Page:The Fraternity and the Undergraduate (1923).pdf/24

 thing about which parents usually concern themselves when their sons leave home to enter college is that they will be thrown at once upon their own resources. I think this is a good thing, but independence and isolation are not identical nor equally necessary. The fraternity man does not run his own affairs, but he is associated closely with the fellows of his own age and tastes who are doing the same thing. Not long ago a young fellow came into my office, lonesome, homesick, pretty close to friendless. He had come from a country home a thousand miles away from the college, he had entered the second semester, he knew no one, and he had no one with whom he could talk, no one with whom he might spend his leisure time, and no personal means of recreation. A fraternity man saw him talking to me, picked him up, and took him to dinner. A few days later he came into the office wearing a pledge button. He was happy, contented, interested in his studies, interested in the college because he had found friends and a home. The fraternity had furnished for him the center of a new life.

The fraternity throws at once upon the undergraduate certain responsibilities about the house, and I believe in no small measure prepares him for the duties which he will later have to assume or direct when he has a home of his own. The young