DePauw University - Mirage Yearbook (Greencastle, IN)

Page 16 text:

But the reaction must come. and is coming. VV'e already see the beginnings of reform in the revived interest in our Oratory. DePauw's old prestige can still be maintained. if her students will but remain loyal. and for the past few years she has had able and competent representatives. who brought praise upon themselves and upon the University. We think more stress should be laid upon our Debating society. Depauw now has a team of which she may well be proud. It has added much to her standard in the State. and should be given the support and merit which it deserves. These enterprises are helpful, instructive, and withal enjoyable, and give to the University that atmosphere of broad culture for which she stands. Hughes is making a step in advance when he organizes a Depauw Literary Society. This will bring all students in closer touch. It is just such organizations that we need to develop and establish a common loyalty. These are questions, we believe, that have an important hearing on our school life. They need to be openly discussed and commented upon in order to be fully understood. And the above modest remarks are oft-ered in humble spirit and a desire to help and further the name and fame of the University. The editors of the '05 Mirage have a strong belief and perfect faith in the possibilities of their Alma Mater. To them she is already the best and dearest. and they predict she will continue in the upward course until she stands the focus of all intellectual movements, the loadstar of the Middle Xvest. The Mirage, dear readers, comes to you with your schoolns life on its pages. you read it. and learn to value and to love even more the broad interests and the culture which the body of wise men here have placed to your benefit? Vve want this book to stand an outer symbol of your affection for DePauw. Be it good or bad., you accept it. remembering that we are just one of you, with like capabilities and powers. and We have done the best that we can? And so we give you God' speed. EDITORS.

Page 15 text:

On the other hand there are some faults to he found on the side of the University. We cannot say much in praise of the gymnasium and the working apparatus that if has provided. Especially is this true for the girls. and we hold it a disgrace that a school of this size and standing should offer no hetter conveniences than are to he found in its darlc and dingy rooms. Let the ruling powers awalce to the fact that their duty lies in the physical as well as the mental welfare of its students. and that they must provide well-equipped and attractive apartments in order to arouse spirit and good worlc. Such would have a direct hearing on the University name. for is it not an old saying that we cannot develop the mind at the expense of the hody. and shall not Depauw hend every effort to send forth into the world men and women fitted in every way for their worlc ? For the past year or two there has loeen great agitation in the social life of Depauw. It is a prolalem that confronts hoth college authorities and students. what social customs shall stand. what must he the limitations? The deploralnle tendency of events to run into an excess of gayety and idle waste of time and nerve energy has aroused the Faculty to a realization that some action is necessary. As a result stringent rules are passed. under which students chafe-and. which is more to he regretted. rules that they hrealc. ls there any advantage in a rule that cannot he enforced? Shall the majority suffer for the sins of a few? And yet. what ls that h3PPY medium in which the student life shall he wisely spent. though with its proper proportion of pleasure and recreation? Vve wonder whether a reform might not he larought ahout hy Faculty and students drawlng closer together. learning to understand each other and to appreciate the question from each View polnt. For. at-ter all. is it not the only story of ignorance rehelllng against its own good. another case in which arhitratlon might worlc to advantage? We can hut mourn over the dying out ot. the old, hearty fellowship and comradeship. where the student hody stood united in common interests and pleasures. where all felt themselves a vital part of the whole. Compare the lulcewarm enthusiasm of our red-letter days with that of ten years ago. when the air rang with the clamor and all the world lcnew that DePauw was out Social life has congealed into private groups. each competing against the other: individual interest has talcen the place of the love and zeal for the University. There are few college functions to-day in which all may partalce. drawing together with the feeling of one hody with one purpose. The Faculty has seen Hr to checlc and wipe out so many established and excellent customs. in the hope. no douht. of doing away with many evils that grew up along with the good. that society is stagnant. hrolcen up into circles of selhsh pride and show. mat is the result? Lil'-e holds just as much gayety and distraction. hut it is for the select. and their efforts are miserahle moclreries. stereotyped formalities. contributing little to the good of the individual. worlcing harm to the school. For we hold that there is something wrong somewhere when the common life of the University is secondary to that of its constituent groups.

Page 17 text:

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