Any doubts as to the instinctive reaction of the normal, healthy young American toward educational opportunities were dispelled by the experiences of the army in France after the armistice. The let-down, after the terrific physical and emotional strain, the impatience regarding any delay as to return home, combined to make a pretty serious situation as to the morale of our troops. After some misguided and nearly disastrous experiments as to the curative properties of heavy drill and strict discipline, the A.E.F. recognized the necessity for a prompt and thorough stimulation of all the welfare activities, and a real educational program; and it was straight, old-fashioned book-work more than it was the movies, or athletics, more even than Miss Elsie Janis, which turned the corner for us. In all, more than 200,000 men volunteered for the privilege of studying. The military order was often reversed and majors sat at the feet of the corporals or privates who had been selected as teachers. The reports as to the intensity of the work of teachers and students alike should put any of us professionals to shame. * * * * * Just now we are hearing a great deal about the benefits of discipline. I think what the speakers are really talking about, though they don't recognize it themselves, is the benefit of the state of mind which accepts and welcomes discipline. We are not, even as the result of the war, a disciplined people in the sense that Germany is, or was, and we can thank God for it. We shall never want in this country a general subordination of the individual will and initiative to external control. Discipline is a means and not an end. If discipline, as such, externally imposed, were so important a factor in success as many people seem to think to-day, we could look through a list of ex-enlisted men in the army and navy--I mean the men enlisted and discharged during peace time--and find a relatively large number who made conspicuously good records after returning to civil life. As a matter of fact, we find nothing of the kind. What we do find is that not a few enlisted men who chose the army or the navy as their permanent career have won commissions and made fine records. There were no better general officers in the war than men like Harbord of our army and Robertson of the British, both of whom rose from the ranks. But isn't it fair to say that the discipline imposed on these men was accepted gladly and accepted in the terms of their fundamental interest, and that these men are not really exceptions to what I have said? I venture to predict that there will be a very different record to tell as to the success in civil life of those men now leaving the Army, who, because they believed in the cause and wished to participate to the full in the great enterprise, gladly submitted themselves to the discipline for the purpose of increasing their efficiency.