Germany and the Germans from an American Point of ViewCollier, Price
History
Germany and the Germans from an American Point of View
Collier, Price
Germany; National characteristics, German
At Bonn, a member of one of the three more fashionable corps spends
far more than these sums, and his habits may be less Spartan. The
ridiculous expenditure of some of our mamma-bred undergraduates, who
go to college primarily to cultivate social relations, are unknown
anywhere in Germany, for a student would make himself unpopularly
conspicuous by extravagance. Two to three thousand dollars a year,
even at Bonn, as a member of the best corps, would be amply sufficient
and is considered an extravagant expenditure.
When the Earl of Essex was sent to Cambridge in Queen Elizabeth's
time, he was provided with a deal table covered with baize, a truckle-bed,
half a dozen chairs, and a wash-hand basin. The cost of all this
was about $25. When students from all over Europe tramped to Paris to
hear Abelard lecture, they begged their way. They were given special
licenses as scholars to beg. Learning then, as it is still in Germany,
alone of all the nations, was considered to be a pious profession
deserving well of the world. We do not even know the names of our
scholars in America. How many Americans have heard of Gibbs, the
authority on the fundamental laws regulating the trend of
transformation in chemical and physical processes, or of Hill and his
theory of the moon, or of Hale who explains the mystery of sun spots
and measures the magnetic forces that play around the sun? How many
Frenchmen know Pierron's translation of Aeschylus, or Patin's studies
in Greek tragedies, or Charles Maguin, or Maurice Croiset, or Paul
Magou or Leconte de Lisle? while in England the mass of the people not
only do not know the names of their scholars, but distrust all mental
processes that are super-canine.
The origin of the Landmannschaften, Burschenschaften, and the Corps
among the students dates back to the days when the students aligned
themselves with more rigidity than now, according to the various
German states from which they came. The names of the corps still bear
this suggestion, though nowadays the alignment is rather social than
geographical. The Burschenschaften societies of students had their
origin in political opposition to this separation of the students into
communities from the various states. The originators of the
Burschenschaften movement, for example, were eleven students at Jena.
Sobriety and chastity were conditions of entrance, and "Honor,
Liberty, Fatherland" were their watchwords. It was deemed a point of
honor that a member breaking his vows should confess and retire from
the society.
The societies of the Burschenschaften are still considered to have a
political complexion and the corps proper have no dealings with them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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