The proposition for which Amherst stands is that preparation for some particular part of life does not make better citizens than “preparation for the whole of it”; that because a man can “function in society” as a craftsman in some trade or technical work, he is not thereby made a better leader; that we have already too much of that statesmanship marked by ability “to further some dominant social interest,” and too little of that which is “aware of a world moralized by principle, steadied and cleared of many an evil thing by true and catholic reflection and just feeling, a world not of interest, but of ideas.” Amherst upholds the proposition that for statesmen, leaders of public thought, for literature, indeed for all work which demands culture and breadth of view, nothing can take the place of the classical education; that the duty of institutions of higher education is not wholly performed when the youth of the country are passed from the high schools to the universities to be “vocationalized,” but that there is a most important work to be performed by an institution which stands outside this straight line to pecuniary reward; that there is room for at least one great classical college, and we believe for many such. [Illustration: Johnston Gate from the Yard, Harvard University] These opinions are impressive. No one can visit widely our American colleges without feeling the appropriateness of such warnings and demands. A story is told of the president of a college praying in chapel for the prosperity of his school and all new and “inferior” institutions. The prayer would seem to have been answered in the last decade, which marks the marvelous growth of modern technical institutions in America. This growth has been specially pronounced in the great State universities and in the institutions fitted to train men in practical education. GROWTH OF PRACTICAL EDUCATION Dr. William R. Harper is quoted as saying shortly before his death that “no matter how liberally the private institution might be endowed, the heritage of the future, at least in the West, is to be the State university.” An ex-president of a State university has given the following indication of ten years of advance in attendance of students at fifteen State universities in comparison with attendance at fifteen representative Eastern colleges and universities: 1896-97 1906-07 State universities 16,414 34,770 Increase 112% Eastern institutions 18,331 28,631 Increase 56%