"I WANT A LILY"

The question of awarding varsity letters for non-athletic process is a hardy perennial. It has bloomed recently at Tufts, where the debaters and musical clubs are asking recognition in the form of "T's". It is somewhat incongruous that artists should value the insignia of the athlete above the appreciation of their audience; such a demand can hardly come from true musicians or sincere orators.

These malcontents seek the emblem of physical accomplishment, not because they want appropriate recognition, but because they with to be identified with the teams. If the debaters were presented with large pink "T's", and the football squad received lilies of the valley, there would still be a similar outcry,--for lilies.

Unfortunately, a certain group of undergraduates make a fetish of "recognition". They worship the varsity letter, the "cum laude", the Phi Beta Kappa key, not for the worthy efforts these symbols represent, but for the fancied prestige they infer. Failing to see that all glory depends on whole-hearted devotion to work, they attribute the glamor of the varsity letter to some intrinsic quality rather than to the strenuous efforts of generations of athletes. Their fatuous grinding away for "recognition" has for its goal an impossible flaunting of decorations, while the "big" man is invariably the least ostentatious. But the small pompous individual lusts to be clad in titles, honors, and ceremonies, and his narrowness prevents his seeing that "Art for art's sake" is the only formula for achievement.

The mere detail of giving a letter to non-athletes is of minor importance. But the clamoring for "recognition" indicates that too many institutions are tainted by that smallness of soul which regards outward display more than inward satisfaction. The colleges should be the first to realize that a "cum laude" without power is irony. Their ideal should be the spirit of true craftsmanship, the desire to do something, not for a specious reward, but for the sake of doing it.