USA > Pennsylvania > Philadelphia County > Philadelphia > Municipal government history and politics, Vol. V > Part 33
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41
Quite otherwise is it with the Belgian student. He is cate- chised by his professor on the course followed during the year, which he is supposed to know by heart, having taken care never to refer to a book and contented with the confused and misspelled notes hurriedly taken at the lecture. Only the few students of the practical course ever take in their hands the necessary books and documents.
No one would accuse the students of Cambridge and Oxford of using too few books ; but are they sufficiently familiar with sources of history and original documents ? I think not. It has been well said that although it is dangerous to begin Quellenstudien too early, as yet no better method of making historians has been discovered than that of studying sources ; for the simple reason that no better method exists.1 While it is unwise to begin this study too soon, still, until the student has been brought face to face with documents apparently con- tradictory which he must criticize and account for, he can have no idea of scientific structure of history. Perhaps some gifted minds can train themselves after leaving the university ; but how much time spent in groping, the princes of the science would save them ! How many lamentable defects mar the work of self-taught scholars, notwithstanding their genius !
1 I cannot forbear referring my readers to the interesting monograph entitled Methods of Historical Study, by Mr. Herbert B. Adams, professor at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. The author states and discusses the systems successively employed in Europe (Germany, France, Belgium) and in America (especially at Johns Hopkins and Harvard Universities).
52
The Study of History in England and Scotland. [434
The Oxford students expressed their appreciation of this fact when they introduced the German historical seminaries.
But these seminaries differ essentially from the German. In the latter one evening's summary discussion of a subject does not suffice ; documents are scrupulously dissected, one or two at a time, to extract all that each one can furnish. They are the small stones, which will go with many fellows to build up an exhaustive treatise, the work of several months. The Oxford students thus, in attempting to introduce the German method, have not begun in the right way. While I would be the last to disparage the alluring debating club where coffee and cigarettes add their charm to the hour, yet I do not hesi- tate to say that it cannot take the place of a practical course in a historical laboratory.
In the English universities there is also need of certain important courses preparatory for truly scientific research, such as paleography, diplomatics, and chronology. At the German universities, at the School of Charters, and at the Practical School of Higher Studies at Paris, there are ex- perienced and enthusiastic masters in these special sciences, without which no historian can be accurate.1
England spends yearly sums unequalled on the continent for printing luxuriously her charters, chronicles and all sources of history, and similar publications appear for all the sciences relating to history. Of what use is this vast expense? No doubt there is in Great Britain a considerable number of scholars and writers to whom these fine collections are valuable; but do the universities receive any benefit from them ? In Germany the Monumenta of Pertz, the Reichstags- akten and all similar publications are diligently explored each year by a multitude of masters and pupils enamoured of historical research and applying to the pursuit the strictest
1 I am glad to see that Mr. Burrows, professor at Oxford, in his lecture before referred to, breaks a lance in favor of the introduction of paleo- graphy among the subjects at his university.
53
435] The Study of History in England and Scotland.
laboratory methods. The system has no parallel in the coun- try on whose bounty it thrives. I have seen Mr. Châtelain, lecturer at L'École pratique des hautes études in Paris, draw for his course in paleography upon the admirable productions of the London Paleographic Society. At German universities, in German books, one continually sees the effects of "State Papers," the collections of the Camden Society and the various other documents of the kind which England scatters broadcast every year. I hope the day is not far distant when Oxford and Cambridge will count among their two hundred or their forty students of history, a chosen few who will dissect with patriotic ardor the original documents of their national history.
The remarkable development in historical instruction that has taken place at Oxford since 1870, and at Cambridge since 1875, leads one to think that the practical course will soon be felt a necessary complement to the already brilliant theoretical course. A corps at Cambridge of one professor and five lecturers for history alone or at Oxford of two pro- fessors and fourteen lecturers offers ample accommodation, at least unsurpassed by German universities. Mr. Seeley has already started along the right road. His conversation-class, though dealing with philosophical principles of history instead of with documents, is really a practical course, an intellectual dissecting-room. His skill, thought and experience are all at the disposal of the pupils who choose to be initiated in the methods of political science; there is a continual exchange between master and pupils, a Socratic, experimental system that cannot be replaced by any amount of theory. If I might counsel the five colleges at Cambridge, I should urge them each for its own specialty to follow this example-as, indeed, Mr. Browning has already done in his Political Society.
As for Oxford, I imagine that Mr. E. A. Freeman, suc- cessor to Mr. Stubbs, will of necessity be an apostle of the new school. I met him at Edinburgh, already familiar with his works, in which are reflected his vast learning, youthful
54
[436
The Study of History in England and Scotland.
spirit, originality of thought and style, and indomitable zeal in the pursuit of historical truth. So deep-dyed a historian cannot fail to exercise a direct scientific influence upon the young men thronging to him, and no doubt circumstances will aid him. That the change is brewing at Oxford is proved by the establishment of the two seminaries and the other historical circles. The younger lecturers with whom I have spoken are already enlisted in the cause. The fruit is ripe and will soon fall.1
Advanced historical instruction in England to-day rivals that of Germany and Paris; and every year the English universities produce new pioneers, eager and well-equipped, bringing to history the clear-sightedness and sound judgment that characterizes all Anglo-Saxon science. The continually · increasing number of prizes and fellowships (for England is the home of intelligent endowments), positive encouragements with which the Continent is not familiar, peculiarly favor the progress of disinterested research, and keep from want those devotees who, like the brave privat-docenten of Germany, give their lives to their cause without one ray of promised remu- neration.
1 In his opening lecture before referred to, Mr. Freeman lets it appear what will be his tendency at Oxford.
XI
SEMINARY LIBRARIES
AND
UNIVERSITY EXTENSION
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES IN
HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE
HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor
History is past Politics and Politics present History - Freeman
FIFTH SERIES XI
SEMINARY LIBRARIES
AND
UNIVERSITY EXTENSION
BY HERBERT B. ADAMS
BALTIMORE N. MURRAY, PUBLICATION AGENT, JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY NOVEMBER, 1887
COPYRIGHT, 1887, BY N. MURRAY.
JOHN MURPHY & CO., PRINTERS, BALTIMORE.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
PAGE.
SEMINARY LIBRARIES AND UNIVERSITY EXTENSION :
I .- Seminary Libraries in Germany.
7
II .- Seminary Libraries in America ..
12
III .- Seminary Libraries for the People.
21
THE WORK OF LIBRARIES.
24
UNIVERSITY EXTENSION IN ENGLAND.
29
5
SEMINARY LIBRARIES
AND
UNIVERSITY EXTENSION.1
I.
SEMINARY LIBRARIES IN GERMANY.
The Historical Seminarium is a German Institution. It first came into prominence about fifty years ago, under the direction of Leopold von Ranke2 at the University of Berlin. Ranke's own training at Leipzig had been chiefly philological, and he transferred the seminary method from philology to history. It had long been customary to train philological students by practical exercises in the critical interpretation of classical authors. The discussions were always carried on in Latin. The practice was simply an adaptation of old scho- lastic methods of disputation to new uses. In seminary priests and in the schools of the Jesuits we have "survivals" of the
1 This paper on "Seminary Libraries" was written at the request of a committee of the American Library Association, and was presented at their annual meeting held September 6-9, 1887, upon one of the Thousand Islands. By consent of the editor of the Proceedings of the Association, the paper is published in this number of the University Studies, in connec- tion with kindred articles on "The Work of Libraries" and " University Extension."
2 See article by the writer on "Leopold von Ranke," published by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 1887, Vol. XXII, part II.
7
8
Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
[444
ancient system of practical training out of which our modern seminary methods have evolved.
Ranke called his seminary work historical exercises (exer- citationes historicœ). They were simply private conferences between the professor and a little group of advanced students for the critical study of the sources of medieval history in the professor's own library. There, with the apparatus of historical learning close at hand, Ranke trained the future historians of Germany to exact methods of analyzing sources and determining facts. It was at this period that George Pertz was editing and publishing the original texts of German mediaval history-the Monumenta Germanic Historica-and it was the proper use of these texts which Ranke taught his students. He showed them how to compare one authority with another, to weigh evidence, and to balance it by critical judgment. It was in Ranke's seminary that men like George Waitz and William Giesebrecht learned how to collect from many scattered sources all the facts and authorities belonging to the history of the Saxon dynasty of the old German Em- pire and to arrange them chronologically in Year Books. Thus, in Ranke's private library, German history began to be reconstructed. Thus to modern fields of inquiry was trans- ferred that critical method of textual study which Ranke had learned from the writings of Niebuhr and from the classical philologists of Leipzig. This method was extended by Ranke's pupils throughout all Germany. The writer is assured by Dr. Jastrow, one of Ranke's students, that there is to-day not a single professor of history at a German university who is not, directly or indirectly, a product of the Ranke school. His ideas have penetrated other lands-Switzerland, Italy, France, Belgium, England, and are now represented in American col- leges and universities.
Seminary libraries in Germany are usually the professor's own collection, reinforced by such drafts upon the University library as seminary students are allowed to make. It is the custom in some German universities-notably in Berlin, as
9
445] Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
the writer well remembers-for professors whose courses a student follows to become surety for him in the drawing of books. Under professorial direction students find their own way in the university library to the proper sources of informa- tion upon the subject under discussion in the seminary or in lecture courses. Sometimes special problems are given by the professor for student solution by private study and for report at a future seminary meeting. There the student appears, fortified by books and documents borrowed from the univer- sity library, and prepared with his brief of points and citations, like a lawyer about to plead a case in the court-room. Usually the members of a seminary take their weekly turn in the presentation and solution of some historical problem or in the elucidation of some historical text, of which all have a copy. Authorities are discussed ; parallel sources of informa- tion are cited ; old opinions are exploded ; standard histories are riddled by criticism, and new views are established. This process of destruction and reconstruction requires considerable literary apparatus, and the professor's study-table is usually covered with many evidences of the battle of books. The dead and wounded are, however, quickly cleared away when refreshments appear upon the scene.
One of the pleasantest features of our seminary meetings in Heidelberg was the weekly display of new books, mono- graphs, pamphlets, and other publications which were sent to our professor from his book-seller for examination by the students before and after the regular seminary exercises. In this way young men were made familiar with current his- torical literature. The professor's comments upon this or that author, his past or present work, were usually very instructive. Such conversation was an agreeable dessert after a somewhat jejune meal of medieval Latin. Ideas were exchanged by the students upon books which they had already read or examined. Useful suggestions were thrown out by the professor in a kindly, helpful way, and the sym- posium usually broke up in a very cheerful state of mind,
10
[446
Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
notwithstanding the sharp tilts and hard hits which some members had received in the course of the evening. Semi- nary work does not consist altogether in looking at new books. The real business is the mock fight of one man against all the rest, including the professor. To be sure, that one man has been permitted to arm and strengthen himself in every possible way in the arsenal of science, the university library ; but usually somebody finds a weak spot in his armor.
While the private library of a professor continues to be a favorite place for seminary meetings in all German univer- sities, it has been found expedient in some cases, where the seminary membership is large, to secure a special room at the university or near the university library. The increased demands upon the latter, the delay and difficulty incident to the procuring of books for seminary use from an inadequate supply, has led to the institution of small working collections for the special and exclusive benefit of a particular seminary. These select libraries are supported by private subscription, special endowment, or definite appropriation from year to year. There is always a professorial director who has authority, within certain economic limits, to order books for his semi- nary. The room and library are placed in the charge of an advanced and trustworthy student, sometimes the senior member who is regarded as the professor's deputy, and is a man having authority over other members, some of whom serve as willing proxies. The library is managed upon prin- ciples of comity and general accommodation. It is a kind of literary club-room. Each member has a key to the room and comes and goes when he pleases. He has a private desk, or a drawer in the seminary table, where he keeps his notes, papers, and writing materials. The room is accessible at all hours during the day and evening, and is usually an attrac- tive place for quiet, uninterrupted work. A well-lighted, well-equipped, comfortable place for study and research is a boon highly appreciated by the average German student,
11
447]
Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
whose domestic accommodations and private library are usually inferior.
The best of these seminary libraries are in Bonn, Leipzig, and Berlin ; but the smaller universities have them also. In Heidelberg there was, in the writer's student days, a semi- nary-library of political economy, which served an excellent purpose in supplying earnest workers with the necessary tools and a work-shop, at a time when the university library was entirely unequal to student demand for economic literature. Seminary work has proved so valuable in Germany that both the state and the imperial governments have recognized and encouraged it in substantial ways. Probably the best equipped seminary in the world is that founded by Dr. Engel in con- nection with the Statistical Bureau at Berlin. It has a superb special library of historical, political, social and economic litera- ture, with all the most important periodicals in this line from various countries. One of the duties of seminary members is to report upon the contents of these periodicals. Some of the best special work in modern German political science has been done in connection with this statistical seminary, which is sup- ported by the Prussian government. Membership is limited to university graduates of advanced standing. The seminary is really a government school, or civil academy, which trains educated men for the highest branches of the civil service, and for special inquiries connected with the census of the German states and of the German empire. There is a general director of the seminary, who also has charge of the Statistical Bureau, and he secures the best talent from the Berlin university to lecture to his seminary students, whom he guides practically into lines of scientific inquiry useful to the State, or to society at large.
12
Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
[448
II.
SEMINARY LIBRARIES IN AMERICA.1
The evolution of the seminary and of seminary libraries in America proceeded from ideas brought home by American students from German universities. One of the first forms of development was that in the University of Michigan, where, as early as 1869, Professor Charles Kendall Adams instituted a special class for the study of English Constitutional His- tory, with reference to the original sources of information as well as to standard literature. He published a useful pamph- let, entitled "Notes on the Constitutional History of Eng- land," with general topics and suggestions for the guidance of his students in their use of the university library. Although there is no published evidence of original work at the Uni- versity of Michigan in the English field of historical research, yet this early form of American seminary training, upon large and conventional topics, served a most important purpose and led the way to excellent original work in the American field, notably to Dr. George W. Knight's scholarly paper on the " History and Management of Federal Land Grants for Edu- cation in the Northwest Territory," published by the American Historical Association in 1885; and to Miss Lucy M. Salmon's "History of the Appointing Power of the President," which has been pronounced by Mr. George William Curtis to be the most valuable contribution to the historical literature of Civil Service Reform since the work of Dorman B. Eaton on the Civil Service of Great Britain. Miss Salmon's monograph was published by the American Historical Association in
1 The relation of American seminary libraries to department work in his- tory is shown in greater detail in a special report on "The Study of History in American Colleges and Universities," pp. 300, made by the writer to the Bureau of Education, and printed as Circular of Information No. 2, 1887. Pictorial illustrations of seminary libraries are there given.
13
449] Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
1886. It must be gratifying to the founder of the seminary method in the University of Michigan that Dr. Knight has carried the seminary idea to the State University of Ohio, where he has given a fresh impulse to the history of the northwest, and where he has become the chief editor of the Ohio Archeological and Historical Quarterly ; and that Miss Salmon has been appointed professor of history in Vassar College, where she will doubtless promote original research among young women.
The Historical Seminary of the University of Michigan was for many years dependent upon the inadequate resources of the general library ; but at last Professor Adams secured the gift of $4,300 to be expended under his direction for the benefit of the historical department, upon the easy condition of not publishing the name of the giver. By the aid of this subsidy it became possible to supply the seminary with a suit- able literary outfit. Counsel was taken with specialists in England and, by their cooperation, a valuable collection of books and documents was procured, suitable for an original study not only of English institutions, but also of municipal government in various European countries. When plans were drawn for the new library building of the University of Michigan, provision was made for the accommodation of the Historical Seminary. Special rooms were reserved in one of the two main wings and there its meetings are now held, in close proximity to a fire-proof book-room, from which literary supplies are brought for seminary use. A portion of the seminary library is kept in the seminary rooms for easy con- sultation ; but the rarer works and books that are not in constant demand, are kept in the fire-proof, central reposi- tory. The seminary is supplied with numerous tables and with all the necessary appliances for the encouragement of quiet, individual work.
From the University of Michigan the seminary method has been transplanted to Cornell University by Professor Moses Coit Tyler, who now directs a flourishing seminary of Ameri-
[450
14
Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
can history, and by President Charles Kendall Adams, who continues, in association with Professor Herbert Tuttle, to encourage original historical research. The writer has taken occasion to visit the seminary-rooms of these teachers. He found Professor Tyler's seminary furnished with excellent apparatus for historical instruction, maps, diagrams, etc., and communicating directly with his own private library, from which books can be easily taken. President Adams' and Pro- fessor Tuttle's seminary is in immediate connection with the main library of the university. A long, high room, well- filled with books of reference and documentary sources of English history, is supplied with a long table, and, around this, special students assemble from week to week for the dis- cussion of original papers. Members of the seminary have access to this room every day during library hours and pur- sue their investigations in greater quiet and seclusion than would be possible in the main hall of the university library. The present librarians are highly favorable to the seminary method of work and cooperate with both students and instruc- tors in every possible way. It is understood that in the new library building of Cornell University ample provision will be made for seminary rooms, which shall have all the advan- tage of privacy, and at the same time convenient connection with the central collection of books. This is the ideal arrange- ment. It is also understood that Ex-President White's histori- cal library, lately presented to the University, will constitute the literary environment of an historical seminary.
At Harvard University the evolution of the seminary idea began very early, although no use appears to have been made of the seminary name. In the year 1870 Henry Adams was appointed Assistant Professor of History, and he led his students into the novel field of mediæval institutional history. Following for a time in the steps of Von Maurer and of Sir Henry Maine, for the purpose of training himself and his classes, he soon struck into the independent field of Anglo- Saxon Law, with a little company of advanced students,
15
451] Seminary Libraries and University Extension.
namely, Henry Cabot Lodge, Ernest Young, and J. Laurence Laughlin, all of whom have since acquired individual reputa- tion as instructors in Harvard University and in other ways. The first fruits of original historical study at Cambridge were published in a volume bearing the title of " Essays in Anglo- Saxon Law," Boston, 1876. The work was republished in England, and is regarded as a substantial contribution to his- torical jurisprudence. To the best of the writer's knowledge it was the first original historical work ever accomplished by American university students working in a systematic and thoroughly scientific way under proper direction.
In the alcoves of the Harvard University Library there has been quietly developing for several years a system of book- reservations for particular instructors and their classes. A stranger walking through the main hall of the old library building will be struck by the great number of special collec- tions or groups of books, bearing the names of individual members of the faculty, as though each one had pre-empted an alcove for his own benefit. A closer examination will show that these are all artificial and temporary groupings of a few dozen books for a particular pedagogical purpose. They have been taken from the main collection, or book stack, and placed here in the alcoves of the general reading-room for the accom- modation of students who are pursuing elective courses in history or literature. These books may be used on the premises at tables provided for the purpose, or they may be taken out over night or over Sunday, under special rules. Upon re- flection it occurs to a student of institutions that here is a system of seminaries in process of evolution. Each instructor with his elective class represents a university leader with a scientific comitatus. Just now their place of muster and training is a university class-room, quite remote from their armory, which is the university library. One of these days, perhaps, they will meet and drill in the armory itself, if that shall be duly enlarged ; or else, perhaps, they will carry off the equipment to their own camp, and leave the management
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.