It was its devotion to science, however, that especially characterized this first great institution of learning of which we have definite records. This devotion to science went so far that even literature was studied from the scientific standpoint. Such details as we have of the instruction at Alexandria and the books that have come down to us, all show men interested in philology, in comparative literature, in grammar and comparative grammar, rather than in the idealistic modes of knowledge. We have commentaries on the great authors, but no great original works of genius in literature from the professors of Alexandria. The translation of the Septuagint version of the Old Testament is a typical example of the sort of work that was being done at Alexandria. They collected the documents of the nations and translated them for purposes of comparative study. It was an education for information rather than for power. The main idea of the time and place was to know as much as possible about literature, rather than to know what it represented in terms of life, and the real meaning of both literature and life was obscured in the study about and about them. People studied books about books rather than the books {68} themselves. There was much writing of books about books, and it was nearly always comparatively trivial things in the great authors that attracted most attention from the many scholiasts, critics, editors, commentators, lecturers of the time. Personally I could well understand such an incident happening at Alexandria as is said to have happened at a well-known English (of course not American!) university not long ago. The class was construing Shakespeare and one of the students asked the professor what the meaning of a particular figure used by the great dramatist was. The professor replied that they were there to construe Shakespeare's language and not bother about his meaning--yet it was a class in literature. Literature in recent years as studied at the universities has come to be quite as scientific in its modes and methods as it was at the University of Alexandria. May I also add that it has become quite as sterile of results of any importance. There is very little real study of literature, practically no encouragement of the attempt to draw inspiration from the great authors, but all devotion to the grammar, to the philology, to comparative literature as exemplified in the old writers.