HARVARD INDIFFERENCE.

Professor Palmer has well said that the spirit which is usually known to outsiders as "Harvard indifference" is in reality only "Harvard difference." The activities here are so many that it is impossible for a man to keep up his interest in all or even part of them. He has to differentiate-choose the ones on which he wishes to put his attention, and in order to do well in those, remain indifferent to the others. Depth of interest in one thing rather than breadth and possible shallowness in many activities is, in the final analysis, the thing which is most worth attaining. Undergraduates are too often criticized for indifference when that indifference is only a lack of interest in the critic's special activity.

But while due credit must be given to the men who work at their different and widely varied activities, it must be admitted that there are certain men who do stand aloof from the opportunities which Harvard offers. Such men are apt to be not only indifferent, but intolerant. The College is so large that it is impossible that there should not be a great number of men who are content to criticize the activities of others and to derive benefit from them without making any effort to do their share. It is against these men that the charge of Harvard indifference is justly made. If a man can have one solid activity of his own, he is not apt to be intolerant of other people's interests, and he will be indifferent to them only so far as he must in order not to neglect his own. "Whatever the hand findeth to do, do with they whole might," is a motto which is, on the whole, well followed in Harvard today. If the men who are content to criticize without actually working could keep it in mind, there would be even less reason than now exists for the charge of Harvard indifference.