FRESHMAN

Freshman, your advisors, as you already know, are manifold. Not to mention fond parents and sophisticated friends in the Sophomore Class you have been assigned Faculty Advisors and Student Advisors, who will descend upon you like the "wolf on the fold" and whom you cannot avoid except by strategy worthy of a Focheor a Hindenburg. Finally there are the Proctors who are to hold office hours this year and of whom a wag has said that they will act not merely as counsellors and friends but as spiritual advisors as well.

In September advice is cheap and is only too likely to be valued accordingly. "You must not be too frequent patrons of the Cambridge-Boston subway" explains one advisor, inspired by a sudden revolation of truth, while a second echoes Gambetta's saying "Du travail, toujours travail, et encore du travail," and a third urges you to "accomplish something" if you would be a true son of Harvard. As for the advisors, official and otherwise, who visit you in the privacy of your room; no one can guess what they will tell you and what mysteries they will reveal.

Freshman, some day you may have to be an advisor too; so spare your criticism now. Some day you may discover that the Proctors are as human as you are; so get to know them soon. Some day you may discover that there is no sure road to success and satisfaction at Harvard, that the University does not demand conformity in dress or habits or speech, that you are free within the bounds of law and decency to say and do as you wish, and that you are, to repeat a truism, in a world in little; so cherish your freedom and make your decisions. Harvard offers you all kinds of advice; it is characteristic of the College you are attending that you must decide for yourself what to accept and what to reject.