GODLESS

Harvard men will learn with conscious pride that every day thirteen western colleges send up thirteen generous prayers for this "godless university". Of course, Harvard has always gloried in being godless has even taken pains, perhaps, to appear just a bit more godless than she really is but this solicitude on the part of her sister universities may be considered as a crowning achievement.

There is really no use in trying to prove that Harvard students are on the whole religiously inclined. The average daily chapel attendance of one hundred indicates that there are at least that many who are genuinely interested in chapel services--and nothing else. It is true that at many colleges, the chapel attendance is compulsory, but this does not mean that there would be a smaller proportion of those student bodies at morning chapel if attendance were not compulsory. It is generally admitted that nowhere would enforced chapel meet with more opposition, or voluntary chapel find smaller congregations than at Harvard.

To those well-grounded in the ancient history of the College, this is neither surprising nor alarming. Yale was founded in the hope of turning out a race of orthodox ministers because even then, Harvard had progressed so far toward godlessness and heterodoxy. The Harvard tradition has survived and waxed strong; presumably Yale with her compulsory morning services still clings resolutely to her ancient purpose.

As Mr. Heywood Broun says, those who take most of the pleasure out of cigarette-smoking are those who say it doesn't do any harm. Those who say Harvard isn't irreligious miss the whole point. Nothing is more entertaining than shocking the casual observer or the ignorant outsider, and the well-meaning people who make excuses for "godless Harvard" and try to point out that it really isn't godless at all simply spoil the fun.

The truth of the matter is that Harvard is not irreligious but unreligious. The distinction between these two terms is the same that exists between immoral and unmoral, the first implies disregard the second implies absence. What is absent at Harvard is that standardization of religious ideas which prevails in most places, and is known as religion. In this, as in other things, the tradition of individuality remains the guiding influence.