up. m--m
THE HESPERIAN
fiiMi TIHJ
Plil Beta Kappa.
The editorial management of The Hes
perian believes that enough has already
been said about Phi Beta Kappa scholar
ship society. But out of courtesy for Mr.
Abbott we print the following:
To the Edifor or The Hesperian: I
would like to submit to the readers of The
Hesperian a few facts in regard to a certain
p organization that has recent!' come into our
school. It has been asserted time and
again that the establishment of a chapter of
Phi Beta Kappa here marks a great stride in
the progress of oar University; that it gives
us rank among the great colleges of our land.
Xow if this statement is true, in this respect,
at least, P. B. K. is good. But is the en
trance of Phi Beta Kappa an "open sesame"
to the highest callegiate rank? This ques
tion forms my theme.
Let us first examine a list of the colleges
with which we can now pride ourselves in
ranking.
According to an official publication of the
order, dated August 31, 1S95, the colleges
composing P. B. K. are Bowdoin in Maine;
Darthmouth in New Hampshire; the State
University of Vermont and Middlebury, in
Vermont; Harvard, Amherst, Williams,
Tuftfe in Massachusetts; Yale, Trinity, Wes
leyan, in Connecticut; Brown, in Rhode
Island: Union, University of N. Y., College
of the City of New York, Columbia, Hamil
ton, Hobart, Colgate, Cornell, Rochester
Universitys, in New York; Rutgers, in New
Jersey; Dickenson, Leigbigb, Lafayette,
University of Pennsylvania, in Pennsyl
vania; William and Mary, in Virginia;
Western Reserve, Kenyon, 31 arietta, in
Ohio; DcPauw, in Indiana; Evanston in Ill
inois; University of Kansas, University of
Minnesota, University of Nebraska. Be
sides these colleges I believe John Hopkins
and the University of Iowa have made ap
plication for membership.
Now this is a formidable li&t and it con
tains many of the really great schools of our
land. But it is a fact that as many of the
colleges of first rank are not found here.
You do not find Ami Arbor, the University
of Chicago, Leland Stanford, Princeton,
the University of Wisconsin or the Uni
versity of California in the list. All of
these schools rank above our University.
Why is it not as reasonable to say we take
rank with the great universities of the coun
try as truly bj staying out of P. B. K. as we
do by getting into it?
Again, is it not fair to say we now take
rank with the great majority of those "world
universities" of which P. B. K. is com
posed, such as Middlebury and the University-
of Vermont, as Wesleyan in Conn., as
Colgate, Hobart, Hamilton or that impcr
ium of colleges, the University of New
York? Why is it not just as reasonable to
say since we have gotten into P. B. K., that
we rank with the other P. B. K. schools
such as Rutgers, Dickenson and Lafayette,
or William and Mary or Kenyon or Mar
rietta; as to maintain we now rank with the
half dozen great colleges in the organization?
But you say, just think of the great men
that have come from these small colleges.
There was Longfellow and Hawthorne from
Bowdoin, Webster from Darthmouth, Gar
field from Williams, Winter Davis and Chase
from Kenyon, and a host of others. Don't
these men make their colleges great I Yes:
and Napoleon came from Corsica. And now
it would be in order for the United States
to try and squirm into some P. B. K. of
nations in which Mr. Corsica plays ring
mailer for we have never produced a
Napoleon. But is it not barely possible
Napoleon became great in spite of Corsica;
not because of it . And is it any more
reasonable to credit all the ability that has
happened to be shut up within the four walls
of these colleges for a few short years, to
the colleges and P. B. K. forsooth, than to
credit Bonaparte's genins to Corsica I
I assert it is more reasonable to maintain
that getting into P. B. K. ranks us with its
score of puny schools than with the six large
C