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THE SOCIAL VALUE OF THE COLLEGE-BRED

By William James

THE SOCIAL VALUE OF THE COLLEGE-BRED, by William James, published in McClure’s Magazine, Vol. XXX, p.419.Reprinted in Scott and Zeitlin,College Readings in English Prose, New York, MacMillan Company, 1920, pp. 137-144.

William James （1842-1910）, American psychologist and philosopher, the brother of Henry James （1843-1916）, novelist and essayist. In 1890 William James published his epoch-making Principles of Psychology in which the germs of his philosophy are already discernible. His fascinating style, his broad culture and cosmopolitanism made him the most influential American thinker of his day.

Of what use is a college training? We who have had it seldom hear the question raised—we might be a little nonplused to answer it offhand. A certain amount of meditation has brought me to this as the pithiest reply which I myself can give: The best claim that a college education can possibly make on your respect, the best thing it can aspire to accomplish for you is this—that it should help you to know a good man when you see him. This is as true of women’s as of men’s colleges; but that it is neither a joke nor a one-sided abstraction I shall now endeavor to show.

What talk do we commonly hear about the contrast between college education and the education which business or technical or professional schools confer? The college education is called higher because it is supposed to be so general and so disinterested. At the “schools” you get a relatively narrow practical skill, you are told, whereas the “colleges” give you the more liberal culture, the broader outlook, the historical perspective, the philosophic atmosphere, or something which phrases of that sort try to express. You are made into an efficient instrument for doing a definite thing, you hear, at the schools; but, apart from that, you may remain a crude and smoky kind of petroleum, incapable of spreading light. The universities and colleges, on the other hand, although they may leave you less efficient for this or that practical task, suffuse your whole mentality with something more important than skill. They redeem you, make you well-bred; they make “good company” of you mentally. If they find you with a naturally boorish or caddish mind, they cannot leave you so, as a technical school may leave you. This, at least, is pretended; this is what we hear among college-trained people when they compare their education with every other sort. Now, exactly how much does this signify?

It is certain, to begin with, that the narrowest trade or professional training does something more for a man than to make a skilful practical tool of him—it makes him also a judge of other men’s skill. Whether his trade be pleading at the bar or surgery or plastering or plumbing, it develops a critical sense in him for that sort of occupation. He understands the difference between second-rate and first-rate work in his whole branch of industry; he gets to know a good job in his own line, as soon as he sees it; and getting to know this in his own line, he gets a faint sense of what good work may mean anyhow, that may, if circumstances favor, spread into his judgments elsewhere. Sound work, clean work, finished work;feeble work, slack work, sham work—these words express an identical contrast in many different departments of activity. In so far forth, then, even the humblest manual trade may beget in one a certain small degree of power to judge of good work generally.

Now, what is supposed to be the line of us who have the higher college training? Is there any broader line—since our education claims primarily not to be “narrow”—in which we also are made good judges between what is first-rate and what is second-rate only? What is especially taught in the colleges has long been known by the name of the “humanities,” and these are often identified with Greek and Latin. But it is only as literatures, not as languages, that Greek and Latin have any general humanity value; so that in a broad sense the humanities mean literature primarily, and in a still broader sense, the study of masterpieces in almost any field of human endeavor. Literature keeps the primacy; for it not only consists of masterpieces, but is largely about masterpieces, being little more than an appreciative chronicle of human master-strokes, so far as it takes the form of criticism and history. You can give humanistic value to almost anything by teaching it historically. Geology, economics, and mechanics are humanities when taught with reference to the successive achievements of the geniuses to which these sciences owe their being. Not taught thus, literature remains grammar, art a catalogue, history a list of dates, and natural science a sheet of formulas and weights and measures.

The sifting of human creations! —nothing less than this is what we ought to mean by the humanities. Essentially this means biography; what our colleges should teach is, therefore, biographical history, that not of politics merely, but of anything and everything so far as human efforts and conquests are factors that have played their part. Studying in this way, we learn what types of activity have stood the test of time; we acquire standards of the excellent and durable. All our arts and sciences and institutions are but so many quests of perfection on the part of men; and when we see how diverse the types of excellence may be, how various the tests, how flexible the adaptations, we gain a richer sense of what the terms “better” and “worse” may signify in general. Our critical sensibilities grow both more acute and less fanatical. We sympathize with men’s mistakes even in the act of penetrating them; we feel that pathos of lost causes and misguided epochs even while we applaud what overcame them.

Such words are vague and such ideas are inadequate, but their meaning is unmistakable. What the colleges—teaching humanities by examples which may be special, but which must be typical and pregnant—should at least try to give us, is a general sense of what, under various disguises, superiority has always signified and may still signify. The feeling for a good human job anywhere, the admiration of the really admirable, the disesteem of what is cheap and trashy and impermanent—this is what we call the critical sense, the sense for ideal values. It is the better part of what men know as wisdom. Some of us are wise in this way naturally and by genius; some of us never become so. But to have spent one’s youth at college, in contact with the choice and rare and precious, and yet still to be a blind prig or vulgarian, unable to scent out human excellence or to divine it amid its accidents, to know it only when ticketed and labeled and forced on us by others, this indeed should be accounted the very calamity and shipwreck of a higher education.

The sense for human superiority ought, then, to be considered our line, as boring subways is the engineer’s line and the surgeon’s is appendicitis. Our colleges ought to have lit up in us a lasting relish for the better kind of man, a loss of appetite for mediocrities, and a disgust for cheap Jacks. We ought to smell, as it were, the difference of quality in men and their proposals when we enter the world of affairs about us. Expertness in this might well atone for some of our awkwardness at accounts, for some of our ignorance of dynamos. The best claim we can make for the higher education, the best single phrase in which we can tell what it ought to do for us, is, then, exactly what I said: it should enable us to know a good man when we see him.

That the phrase is anything but an empty epigram follows from the fact that if you ask in what line it is most important that a democracy like ours should have its sons and daughters skilful, you see that it is this line more than any other. “The people in their wisdom”—this is the kind of wisdom most needed by the people. Democracy is on its trial, and no one knows how it will stand the ordeal. Abounding about us are pessimistic prophets. Fickleness and violence used to be, but are no longer, the vices which they charge to democracy. What its critics now affirm is that its preferences are inveterately for the inferior. So it was in the beginning, they say, and so it will be world without end. Vulgarity enthroned and institutionalized, elbowing everything superior from the highway, this, they tell us, is our irremediable destiny; and the picture-papers of the European continent are already drawing Uncle Sam with the hog instead of the eagle for his heraldic emblem. The privileged aristocracies to the foretime, with all their iniquities, did at least preserve some taste for higher human quality and honor certain forms of refinement by their enduring traditions. But when democracy is sovereign, its doubters say, nobility will form a sort of invisible church, and sincerity and refinement, stripped of honor, precedence, and favor, will have to vegetate on sufferance in private corners. They will have no general influence. They will be harmless eccentricities.

Now, who can be absolutely certain that this may not be the career of democracy? Nothing future is quite secure; states enough have inwardly rotted; and democracy as a whole may undergo self-poisoning. But, on the other hand, democracy is a kind of religion and we are bound not to admit its failure. Faiths and utopias are the noblest exercise of human reason, and no one with a spark of reason in him will sit down fatalistically before the croaker’s picture. The best of us are filled with the contrary vision of a democracy stumbling through every error till its institutions glow with justice and its customs shine with beauty. Our better men shall show the way and we shall follow them;so we are brought round again to the mission of the higher education in helping us to know the better kind of man whenever we see him.

The notion that a people can run itself and its affairs anonymously is now well known to be the silliest of absurdities. Mankind does nothing save through initiatives on the part of inventors, great or small, and imitation by the rest of us—these are the sole factors active in human progress. Individuals of genius show the way, and set the patterns, which common people then adopt and follow. The rivalry of the patterns is the history of the world. Our democratic problem thus is statable in ultra-simple terms: Who are the kind of men from whom our majorities shall take their cue? Whom shall they treat as rightful leaders? We and our leaders are the x and the y of the equation here; all other historic circumstances, be they economical, political, or intellectual, are only the background of occasion on which the living drama works itself out between us.

In this very simple way does the value of our educated class define itself; we more than others should be able to divine the worthier and better leaders. The terms here are monstrously simplified, of course, but such a bird’s-eye view lets us immediately take our bearings. In our democracy, where everything else is so shifting, we alumni and alumnæ of the colleges are the only permanent presence that corresponds to the aristocracy in older countries. We have continuous traditions, as they have; our motto, too, is noblesse oblige;and, unlike them, we stand for ideal interests solely, for we have no corporate selfishness and wield no powers of corruption. We ought to have our own class-consciousness.“Les intellectuels! ”What prouder club-name could there be than this one, used ironically by the party of “red blood,” the party of every stupid prejudice and passion, during the anti-Dreyfus craze, to satirize the men in France who still retained some critical sense and judgment! Critical sense, it has to be confessed, is not an exciting term, hardly a banner to carry in processions. Affections for old habit, currents of self-interest, and gales of passion are the forces that keep the human ship moving; and the pressure of the judicious pilot’s hand upon the tiller is a relatively insignificant energy. But the affections, passions, and interests are shifting, successive, and distraught;they blow in alteration while the pilot’s hand is steadfast. He knows the compass, and, with all the leeways lie is obliged to tack toward, he always makes some headway. A small force, if it never lets up, will accumulate effects more considerable than those of much greater forces if these work inconsistently. The ceaseless whisper of the more permanent ideals, the steady tug of truth and justice, give them but time, must warp the world in their direction.

This bird’s-eye view of the general steering function of the college-bred amid the driftings of democracy ought to help us to a wider vision of what our colleges themselves should aim at. If we are to be the yeast cake for democracy’s dough, if we are to make it rise with culture’s preferences, we must see to it that culture spreads broad sails. We must shake the old double reefs out of the canvas into the wind and sunshine, and let in every modern subject, sure that any subject will prove humanistic, if its setting be kept only wide enough.

Stevenson says somewhere to his reader: “You think you are just making this bargain, but you are really laying down a link in the policy of mankind.” Well, your technical school should enable you to make your bargain splendidly;but your college should show you just the place of that kind of bargain—a pretty poor place, possibly—in the whole policy of mankind. That is the kind of liberal outlook, of perspective, of atmosphere, which should surround every subject as a college deals with it.

We of the colleges must eradicate a curious notion which numbers of good people have about such ancient seats of learning as Harvard. To many ignorant outsiders, that name suggests little more than a kind of sterilized conceit and incapacity for being pleased. In Edith Wyatt’s exquisite book of Chicago sketches called Every One His Own Way, there is a couple who stand for culture in the sense of exclusiveness, Richard Elliot and his feminine counterpart—feeble caricatures of mankind, unable to know any good thing when they see it, incapable of enjoyment unless a printed label gives them leave. Possibly this type of culture may exist near Cambridge and Boston, there may be specimens there, for priggishness is just like painter’s colic or any other trade disease. But every good college makes its students immune against this malady, of which the microbe haunts the neighborhood-printed pages. It does so by its general tone being too hearty for the microbe’s life. Real culture lives by sympathies and admirations, not by dislikes and disdains—under all misleading wrappings it pounces unerringly upon the human core. If a college, through the inferior human influences that have grown regnant there, fails to catch the robuster tone, its failure is colossal, for its social function stops; democracy gives it a wide berth, turns toward it a deaf ear.

“Tone,” to be sure, is a terribly vague word to use, but there is no other, and this whole meditation is over questions of tone. By their tone are all things human either lost or saved. If democracy is to be saved it must catch the higher, healthier tone. If we are to impress it with our preferences, we ourselves must use the proper tone, which we, in turn, must have caught from our own teachers. It all reverts in the end to the action of innumerable imitative individuals upon each other and to the question of whose tone has the highest spreading power. As a class, we college graduates should look to it that ours has spreading power. It ought to have the highest spreading power.

In our essential function of indicating the better men, we now have formidable competitors outside. McClure’s Magazine, the American Magazine, Collier’s Weekly and, in its fashion, the World’s Work, constitute together a real popular university along this very line. It would be a pity if any future historian were to have to write words like these: “By the middle of the twentieth century the higher institutions of learning had lost all influence over public opinion in the United States. But the mission of raising the tone of democracy, which they had proved themselves so lamentably unfitted to exert, was assumed with rare enthusiasm and prosecuted with extraordinary skill and success by a new educational power; and for the clarification of their human sympathies and elevation of their human preferences, the people at large acquired the habit of resorting exclusively to the guidance of certain private literary adventures, commonly designated in the market by the affectionate name of ‘ten-cent magazines.’”

Must not we of the colleges see to it that no historian shall ever say anything like this? Vague as the phrase of knowing a good man when you see him may be, diffuse and indefinite as one must leave its application, is there any other formula that describes so well the result at which our institutions ought to aim? If they do that, they do the best thing conceivable. If they fail to do it, they fail in very deed. It surely is a fine synthetic formula. If our faculties and graduates could once collectively come to realize it as the great underlying purpose toward which they have always been more or less obscurely groping, a great clearness would be shed over many of their problems; and, as for their influence in the midst of our social system, it would embark upon a new career of strength.

Notes

hear the question raised, hear the question brought up or asked.

nonplused, puzzled; reduced to hopeless perplexity.

offhand, without previous study or preparation; extempore.

pithiest, most forceful; concise; most terse.

on your respect, in your particular case; with respect to you.

aspire, desire earnestly; hope.

women’s as of men’s colleges, because very often there are separate colleges for men and women.

abstraction, theory; an idea stripped of its concrete accompaniments, sometimes visionary.

historical perspective, the faculty of seeing into things from a point of view that is based upon the evidence or investigation of history.

petroleum, rock oil, kerosene.

suffuse, overspread, as with a fluid, tinge, or tint; fill.

“good company” of you mentally, so train your mind that you are a more pleasant companion to talk with.

boorish or caddish mind. Boorish refers to gross lack of breeding or to rudeness of manner; caddish refers to low-brow, presuming, mean, vulgar manners. A person with a boorish or caddish mind is one who is not fit companion to talk with because his interests are so narrowed down to the mean and vulgar things of life.

how much does this signify? How much of this is true, worth while?

pleading at the bar, that is what the lawyer does.

second-rate, second class; not of the best.

first-rate, first class; of the best.

in his own line, in his own field of interest or business; in his own profession.

slack, loose, careless.

sham, unsound, false.

beget, give birth to; produce; give rise to.

line of us, our interest; that which concerns us.

“narrow, ” not broad in scope or view; illiberal.

“humanities, ” the branches of polite learning, especially the ancient classics; those studies which aim to appeal to our reason, polite literature having to do with human beings and teaching a reasoned attitude towards life.

masterpieces, the best works; the best things written.

primacy, prime or first, as in time, place, rank, etc.; hence, excellency, supremacy.

being little more than, a little bit more than; being somewhat more than.

chronicle, record, history.

successive achievements, accomplishments which follow one after the other.

The sifting of human creations! Taking that which human beings have brought into existence and separating the finer things from the coarser things.

biography, the lives of persons as a branch of literature.

politics, dealing with the laws and organization of the state and also with the administration of the state and its laws.

stood the test of time, made trial of for a length of time and have been found excellent.

durable, of lasting quality; strong.

quests of perfection, looking for, searching for perfection.

gain a richer sense, come better to appreciate.

less fanatical, more tolerant.

pathos, that quality of human experience which awakens feelings of pity, sympathy, and tender sorrow.

lost causes, causes which have not had a successful issue; unsuccessful causes.

misguided epochs, ages which have suffered because those who were leaders had been misguided, had a wrong or mistaken idea as to where their duty lay.

pregnant, having a hidden meaning; significant; suggestive.

disesteem, low estimation, inclining to dislike.

cheap and trashy, of low esteem and worthless or useless.

impermanent, not permanent.

ideal values, values which answer to one’s highest conception.

blind prig or vulgarian. A person who is unwilling or unable to understand or judge, and is narrowly and self-consciously engrossed in his own mental or spiritual attainments is a blind prig. A vulgarian is a coarse, unrefined person.

scent out, discern; begin to suspect the presence or existence of;detect out.

divine it, foresee, predict, conjecture it.

its accidents, its accessories; the things which are not essential to the main thing but serve instead to hide that important thing.

ticketed, distinguished with descriptions; carrying a label to distinguish it from others.

shipwreck, disaster.

appendicitis, inflammation of the vermiform appendix.

cheap Jacks. A cheap Jack is a dealer in low-priced goods, especially goods of an inferior or shoddy make; hence, a cheap, impertinent, or low-bred fellow.

atone, make reparation, compensation, or amends for a crime or an offense.

dynamos, mechanical devices for converting mechanical energy into electrical energy.

epigram, a bright or witty thought, tersely expressed.

“The people in their wisdom, ” the people in full possession of their wisdom; the people acting wisely.

pessimistic prophets, people who take the least hopeful view of the future.

inveterately, habitually.

world without end, eternally.

irremediable destiny, that which is in store for us in the future, and that which cannot be remedied, changed.

Uncle Sam with the hog instead of the eagle for his heraldic emblem. The United States of America is referred to as Uncle Sam:according to a story which lacks proof, the name arose from the circumstance that the initials U. S. （United States） marked on certain casks of provisions at Troy, New York, purchased for the American army in the war of 1812, were facetiously interpreted as “Uncle Sam,” the nickname of Mr. Samuel Wilson, government inspector. The eagle is the emblem of the United States; hence in drawing the hog, a greedy, gluttonous and filthy animal, instead of the eagle to represent the United States, the suggestion of coarseness and absence of refinement is implied.

to the foretime, of the past.

vegetate, lead a passive existence without initiative or exertion of body or mind.

sufferance, tolerance; consent.

utopias. Utopia is an imaginary island, represented by Sir Thomas More (1478-1535) in his book Utopia, as enjoying approximate perfection in politics, laws, etc.; hence, utopias are places or states of ideal perfection. Utopia itself means “no such place.”

fatalistically, in the manner of one who believes the doctrine that all things are subject to fate—that the appointed lot or allotted life of an individual is foredoomed or predetermined.

croaker, one who grumbles or complains unreasonably; one who habitually forebodes evil.

glow,from intense heat within;shine, by emiting or reflecting light.

brought round again, come back again.

anonymously, without a leader or a name.

initiatives, first steps; leads; things done by an inventor.

patterns, those which are to be, or are fit to be, copied or imitated.

rivalry, competing; vying; being rivals.

statable, can be stated.

ultra-simple, extremely simple; easily intelligible.

cue. The cue is the last word or words of a speech, or the ending of any action in a play, as indicating the time for the next person to speak or act. Taking their cue means succeeding in order of time, rank, sequence, etc.

bird’s-eye view, the view that can be embraced at a glance, hence, a general view, not one that enters into minute details.

take our bearings, find out where we stand; show us where we are.

shifting, changing in form or character; changeable.

alumni are the male graduates of a college or other institution of learning;alumnæ are the female graduates.Alumnus and alumna are the corresponding singular forms.

noblesse oblige, nobility obliges, —often used to denote the obligation of the honorable and generous behavior associated with high rank or birth.

corporate, united, combined into one group; group.

class-consciousness, thoughts and feelings that belong to us as a class.

“Les intellectuels, ” applied ironically by the “red bloods” to Zola, Clemenceau and other intellectual leaders of France who stood up for Dreyfus.

ironically, expressing a sort of humor, ridicule, or light sarcasm, which adopts a mode of speech the intended implication of which is the opposite of the literal sense of the words, as when expressions of praise are used where blame is meant.

“red blood, ” the anti-Semitic and other strongly nationalistic groups in France which were in favor of keeping Dreyfus in Devil’s Island （the French penal colony）, primarily because he is a Jew. These men brought the strongest pressure to bear on the officials to prevent them from reopening the case, especially in 1896.

anti-Dreyfus craze. Alfred Dreyfus （1859-1935）, a captain in the French army, of Jewish parentage, was accused of selling army secrets and convicted in 1894. In 1896 evidence was shown that Major Esterhazy was the traitor. The affair became a public issue. Only the decline of nationalism permitted the eventual reversal of the verdict in 1906. In the World War, Dreyfus rose to the rank of lieutenant general and was awarded the Legion of Honor. Zola, for his famous attack on the government “J’accuse,” was imprisoned. Clemenceau also fought for the condemned man.

satirize, bring ridicule; assail with satire.

judicious pilot, sensible and prudent guide through a difficult or unknown course.

tiller, a lever of wood or metal fitted to the rudder-head and used for turning the rudder of a ship from side to side.

distraught, crazed with grief; beset with doubt or mental conflict.

leeways, the lateral movements of a ship to the leeward of her course;the deviations from the course indicated by the line of her keel which she makes by drifting to leeward.

tack, to change the direction of a vessel when sailing closely-hauled, by putting the helm alee and shifting the sails so that she will come up into the wind and then fall off on the other side until she proceeds at about the same angle to the wind as before, but on the opposite tack—a tack on a vessel is the direction in which the vessel sails.

tug, a laborious pulling or straining; hence, a severe stress.

warp, pull ship by means of a rope; haul along by a rope.

yeast cake for democracy’s dough. A yeast cake is a mealy or doughy cake impregnated with live germs of the yeast plant, used for raising bread. Dough refers to the soft mass of moistened flour or meal, kneaded or unkneaded, but not yet baked. Hence the clause means that we must be the uplifters, the persons to improve and move the mass of humanity.

double reefs, doubling over or together of those parts of a sail which are taken in or let out by means of the reef points, in order to regulate the size of the sail.

canvas, a sail or a collection of sails of a vessel; a coarse, heavy cloth of hemp or flax, spread to catch the wind by means of which a vessel is driven forward in the water.

Stevenson, Robert Louis （1850-1894）, Scottish essayist, romancer, and poet.

eradicate, root out; pluck up by the roots; destroy utterly.

Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U. S. A. America’s foremost seat of learning, founded in 1636. William James was professor of psychology and philosophy at Harvard.

sterilized conceit, personal vanity that has been rid of microbes even;conceit that is very particular and exclusive.

Edith Wyatt （1873-1958）, American author. Her home is in Chicago. Her Every One His Own Way was printed in 1901.

a couple, a wedded or engaged pair.

Richard Elliot, one of the main characters in Edith Wyatt’s book.

feminine counterpart, wife.

caricatures, grotesque representations of persons by overemphasis on characteristics.

Cambridge and Boston, where Harvard University is located.

priggishness. A prig is a person who is narrowly or self-consciously engrossed in his own mental or spiritual attainments.

painter’s colic, a paroxysmal pain in the abdomen, due to spasm, obstruction, or distention of some one of the hollow viscera.

trade disease, illness, sickness, or ailment pertaining to a particular trade.

pounces, swoops down and seizes.

human core. The core is the central part of anything; the essential part; hence, the heart or soul of the human being.

regnant, prevalent, predominant, ruling.

robuster, more vigorous.

gives it a wide berth, keeps far away from it.

“tone, ” prevailing character of morals, sentiments, etc., which gives a general effect of the whole.

reverts, turns back, goes back; returns.

spreading power, power of spreading and influencing others.

McClure’s Magazine, etc., are all American magazines of a very popular nature and therefore not of the highest literary merit.

popular university, a place of higher learning for the mass of people. clarification, act or process of making clear.

“ten-cent magaines, ” popular magazines, commonly trashy or sensational, and sold for ten cents, so that all may buy them to read.

synthetic, formed by artificial synthesis—the art or process of making or “building up” a compound by a union of simpler compounds or of its elements.

groping, feeling our way as in the dark; proceeding tentatively.

Questions

1. From what point of view is Mr. James considering the value of college education?
2. What does he mean by the phrase “help you to know a good man when you see him”?
3. What contrast is usually made between colleges and business, technical, or professional schools? How far do such schools develop critical sense?
4. What is meant by the humanities? When is a study of humanity?
5. What should be gained from a study of the humanities?
6. Why is it important to recognize superiority?
7. Why is it important in a democracy that the people should know good men? What do critics of American democracy claim?
8. What are the sole factors active in human progress?
9. Explain the meaning of “The rivalry of the patterns is the history of the world.”
10. How may the democratic problem be stated?
11. How does the value of the educated class then define itself?
12. In what way may the group of college graduates be compared with the autocracy in older countries?
13. How is the function of the college-bred in a democracy like that of the pilot on a ship?
14. By what does real culture live?
15. What is meant by “tone”?
16. How are certain magizines competing with the college-bred in indicating the better men?
17. In conclusion, what formula describes best the results at which colleges ought to aim?

参考译文

【作品简介】

《大学生的社会价值》，作者威廉·詹姆斯，载于《麦克卢尔杂志》第30卷，419页。后收入斯科特及泽特林编写的《大学英语散文选读》，纽约麦克米伦公司1920年出版，137—144页。

【作者简介】

威廉·詹姆斯（1842—1910），美国心理学家、哲学家。其弟为亨利·詹姆斯（1843—1916），小说家，散文家。1890年，威廉·詹姆斯发表划时代作品《心理学原理》时，其哲学思想之萌芽已清晰可辨。他独具特色的风格、广阔的文化视野和世界主义思想使其成为当时美国最具影响力的思想家。

大学生的社会价值

大学教育有何用途？我们接受了大学教育，但很少听到过这个问题——一时间要给出答案，恐怕多少有些茫然。考虑良久后，我能给出的最为简明扼要的回答就是：大学教育的理想追求，期望为你达成的最佳成就便是——帮助你在遇见贤达时能有知人之明。这句话既适用于男校，也适用于女校；但它绝非戏言，更不是以偏概全的空洞辞藻。

有关大学教育和商学院、技校或专科院校教育的差别，我们平常听到的说法是什么样的？大学之所以唤作高等教育，是因为其通识性与非功利性。你被告知，在“院校”中掌握的是一门相对狭窄的实用技能，而“大学”赋予你更加自由的文化、广阔的视野、历史的视角、哲学的氛围，或是类似的词汇描述的东西。你听到的是，院校能让你成为完成特定事项的有效工具；但是仅此而已，就像呛人的原油一样无法传播光亮。大学和学院则不然，尽管它们让你在应对这种或那种实用任务时没那么熟练，但是却向你的整个头脑注入比技能更为重要的东西。它们重新塑造你，让你拥有良好的修养；培养你的心智，让你成为思想上的“知音”。在这里如果你暴露出粗俗不堪的本性，学校不会像技校那样坐视不管。至少表面上看是这样的；这也是从大学里出来的人宣称的大学教育的独到之处。那么，这种说法究竟有多少可信度呢？

首先，即使是最狭义的职业或专门训练当然也不止培养熟练工那么简单——它还让人能够对他人的才能做出判断。不管是律师、医生、泥瓦匠还是管道工，这些训练让其具备对该项职业的辨别能力。他通晓整个行业中优和劣的差别；在本职工作完成得好时，一眼便知；并且凭借对自身领域的把握，大致地知道优秀到底是什么，在合适的情况下便能举一反三，对其他领域也做出判断。精益求精、干净利落、圆满完成；敷衍了事、消极怠工、漏洞百出——这些词汇表明在众多不同的工作中都有同样的对比。那么，到目前为止，即使是最卑微的手工艺人也可以发挥微小的力量，来判断普遍意义上工作的优劣。

既然如此，我们这些受到高等教育的人应该以什么为本业呢？有没有更宽广的领域——既然我们的教育宣称力避“狭隘”——通过教育我们是否也能够很好地辨别优劣？大学所开设的课程长久以来被称作“人文学”，而所谓人文学往往等同于希腊语和拉丁语。但是希腊语和拉丁语仅仅在作为文学，而非语言的时候，才有普遍的人文价值；因此广义上的人文学主要指文学，继续推而广之，则指对人类在几乎任何领域创造的经典所进行的研究。文学占据首位，是因为文学不仅由杰作组成，在很大程度上也是关于杰作的，若以批评和历史的形式出现，那么简直就是人类伟大成就的欣赏史。你可以借由历史的视角赋予几乎任何事物人文价值。在教学的时候若关注天才们相继取得的科学成就，那么地质学、经济学和力学也可以成为人文学。相反，则会将文学教成语法，艺术教成目录，历史教成日期列表，或是把自然科学变成公式、重量和度量组成的表单。

对人类创造的精挑细选！——我们对人文学的理解必在此之上。从根本上说，这意味着传记；因此我们的大学应当讲授的是传记历史，不仅是政治，而是有关人类努力和成就的任何事物和一切事物。依此展开研究，我们就知道何种活动经受住了时间的检验，从而取得衡量卓越与持久的标准。所有的艺术、科学和机构都不过是人类对完美孜孜不倦的追求；在看到卓越的不同类型，检验的多种多样，适应的灵活变化时，我们就对普遍意义上的“更好”和“更坏”有了更深的理解。批判能力就变得多一分敏锐，少一分偏执。即使在纠正他人的偏误时，也能够将心比心；即使在为胜利的一方喝彩时，也可以对功败垂成和崎岖年代的痛苦感同身受。

虽然表述尚不确切，观点也有待完善，但意思是显而易见的。大学——讲授人文学所举案例或许特殊，但必须是典型而富有深意的——至少应该力图拨开重重迷雾，让我们至少在普遍意义上知晓高贵一直以来并将继续承担的含义。对一切人类杰作的感知，对值得仰慕之事的仰慕，对廉价、低劣和昙花一现的蔑视——所谓批判意识即是如此，是对理想价值的渴求。这是更为高级的智慧。在这方面有些人天性聪慧，有些人却永远难以企及。但是如果年轻人进了大学，接触了精选、稀有而珍贵的事物，却仍然愚昧庸俗，做不到去芜存菁，只有等别人做好了标记说明，三令五申之后才有所察觉，那么这才真正是高等教育的灾难和悲剧。

因此，追求人的高贵应当视作我们的本业，正如乏味的地铁之于工程师，阑尾炎之于外科医生。大学应当让我们心中始终保有对贤达的向往，对平庸之辈的漠视，以及对贩夫走卒的鄙视。在应对纷繁复杂的事务时，我们应当留意人们品格与意见的不同。擅长于此或许能补偿我们对事物的不知所措，弥补我们对原动力的无知。我们对大学教育的最高要求，最能概括高等教育目的的正是我说过的那句话——让我们在遇见贤达时能有知人之明。

之所以说这句话并非空洞的辞藻是因为，如果你问在我们这样的民主中，最该让人们在哪方面拥有才能，你就会发现这一方面脱颖而出。“人尽其才”——这正是人们最需要的智慧。民主正经历一场试验，没有人知道它将如何渡过难关。我们周围有太多悲观的预言家。他们曾经给民主安上反复无常和暴力的罪名，但如今已经不再如此。批评家们现在的论调是，民主习惯性地倾向于底层。他们因此宣称，民主起步如此，并将照此状不断向世界扩散。他们告诉我们，粗俗登上了王位并且体制化，将所有的高雅推到一旁，这将是我们无药可救的宿命；欧洲大陆的画报在描绘美国时，已经用猪替掉了老鹰的标志。过去高高在上的贵族，纵使恶贯满盈，至少沿袭了一部分对人类高贵品质的追求，并通过保留下来的传统，推崇某种形式的雅致生活。但是，在质疑者看来，一旦民主占了统治地位，高贵便成了某种看不见的教会，失去了荣誉、优先和偏爱，真诚和雅致便只有在私人的角落苟延残喘，不再拥有广泛的影响力，沦落为与人无害的怪癖。

那么，谁敢断言这可能不是民主事业呢？未来的事情是难以确定的；有些国家已经从内部变得腐朽；民主作为一个整体也有可能经历自我毒害。但是，就另一方面而言，民主是一种宗教，我们必定不会承认它的失败。信仰和乌托邦是对人类理性最高尚的锻炼，稍有理性的人都不会在抱怨者描绘的图景面前坐以待毙。我们中间最优秀的人头脑里更是充满民主逆流而上的愿景，历经艰难，直至其正义的制度和习俗放出美丽的光芒。精英们应当指明道路，我们应当紧紧相随；这样我们就又回到了高等教育帮助我们在遇见贤达时能有知人之明这一使命。

如今大家已经知道，民众可以自我运行和管理事务是最荒唐的无稽之谈。大小事务，若没有创造者开辟道路、其他人追随模仿，人类会一事无成——这些是人类进步过程中唯一发挥作用的因素。天才们指引道路、建立模式，普通人采纳效法。模式间的斗争构成了世界历史。因此民主的问题可以用最简洁的表达来描述：谁为大部分人带来启发？谁应当成为领袖人物？这里我们和我们的领袖分别代表方程式中的x和y；其余一切历史环境，不论是经济、政治，还是知识上的，都只不过是生活戏剧上演的背景罢了。

受教育阶层用这样一个简单的方式定义自身价值；我们比其他人更有能力预见谁可以成为更可敬可佩的领袖人物。这当然是极端简化后的说法，但是纵览全局让我们可以迅速定位。在我们的民主中，其他一切事物都在变化，只有我们这些大学校友成为稳定的存在，与旧国度的贵族一脉相承。跟贵族一样，我们沿袭传统；而我们的口号也正是“位高则任重”；与贵族不同之处在于，我们只代表理想的利益，因为我们不会徇私舞弊，也不会贪赃枉法。我们应当抱有阶层自觉性。“知识分子！”没有比这个集体名词更加充满自豪感的了，但是那些满脑子愚蠢的偏见和冲动的“血性”阶层却在“反德雷福斯狂热”中，用这个称号来讽刺法国那些仍然保有批判意识和判断力的人！必须承认，批判意识并非一个激动人心的词语，更不会成为游行中高举的横幅。对于旧习惯的喜好、自私的潮流、狂热的风潮是让人类这艘大船前行的力量；而睿智的船长在舵柄上施加的力量相对而言则微不足道。但是这些喜好、热情和利益是在不断变化、交替和错乱的；就在这此消彼长之中，船长的手却是稳定的。他对罗盘了然于心，并且在偏航时抢风行驶，奋力向前。再微弱的力量，如果持之以恒，相比起那些虽然强劲但却时断时续的力量而言，其效果都将是更为可观的。更加恒久的理想信念有如微风轻轻吹拂，真理和正义坚持不懈地引领道路，那么假以时日，必能扭转乾坤。

在民主的起伏中来纵观大学生发挥的总体引领作用，可以帮助我们从更广阔的视角来看待大学本身的目标。如果我们要成为民主这个面团的酵母，如果我们要通过文化的偏好来推动民主，我们就必须保证文化鼓起风帆。我们就必须将折叠风帆打开接受风和阳光的洗礼，接受现代学科进入——如果视野足够宽广，那么任何学科都将是人文的。

史蒂文森曾经这样写道：“你认为自己只是在谈判，其实却在人类进程中建立了一个联系。”当然了，技校理应教会你得心应手地讨价还价，但是大学应当向你展现出人类进程中这种谈判的场所——可能是个破烂不堪的地方。这应当是围绕大学每一门学科的通识观、视角和氛围。

身处大学的我们应当消除一个不少人关于哈佛等古老学府的奇怪观念。在很多无知的旁观者看来，这个名字不过意味着固执自负和难以取悦。在伊迪斯·怀亚特描写芝加哥的书《各行其是》中，有一对夫妇代表着一种独一无二的文化，即理查德·艾略特和他的妻子，他们见到任何美好的事物都无从辨别，若没有一个印出来的标签，欣赏就无从谈起——这二人正是对人类的讽刺影射。这类文化可能就存在于哈佛校园附近，那里恐怕找得到一些典型人物，因为自命不凡就好像画家的疝气或其他各种职业病一样。但是每所好的大学都避免让学生沾染上这类顽疾，避免让病菌扩散到附近的书本：它们调动整体基调活跃起来，让病菌难以为继。真正的文化兴盛之道在于同理心与敬畏心，而非厌恶和鄙夷，即能够突破重重伪装，直达人类心灵深处。如果一所大学在人类恶习的控制之下，无法创造蓬勃的氛围基调，就将因丧失社会功能而一败涂地；民主会对它敬而远之，视而不见。

当然，“基调”这个词太过模糊，但是也没有其他的选择，而此处的全部思考正是有关基调的问题。人类的所有事物正是因基调而丢失，或是留存。若要留住民主，就必须抓住更为高尚和健康的基调。如若我们要让民主如愿发展，就必须使用恰当的基调。而我们正是从自己的老师那里继承基调。最终一切都回到无数个体的相互模仿，回到何种基调拥有最大影响力这一问题上来。作为一个阶层，大学毕业生应当力图使我们的基调得到传播。这种基调应当拥有最高的传播力。

在辨识贤达之人这一本质功能之中，我们现在也遇到了来自外界的劲敌。《麦克卢尔杂志》《美国杂志》《科里尔周刊》，以及类似的《环球作品》，在这一领域共同打造了一所真正的平民大学。如果将来哪位历史学家写了接下来这段话，那可真是一桩憾事：“二十世纪中叶，高等学府对于美国的公众意见已全然丧失了影响力。这些学府已经证实了自己无力承担起提高民主基调这一使命，取而代之的是一股新兴的教育力量，带着无与伦比的热情，并用非凡的能力和成就付诸实践；为了满足同理心，提升人生品位，大众已经习惯完全听命于某些私下开展的文学行动，市场上通常把它们亲切地统称为‘十美分杂志’。”

难道我们不应该力图避免历史学家说出这样的话来吗？尽管“遇见贤达能有知人之明”这样的表述还不够明了，在实际运用中也难免困惑与不确定，但是还能找到其他方法来很好地描述高等学府应有的使命吗？如果大学做到了这一点，那么就做了想象中最好的事情。如果没有办到，那么就一事无成。这确实是一个不错的综合表述方法。如果有朝一日大学的师生能够集体认识到，它便是自己一直以来在摸索的伟大的目标，那么很多问题将有望得到解决；并且鉴于他们在社会体系中的影响力，也将开辟一番全新的蓬勃事业。

（郑文博　译）

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