the public elementary school is not a ground for exemption from the school tax ($80). Private instruction, when offered as equivalent to the public school course, must be given by a person who has shown, to the satisfaction of the authori ties, that he possesses the necessary liberal and technical training, and that his character is good (§ 81). The local authorities are empowered to deal with truancy (§ 84), and those parents or guardians who do not send their children to school are punishable with a light fine and short imprisonment (§ 86). Employers of labor who engage the services of children of school age, and employ them during school hours, are punishable with a considerable fine, and possibly imprisonment for fourteen days (§ 88).

The state undertakes to provide for the professional preparation of elementary school teachers by founding and conducting teachers' seminaries (§ 104). These seminaries are to be on a sectarian basis; all of the teachers employed must be members of the sect to which the seminary belongs ($105). Their curriculum, as a rule, extends over three years (§ 106). Every such seminary must have attached to it a practice school where the students may observe and study the conduct of ungraded and graded schools and also serve an apprenticeship in teaching under proper supervision (§ 108). No person may be appointed teacher of an elementary school who has not passed an examination; in this examination the religious authorities are to participate. No certificate of capacity to give religious instruction shall be issued without the consent of the religious authorities (§ 111, 112). A definitive appointment as teacher can only be made after at least four years' practical experience (§ 113). When any elementary school teacher shall, after not less than ten years of service, be incapacitated in mind or body, he shall be entitled to a pension. A teacher who has reached the age of sixty-five years, and has been ten years in service, is entitled to a pension ipso facto (§ 155).

This law shall take effect on April 1, 1893 (§ 192).

COLUMBIA COLLEGE,

NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER.

NEW YORK.

V.

THE COLLEGE PRESIDENT.

The office of college president has attracted in recent years an unusual amount of public notice. The resignations and elections of college presidents have been many, and the declination of elections has been almost as frequent as their acceptance. Never has there been a period when the office of the chief executive of our colleges has drawn to itself so much attention. This attention need not be very profound, or greatly prolonged, to reveal several somewhat important facts as to the difficulties of the administration of this office. It soon becomes evident that the recent history of our colleges is distinguished by the comparative lack of success in administration. Conspicuous failure is not common; conspicuous success is not infrequent; but that measure of failure and that measure of success which are equally removed from either extreme are both common and frequent. The success of the administration may be limited to one sphere of college life or may extend to all; and the failure may be likewise narrow or wide in its scope. Yet constant and comparative failure in one great respect is usually sufficient to terminate, after a long series of years, the tenure of the office. One college president, learned, able, and distinguished, retired because of unpopularity with the students. Another, also learned and able as well as famous, retired because of unpopularity with the graduates. Yet another resigned by reason of opposition on the part of several of the trustees. A fourth, failing to secure the personal respect of the students, though most worthy of it, saw fit to make way for a successor. Long might be made the list of those who have withdrawn from this most honorable position by reason of some one defect in their administration.

The simple truth is that this position demands not only

great ability, but ability of such variety as to render eminent success in holding it a cause of much greater wonder than ordinary failure. For the college president represents at least four definite, distinct, and important relations. He holds, in the first place, a relation to the governing boards, to the trustees or overseers or corporation, as these boards are named in different institutions. In the proper legal sense he is their agent; elected by them, he is to do their bidding and to report his doings at their tribunal. To them he is directly responsible, and with them rests the continuance or the termination of his official tenure. But as a matter of fact, and in part as a matter of propriety, they are his agents, and do his bidding. He has usually, and ought to have, an acquaintance with the needs of the college far more intimate than the very bestinformed trustee can possess. He, not they, is to make plans which they are to approve. He, not they, is to suggest schemes which they are to aid him in executing. He, not they, is to introduce college reforms and point out ways and means of replenishing the college exchequer. At once he is thus master and servant, ruler and subject, principal and agent. It is evident that to unite these opposite functions, and to perform them honestly and efficiently, is very difficult. I know of an instance in which a college president whose long and successful term gave him assurance of the compliance of the official boards with his recommendations, suddenly found himself under their fire for certain ill-timed criticisms. Into similar exigencies every president is constantly in peril of falling. It may also be said that never to incur this danger is not complimentary to a man's intellectual force or freshness.

But not only to the governing boards does the president bear this involved relation, he also holds a relation, more constant and intimate, with the professors and instructors composing the customary faculty. This relation is also of a double character. The president of a college is president of the faculty. He is not that faculty, but he represents and declares the will of that faculty. Their will is his official will; their votes he is supposed to execute. He is their agent and factor, not their

sovereign. But holding his official trust with solicitude, and knowing his influence with the superior boards, he is prone to look on himself as a monarch. Are not presidents of wellknown colleges charged with this imperialism? And have not the faculties so rebelled against such alleged monarchical methods as well-nigh to expel the sovereign? Happily, human nature usually adjusts itself to exigencies; and the difficulties of this sort are not common. A sense of the fitness of things, i. e., common sense, guides a president safely through such perils.

A third relation which the college president holds is more prolific of danger; it is the relation he bears to the students. For the sake of both parties this relation should be as intimate as possible. For the sake of the students the intellectual and Christian influence of one their superior should be as potent a factor as possible in the formation of character; and for the sake of the president he should constantly receive light as to the improvement of administrative and educational methods. In the large college this intimacy is most difficult, if not impossible, of attainment; but in the small colleges it can easily be secured. If the paternal system of college government is no longer practicable, yet the president should in certain respects be worthy of being a father to his "boys." In a personal interest and regard for each, in a willingness to sacrifice his comfort for their welfare, in an evident desire to make their good the immediate purpose of his work, he may be well looked upon as a father. The late Professor Atwater was known by the men at Princeton as " Dad." It was a doctorate of which any college officer might well be proud. Of him it was often said by his students, "Dad is the squarest man in the faculty"-a compliment which would deserve to brighten the laurels of the most distinguished professor. And yet the temptation is strong to make this relation of quite a different sort. College students are by no means always worthy of respect. College presidents do not always seem to the students worthy of respect, however worthy they in fact may be. The president represents to the students interests which they are

inclined to regard as antagonistic to their own. He is looked upon as their master and governor, the one who wishes to make their pleasures few and their work great, and the despot who curtails their liberties. Even if the occasion be slight and the right wholly on his side, as it usually is, antagonisms are constantly fostered. To make the occasions of such differences as slight and as few as possible, and to impress his students with his supreme desire to treat them honestly and squarely, may well be one aim of a college administration. If by methods arbitrary and severe, or by methods of apparent compliance and real opposition, the attempt is made to govern students, the administration, though of several years' continuance, is foreordained to failure.

The chief executive officer of the college holds a relation not simply to his own immediate environment of corporation, faculty, and students, but also to the general public. It may well be said that if this narrower threefold relation is satisfactory, no concern need be felt as to the larger one. This is true; yet the relation a college president bears to the public is one distinct and separate in itself. The college certainly bears an important relation to the community, and this relation the president represents. If he is regarded with great respect by the community, as he usually is, the college also is honored; if for any reason he fails to command this respect, the college also suffers. The association of his name with anti-Christian schemes or doctrines injures his influence and the power of his college with the Christian part of the community; or his participation in strongly partisan movements in politics is liable to lessen his reputation for sobermindedThe importance of this public relation some governing boards are prone to emphasize. I know of a gentleman, lately chosen to the presidency of a famous college, who was told by the president of the board of trustees that one large part of his work the first year would be to represent the college before the churches and the people of the State. The chairman felt that the former president had failed in this feature of his administration. Twenty years or more ago, a conference of

ness.