ard of any college. We take the oppoitunity
to congratulate the student and the whole col
lege upon this fact. We believe, however,
that one side of our social character could be
improved by the addition of an elegance which
a more extended, not necessarily more licensed,
intermingling of the sexes would contribute.
We believe that methods for suppressing such
communication are wrong, and are a pool
apology for the lack of pains and attention
which ought to be exercised in regulating,
organizing, and extending it in a way cal
culated to educate. It certainly is not ne
cessary to sacrifice polite attainment to normal
purity; with regulation we may have both.
Such as intimated, arc the social manner,
standard, and attainment of our student,
The mental traits which commend our stu
dents are an effective, practical giasp, and the
absence of superfluous methods and unessen
tial processes in dealing with a question. We
think this is shown by the work of our stu
dents after leaving college. These picdomi
nant mental characteristics arc the result of
the methods of instruction employed and the
analytic nature of most of our subjects of study.
These traits are apparent in debates, orations,
and all the work of the students exposed to the
observer.
Along with these points there are others
less commendable. We can not avoid the
conclusion that there is a lack of .esthetical
discrimination and versatility which an ex
tended dpartment in belles-letters would sup
port and sustain.
We do not forget how strongly our atten
tion was attacted by the moral standard of the
students at P. S. C. when we first became one
of their number. Two things we observe here.
The first is that our students maintain in their
midst an exceptionally high sense of honor.
We have never seen anywhere a body of young
men more ready to render a verdict against
meanness. Manhood is well sustained, and
we believe its standard is being raised higher
THE FREE LANCE.
and more carefully guarded each succeeding
year. A second point prominent enough to
be noted, is the strength of the non-religious
element. This strength is, however, rapidly
decreasing. In speaking of this feature we do
not say that the moral standard is low; It is
high! But we do not like to see universal
disregard of religion applauded by attention or
excused by popular toleration. No doubt the
religious character at large here is as radical
as at any other non-sectarian institution,
but this is the point where the students of such
institutions generally fall below those of de
nominational colleges. We believe such in
stitutions would do a better work if some of
the methods of denominational schools were
employed to diffuse radical Christianity through
out the college course; for the Christian
organizations among the students at P. S. C.
there is also a work to do which will tell upon
the moral character of her students.
PEOPLE may be classified as people in
particular, and people in general. Peo
ple in particular like the exceptions to the rules
of syntax, are found in fine type, and exhibit a
similar fineness and delicacy in construction,
for they include those exquisitely moulded
natures that are capable of expansion and con
traction of feeling in the highest and lowest
degrees. They can glide along the whole key
board of emotion with the ease of the skilled
musicians, who awaken the soul of harmony
by their magnetic touch.
While people in general are like adjectives
modifying the things to which they are at
tached, in three degrees, the positive, the com
parative and the superlative.
Those lymphatic people, those easy-going,
passive, non-explosive mortals that take all
affairs of life with cool indifference, may be
termed the positive order. Nothing ever dis
turbs their equilibrium, because they are all
equilibrium; there is nothing about their make-
PEOPLE.