CLASSIC SELF SUPPORT

For many complex reasons the study of the classics has sunk, with all the rapidity of a torpedoed ship, to a pitiable position in the interests of students in the modern colleges and secondary schools. Aroused by this catastrophe, the American Classical League has rushed assistance in the form of an imposing array of statistics by which, among other things, they show, as usual, that classical scholars have a higher average in all other subjects than do students who have not dipped into the rewarding, if difficult literatures of Rome and Athens. The inference seems to be that the classics are worthy of study merely for the mental training involved.

The statistics cited are possibly accurate, but entirely too much reliance may be placed on their supposed significance. The classics are avowedly difficult. By that very token the students who eject them are more likely to be men of the scholarly type, men who would naturally excel in any field of scholastic endeavor. Once this is admitted a certain stigma of futility attaches itself to the statistics of the League. The organization might employ its time to better advantage in showing the value of the ancient authors to modern thought, the message which the mellowed wisdom of the ages has to offer modern civilization. The immensity and importance of the great literature of the ancient world might well be painted in vivid phrases. Finally, an explanation of the reason why English translations of Greek and Latin authors are unsatisfactory would be wholly relevant to the discussion. There are many arguments to support such statements, the classics are quite capable of standing on their own feet.