fields and erect gymnasiums was successful and vast sums have been expended, far out of proportion to any possible good that might result. But what has been gained by the expenditure? Some colleges have a brief compulsory course in the gymnasium; but the great equipment is utilized more and more each year for teams composed of men whose bodies need no such anxious care. The vast majority of students must gain their physical culture by proxy, by paying generously toward support of the college champions, just as they must secure much of their esthetic culture by supporting publications or teams in chess and debating and by purchasing tickets to glee club concerts—all for the advancement of the college. The chances for neglect of physical culture are greater than formerly, as the pocket money which enabled the boys of other days to have their little baseball and rowing clubs is now consumed in purchasing admission tickets to concerts, contests and the rest.

The method in which defenders of intercollegiate contests have conducted their side of the discussion does no credit either to their manliness or to their integrity. Those who oppose the waste of time and the diversion of funds have been stigmatized as men indifferent to the health of students, as effeminate, as desiring that young men become "mollycoddles"; sneers have taken the place of argument. But the statements and characterizations are false throughout. By far the great majority of those who criticize the present deplorable condition are warm defenders of physical culture; they would be gratified if the course in gymnastics were made more extensive and compulsory, for they recognize that young men who need such training have no desire for it; they not only maintain that physical exercise, singing, chess playing, debating and the rest are commendable, but they assert also that such diversions are necessary for they are firm believers in the old adage that "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, they say." But they denounce the present system which has relegated study to the background and has made the proper college work merely an annex to exhibitions. That which is only incidentialincidental [sic] has been made all-important.