You are made into an efficient
instrument for doing a definite thing, you hear, at the schools; but,
apart from that, you may remain a crude and smoky kind of petroleum,
incapable of spreading light. The universities and colleges, on the
other hand, although they may leave you less efficient for this or that
practical task, suffuse your whole mentality with something more
important than skill. They redeem you, make you well-bred; they make
"good company" of you mentally. If they find you with a naturally
boorish or caddish mind, they cannot leave you so, as a technical school
may leave you. This, at least, is pretended; this is what we hear among
college-trained people when they compare their education with every
other sort. Now, exactly how much does this signify?
It is certain, to begin with, that the narrowest trade or professional
training does something more for a man than to make a skillful practical
tool of him--it makes him also a judge of other men's skill. Whether his
trade be pleading at the bar or surgery or plastering or plumbing, it
develops a critical sense in him for that sort of occupation.
Pages:
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356