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BY PRINCIPAL GRANT
QUEEN'S was founded by
graduates of Scottish Universities, who had "cultivated learning on a
little oatmeal" in the old land, and who believed that the youth of
Canada were animated by the same spirit. Having the characteristic
caution of their race, they did not enter on the undertaking without
counting the cost, nor until they saw no other way of having a native
ministry, trained too—as their Scottish spirit demanded—in an
institution where they would meet competitors on equal terms; for it was
an educated ministry that they chiefly had in view, although the
education the Scottish Church requires on the part of its ministers is
one equally suited to all professions, because it aims at a mental
training, such as a man is the better of having, though he should never
rise to be anything higher than a ditcher and delver. Obtaining a
charter from Her Gracious Majesty early in her reign, and taking her
title, by her express permission, for the new University, they naturally
decided to model it after the Scottish type with which they were best
acquainted. That type it still retains, though its professors are from
Oxford, Cambridge and Canadian, as well as from Scottish and German
Universities. I am asked to indicate in a brief paper some of the
characteristics of this type.
In the first place, as to method. The
instructors are professors, instead of fellows or tutors as inthe great
English Universities. The difference results from their respective
origins and historical conditions. A professor is expected to lecture to
and inspire men, and a tutor to drill boys. It depends on circumstances
which is the better method. If the classes are as large as they were in
my day in Glasgow or Edinburgh, and the professors are left without
assistance, and if in addition the students come without the preparation
that a good secondary school or gymnasium gives, then in the subjects in
which thorough drilling is obligatory the result is not good, save in
those exceptional cases in which talent and determination triumph over
all difficulties. Hence, the Scottish Universities cannot turn out such
classical or mathematical scholars as Oxford and Cambridge. Things have
greatly improved, however, during the last twenty-five years. In
consequence of the liberality of the Government, assistants have been
provided, and what is of even more consequence, a matriculation
examination has been made compulsory. In my day, the Professor of Greek—Lushington,
the brother-in-law of Tennyson, celebrated by him as
"bearing all that weight
Of learning, lightly as a flower,"
had to begin his Greek junior class with the
alphabet. Putting an Arab of the best breed to the task of a dray horse
is an inadequate simile to describe such waste of material. But the
students who had to struggle through easy classics and easy mathematics
found their feet on their native heath when they came to the classes in
Logic and Ethics. The amount of intellectual energy, reflective power
and good essay writing developed in these classes was prodigious. The
course in Philosophy alone was an education. In this subject, Scotland
has always far excelled the other two kingdoms.
This leads me to point out, in the second
place, that a characteristic of the Scottish Universities is the
importance attached by them to Philosophy. They teach men how to think,
and they do so by forcing them to grapple with the fundamental questions
of thought. It may be said that Theology deals with these questions. It
does so, but not scientifically. It presents them as dogmas of
revelation. But Protestantism insists on appealing from authority to
reason; and therefore, in the German and Scottish Universities, in both
of which the method of instruction is by professors, whose aim is to
quicken and stimulate thought rather than to act as drill-sergeants, the
fundamental questions which the mind asks concerning all existence are
grappled with, in the assured confidence that the universe is not a
riddle, but rational throughout and comprehensible by reason. Hence it
is that a student for the ministry, in any Protestant Church should
never dream of beginning the study of Theology until he has had a two
years' course, at the least, in Philosophy. The Scottish pulpit has been
the great educator of the Scottish people, just because its ministers
have been so trained that they look at all subjects rationally and are
able to reason logically. They do not demand blind faith on the part of
the people. "We speak as unto wise men," is their attitude in the
pulpit, and they know that the people judge them, as a rule, by the
matter of their sermons, rather than by anything external.
In the two points indicated above, Queen's
has been true to the best Scottish traditions. The system is
professorial and not tutorial. Hitherto, the classes have not been so
large as to prevent the professors from adding to their daily lectures
the work of personal supervision and instruction, which is the essence
of the tutorial system. Essays are prescribed, examined and commented on
in class. Class examinations are held from time to time. Attendance is
marked. The student thus knows that he is under super- vision, though a
large freedom is allowed him, for he is treated as a man to be led
rather than as a boy to be driven. But, the classes in some subjects are
becoming so large that a system of assistants and tutors will soon be
called for. Beginnings in this direction have already been made. We are
determined to combine the dignity, the leadership in the world of
thought, and the inspiring power of professors with the best features of
the tutorial system.
I may say that we attach quite as much
importance to a thorough philosophical training as the best Scottish
University does. A look at the calendar is sufficient to show how
extensive and thorough the course is. No man can get first- class
honours without at least four years' study, whether he tries along the
line of Mental, Moral, or Political Philosophy. It is rather remarkable
that, whereas many Universities, calling themselves "great," have been
satisfied with one Professor of Philosophy, Queen's has had for years
three, one for each of the departments just specified, and that she has
added a fourth instructor to the staff, chiefly for extra-mural
students; although her endowments have been so scanty that she could
appoint only one professor of English and one of French and German. No
better proof could be given of the importance attached in Queen's to
Philosophy, and no one will call this exaggerated who reflects that "no
problem appears in Theology that has not first appeared in Philosophy,"
and that all life is in the end determined by thought. As to the men who
represent the high cause of Philosophy in Queen's, Watson, Shortt, Dyde
and Sharp, it is needless for me to speak. |
