MILITARY TRAINING A LOGICAL PART OF COLLEGE

Of the Philosophy Department.

The interest in preparedness does not depend, I think, on any momentary excitement or alarm. It means, rather, that we are waking up to certain permanent facts,--facts more permanent even than the need for national defence.

No man exists primarily for the sake of defending himself. He exists for the sake of doing things. The same is true of nations. Among the things which a man may be called on to do are the helping and protecting of others. The same is true of nations. We Americans have passed our national infancy; it is no longer our chief biological function to feed and fatten and protect ourselves. We have reached the age of public responsibility; and unless we wish to invite national atrophy and decline, we must make up our mind to do a man's part in the hard work of the world. The chances that we shall be called upon to defend our national existence seem to me very small--though that is no reason for neglecting them. But we are called upon, and must be prepared, to do our part in "enforcing peace" in the world. And we have been already called upon--to our shame--to speak up for the principles we have professed. We must be able to "speak, and be listened to" when questions of international law and common humanity are at stake. This means the necessity of deliberate and sufficient military training.

It means the training of a large body of men who have neither desire nor prospect of taking part in actual warfare, but who are known throughout the world as potential forces on land and sea. It means especially potential officers. This may be the particular point at which the college man comes in. But let me point out another side of the case, less often dwelt on. It is true that the country needs the military power of its college men, and has a peculiar claim upon them. It is also true that the college man needs the military training. Let me say a word about that.

What is the meaning of the great trend toward the major athletic sports in the last half century? Does it mean that college life is becoming more frivolous? On the contrary, it means that it has a craving for greater reality. The college student is a man in growth without a man's responsibilities; he needs an ingredient in his life of something beside books in order to make his books themselves seem real to him; he needs a dash of physical effort and even risk. And there is nothing, at present, except the more strenuous phases of athletics that can supply this want. If the college man's play looks to an outsider like the most earnest and whole-hearted thing that he ever does, it is because this play is at present his best substitute for "experience," and for that kind of "reality" which pain and hard training rub in. I take the development of athletics as a sign that the instincts of American college students are sound; that they have a healthy appetite for exertion, teamwork, common service, pain and danger. But nobody pretends that the present situation in athletics is right, for the student body as a whole.

Its defects, I think most of us would agree upon. It gives too few a chance for the real thing (together with an overdose for some). And it doesn't link up with anything more substantial. Military training meets both these deficiencies. It is capable of taking care of the entire student body. And it is linked up with the life of the nation. In fact it is, or can be made, an actual piece of the nation's life. It is the natural counterpart of the years of study, and an excellent supplement to athletics as they now are.

I might say, too, that military training is the other half of all education of character. Training of the will must begin with control of the body. Moral training must have at least two sides: theoretical instruction in ethical principles, and the actual development of habits. Greek education made the habit-building primary: their "gymnastics" had the purpose of building body and character alike. Our universities have all but dropped the development of the will by habit. Of course, every task and responsibility involves some moral training, and every college has its routine of demands. But the foundation of all character-building is the discipline of the body, under conditions that require co-operation with others, or team-work. And this is precisely what military training requires,--with the higher athletics, perhaps, as an advanced course for the spiritual elite.

Our democracy is in crying need of leaders; and no one is fit to command who has not had his preliminary discipline in obedience and co-operation. It is said that obedience weakens the character; but that is true only if it is blind and unwilling. Look at Switzerland. It is said that military training develops too far the pugnacious instincts, which should rather be lulled to rest. Again, look at Switzerland. No passion is made more unruly by being instructed and self-conscious; the reverse is true. A course of lessons in boxing adds nothing to the likelihood that a man will attack his neighbor on the street; though it may well make-him more ready to go to the aid of a neighbor in distress. It is forgotten by those who urge these criticisms that in military training the enemy is present chiefly in imagination, whereas the person in evidence is the fellow-soldier with whom one must act, and the representative of the nation whom one must obey. It is the social and political capacities that are chiefly developed, while the pugnacious elements of our nature are trained into their subordinate place.

As to the best time for military training, my own belief is that an interval between preparatory school and college is the natural moment; and that this should be long, enough and intensive enough to give the elementary habits of the soldier a firm footing. But for those who are already in college, the practical consideration is to find or make some place in your plans for this important part of education. And with all sorrow for the tragedy which has raised the issue in this land, we can still thank God that we live in a time when citizenship is taking on a more serious and concrets meaning than it has yet borne