Page:The Fraternity and the Undergraduate (1923).pdf/209

 wholly a matter of money or pull. These things sometimes help, but there are in every organization with which I am familiar, men who have neither. It is largely a desire for comradeship, for association with his fellows, and adaptation to such a relationship that causes one man to join and another one to be left out. It is very often a genius for leadership; and if a man has this, if he fails with one sort of organization, he gets into another or makes one of his own.

The independent who pushes his way to the front and who attains leadership by his own efforts is more often than otherwise the strongest man in college, because he has fought and conquered against the greatest odds. There is more honor and training in winning alone but far less chance. The man who doesn't join usually does not care to do so, or is unsuited to fit into an organization life. It is the occasional exception, only, who overrides the handicap and proves himself the strongest man in college.