of the annual meetings of the Nassau street Tract Society might be reproduced in Chicago, with aggravations.

We do not believe, therefore, that any thoughtful man considers this novel idea as a solution of the difficulty: it will be well indeed for the Churches of the great Northwest, if it does not prove to be the very worst form of denominationalism, in its relation to Seminaries of learning. We do not predict; we cannot refrain from suggesting; time must determine.

In view of these and like considerations, we think it will be conceded, that there are great and perhaps fatal objections against subjecting Colleges to the direct organic control of the various denominations. But it may still be claimed that there are other ways in which we may have denominational Colleges, without encountering the difficulties which have been alluded to. Let us then examine the other methods which have been proposed and to some extent attempted in practice.

The College may be placed under the direction of a selfperpetuating Board of Trust, composed, however, of men who are attached to a single denomination, and regarded as under bonds to conduct the Institution in the interest of that denomination, and to perpetuate the Board of Trust in the same line of succession. We cheerfully admit that this form of denominationalism partially avoids some of the objections which we have thus far urged. A College so constituted will be exposed to much less danger from those internal commotions to which all ecclesiastical systems are more or less liable, and may for that reason be expected to enjoy a much calmer and more peaceful existence. But still, as it is regarded as the property of the denomination, it cannot altogether escape the storms. The organic powers of the denomination will claim to speak in the name of the denomination, and in its behalf to dictate measures to the guardians of the College, and will have it in their power not a little to disturb the tranquillity of the halls of learning, and weaken the hold of the Institution on public confidence. Neither the Faculty nor the Trustees of such an Institution, can be fully independent in

their offices; they can only enjoy peace by doing the behests of the sect with great promptness and submissiveness.

In so far as the denominational control of an Institution can be successfully exerted under this form, it has no less tendency to illiberality and narrowness, than the method of direct ecclesiastical control. It tends to confine all appointments within the limits of a single denomination, and forbids the Trustees to place the fittest men in the chairs of instruction, unless they are right on all denominational issues. We do not assert that a Board of Trust, so pledged, would not sometimes make appointments outside the denomination. But such cases would be rare and exceptional, and not at all inconsistent with the general tendency of which we speak. And we affirm, without fear of successful contradiction, that men qualified in the high and proper sense of that word-qualified intellectually, morally, and religiously—to fill the various departments of instruction in our Colleges, are not so abundant, especially men whose services can be had at the present miserably low salaries of College Professors, that our Boards of Trust can afford to apply such tests to candidates otherwise eminently fitted for the places which are to be filled. And if they persist in applying them, they will not fail to belittle, and degrade their Colleges. In proof of the soundness of this view, we appeal to facts which are patent to every observing man.

There is yet a third form in which it is conceivable that we should have Denominational Colleges; and it is a form which is not without its advocates and its experiments. It is to unite two or more denominations in the support and control of the same College, but to divide it between them by a definite understanding that each denomination is to be entitled to a certain number of seats in the Board of Trust, and to certain chairs of instruction. This plan does seem to offer the advantage of uniting more than one denomination in the support of the same Institution. And yet it is for experience to deternine how far it will accomplish even this. We should fear that it might result in depriving it of the hearty sympathy and support of either. But however that may be, it as truly imbues the Institution with the spirit of sect as the methods be

fore considered. It elevates minor denominational peculiari. ties into tests of fitness for the highest and most dignified stations it tends to fill our most important chairs of instruction with men of inferior talents and attainments, because they are supposed to be right in the matter of denomination, and thereby to impair the efficiency of the Institution in the discharge of its appropriate function.

And by whom are the instructors of an Institution, under such auspices, to be appointed? By the respective denominations in partnership, acting through their organic bodies? Then we fall back upon all the consequences of a direct ecclesiastical control. And we should be apprehensive, too, that in such a case little regard would be had for those quali fications which make the true educator, and that the Faculty of such a College would be made up on both sides, or on all sides, of ardent sectarians, who could never harmonize with each other. Such an Institution would, we suspect, achieve very little for the cause of liberal learning.

But, on the contrary, are the instructors to be appointed by a Board of Trust, held under bonds to give a certain number of places to each of the denominations in partnership? What guaranty, then, has either denomination that such men will be appointed as will be acceptable to the denomination, and in the judgment of their brethren fitted to take care of its interests in the Institution? In such an order of things we should expect to hear the Trustees charged with appointing men as representatives of this or that denomination, who are not the genuine article, belonging to the denomination only in name and position, and not true to its principles and interests. Whether there are any facts now before the public to justify such an expectation, we leave to well informed readers to judge. In truth, we are inclined to regard this as the worst of the three forms of Denominationalism to which we have referred. Sure we are, that it is the most likely to produce alienations among brethren, and heart-burnings in the community, and to prove in practice utterly impracticable. We believe the obstacles supposed to lie in the way of the individual coöperation of Christians in all good works, though

connected with different denominations, to be more imaginary than real; and so far as they are real, we believe they ought to be regarded as contrary to the spirit of Christ, and discreditable to the Christian name. But we do not believe that dif ferent denominations, as societies, as corporations, can coöperate. Christian coöperation is individual, not corporate.

If, then, American Protestantism cannot devise a better platform for a Seminary of learning than either of those we have thus far spoken of, we must conclude that the prospects of liberal learning among us are rather gloomy. Indeed, the considerations thus far presented do show this, if nothing else, that the difficulties to be encountered in laying satisfactory foundations for Institutions of learning among the heterogeneous elements of our Western States, and amid the jarring passions, the conflicting views, the rival interests of so many sects, must be great and appalling. We are persuaded, also, that a practical acquaintance with that problem would greatly increase the depth and solemnity of that conviction. Still we do not believe the case hopeless. A better platform is possible, and the present is the time when all enlightened good men should take their place upon it. It is not new; our fathers erected it amid the primeval forests of New England. It is not untried; it has been subjected to the test of experiment for generations, and that noble galaxy of New England Colleges is the result. With such an experiment, we are satisfied. Let those who are moved to test some new model, pay the cost of the experiment; we are not inclined to share it with them. We do not mean that the New England Colleges are perfect; the age of perfect social institutions is, we apprehend, far off in the future. But the New England Colleges are manifesting, in every year of their history, a sober, conservative tenacity in adhering to the good which has been attained, combined with a ready capability of all needed changes and improvements. Nobly have they done their work in the past; nobly are they doing it now; and nobly will they adapt themselves to coming exigencies.

We deny that these Colleges are in any proper sense Denominational. They are for the most part controlled by inde

pendent Boards of Trust, owing no obligations, expressed or implied, to any denomination or ecclesiastical power. They are under obligations to founders, to society, and to God, to perform their sacred trust "Christo et Ecclesiæ," for Christ and the Church universal; to consecrate the Institutions under their care to sound learning and Evangelical Faith, and to nothing else. It is not important, it is not relevant, even, to inquire whether a candidate for a chair of instruction in Yale College believes in the Congregational, or the Presbyterian theory of the Church. If the venerable Corporation of that Institution were to descend to such folly, we should expect the spirit of the sainted Dwight to haunt their dreams.

Such a constitution, and only such, do we demand for the Colleges which Christian liberality is founding in the new States of the West. Does any one suggest that this will do very well for New England, but will not do for the West? We think we have shown how well those things are likely to do, and are doing, which it is proposed to substitute for this, at the West. And what reason is there to suppose that this plan will not work well at the West? Is it suggested that the denominational spirit is so much more prevalent at the West than in New England, that more regard must be had to it in constituting our Colleges? We reply, that the effort to satisfy the spirit of sect in laying the foundations of liberal learning, seems to us not unlike the attempt to satisfy the drunkards and the rum sellers in the constitution of a Temperance Society. If it is meant that the enormous prevalence of the spirit of sect in the West is a very formidable obstacle to the success of Institutions of liberal learning, we surely do not need to be told that. But if it is meant that the spirit of sect can suggest any modification of this broad New England platform, which enlightened friends of learning can afford to adopt, we have yet to be convinced of the truth of the proposition.

There is, indeed, one condition on which, were it fulfilled, we should be compelled to admit that unsectarian Colleges in the West are impossible. If it shall prove true that this same spirit of sect, this "esprit du corps," as it has been