The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 10Brann, William Cowper
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The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 10
Brann, William Cowper
Brann, William Cowper, 1855-1898; Essays; Reformers
Not only has Baylor demonstrated its unworthiness to be the
custodian of young people of either sex, but such unworthiness
has been proclaimed in the public prints by Dr. Rufus C.
Burleson, who served as its president for almost half a century.
I insisted that the salaries paid the faculty at Baylor were
insufficient to command the services of first class educators,
and that those entrusted with the duty of selecting teachers were
incapable of correctly estimating the educational qualifications
of others Dr. Burleson goes far beyond that, expressly declaring
in the Dallas News that a majority of the present board of
managers are not college educated, that for them to properly
administer discipline and make wise selection of teachers "is
simply impossible." What, in God's name, can be expected of an
institution containing several hundred young people of both
sexes, if it be deficient in dissipline? Of what earthly use is a
University if it be not provided with a wisely selected faculty?
It now remains to be seen whether the Baptist brethren will mob
Dr. Burleson--or sneak up behind him with an assortment of clubs
and six-shooters! But that is not the worst that Dr. Burleson
says. In a published letter of his now before me he denounces Dr.
B. H. Carroll, chairman of the board of trustees and present high
muck-a-muck of Baylor, as an ingrate, a self-seeker, a mischief
maker and an irremediable liar! Now if Burleson is telling the
truth--and I am not prepared to dispute his statements--what can
we expect of a University managed by such a man? I am frank to
confess that I did not suspect Bro. Carroll to be quite so bad. I
knew that he was an intellectual dugout spreading the canvas of a
seventy-four, that there was precious little to him but gab and
gall; but I did not suppose that he was an habitual falsifier and
guilty of base ingratitude. I really hope that Dr. Burleson may
be mistaken--that the new boss of Baylor has not contracted such
a habit of lying that it is utterly impossible for him to tell
the truth. I should dislike to believe all that is said about
each other by the two factions of my Baptist brethren now
struggling for the control of Baylor. According to Carroll, Dr.
Burleson, president emeritus, ought to be in the penitentiary;
according to Burleson, Carroll is not a fit associate for a
brindle cow. "Speak disrespectfully of Baylor and die!" Good
Lord! were I to repeat one-half the Baylor factions are saying
about each other I'd wreck the state. Time was when the faculty
of Baylor was the pride of the South. Those were the days when
many of the noblest men and women of Texas were educated within
its walls. They love their alma mater, not for what she is, but
for what she was. The old professors are gone, have been
supplanted in great part by a lot of priorient little preachers,
selected by a board of trustees, half of whom couldn't tell a
Greek root from a rutabaga, pons asinorum from Balaam's ass. Dr.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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