Page:The Fraternity and the Undergraduate (1923).pdf/22

 It is just as well to keep in mind that a fraternity man is held responsible for what every other man in his chapter does and that the character of the chapter is determined by what the worst man in it does. A very good chapter of one of the oldest and most respected fraternities at the University of Illinois is at present about as unpopular and about as thoroughly disliked as any chapter on the campus, and all because a few of its men are always on hand to recount tales of personal deviltry at the popular loafing places, and are eager to be known as "men of the world," whatever that suggestive phrase may mean. The whole chapter has the name of being loafers and rounders, just because three conceited men have taken courses in public speaking and are able to put their stories across.

I have sometimes thought that I should be better satisfied if the method of picking out the brothers in a fraternity were characterized by a little more sanity. The rushing systems of most fraternities with which I am acquainted are on the whole unlikely to give the freshman a true conception of the real character of the fraternity and its members, as I shall show later. In choosing between the local organization and the national fraternity, I have often advised fellows to join the former if the make-up of the latter organization