Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Science & Education by Thomas Henry Huxley
page 208 of 357 (58%)
give their powers a fair trial. If such a one fail, his endowment
terminates, and there is no harm done. If he succeed, you may give
power of flight to the genius of a Davy or a Faraday, a Carlyle or a
Locke, whose influence on the future of his fellow-men shall be
absolutely incalculable.

You have enunciated the principle that "the glory of the university
should rest upon the character of the teachers and scholars, and not
upon their numbers or buildings constructed for their use." And I look
upon it as an essential and most important feature of your plan that
the income of the professors and teachers shall be independent of the
number of students whom they can attract. In this way you provide
against the danger, patent elsewhere, of finding attempts at
improvement obstructed by vested interests; and, in the department of
medical education especially, you are free of the temptation to set
loose upon the world men utterly incompetent to perform the serious and
responsible duties of their profession.

It is a delicate matter for a stranger to the practical working of your
institutions, like myself, to pretend to give an opinion as to the
organisation of your governing power. I can conceive nothing better
than that it should remain as it is, if you can secure a succession of
wise, liberal, honest, and conscientious men to fill the vacancies that
occur among you. I do not greatly believe in the efficacy of any kind
of machinery for securing such a result; but I would venture to suggest
that the exclusive adoption of the method of co-optation for filling
the vacancies which must occur in your body, appears to me to be
somewhat like a tempting of Providence. Doubtless there are grave
practical objections to the appointment of persons outside of your body
and not directly interested in the welfare of the university; but might
DigitalOcean Referral Badge