CAMPUS DAYS
So it was that J.W. and Marty had come into the inner places of each
other's lives. Of all the developments of Institute week, naturally the
one which filled J.W.'s thoughts with a sort of awed gladness was
Marty's decision to offer himself for the ministry. Joe Carbrook's
right-about-face was much more dramatic, for J.W. saw, when the decision
was made, that Marty could not have been meant for anything but a
preacher. It was as fit as you please. As to Joe, previous opinion had
been pretty equally divided; one side leaning to the idea that he might
make a lawyer, and the other predicting that he was more likely to be a
perpetual and profitable client for some other lawyer.
In the light of the Institute happenings, it was to be expected that the
question of college would promptly become a practical matter to four
Delafield people. Marty was greatly troubled, for he knew if he was to
be a preacher, he must go to college, and he couldn't see how. J.W. felt
no great urge, though it had always been understood that he would go.
Marcia Dayne had one year of normal school to her credit, and would take
another next year, perhaps; but this year she must teach.
Joe Carbrook spent little time in debate with himself; he let everybody
know that he was going to be a missionary doctor, and that he would go
to the State University for the rest of his college course.
"But what about the religious influence of the University?" Marcia Dayne
had ventured to ask him one evening as they walked slowly under the elms
of Monroe Avenue.
"I don't know about that," Joe answered, "and maybe I'm making a
mistake. But I don't think so. To begin with, there isn't any question
about equipment at the State University. They have everything any church
school has, and probably more than most church schools, for what I want.
And they work in close relationship to the medical school. That's one
thing. The big reason, though--I wonder if you'll understand it?"
"I believe I could understand anything you might be thinking about--now,
Joe." And Marcia's voice had in it a note which stirred that usually
self-possessed young man out of all his easy composure.
"I'll remember that, Marcia," he said in the thrill of a swift elation.
"I'll remember that, because I think you do--understand, and some day
I--but I've got at least five years of plugging ahead of me, and----"
"You were going to tell me about your big reason for going to the State
University," Marcia broke in, though she wondered afterward if her
instinct had not played her false.
"Yes," Joe said, with a little effort. "Well, this is it. You know I
didn't make much of a hit at college; I pulled through sophomore year,
but that's about all, and I doubt if the faculty will pass resolutions
of regret when I don't show up there in the fall. The religious
influences of a church school didn't prevent me from being a good deal
of a heathen, though I will say that was no fault of the school. Maybe I
ought to go back and face the music. It wouldn't be so bad, I guess. But
I feel more like making a clean, new start, in a new place. The State
University wouldn't be any worse for me than I should be for it, if
nothing had happened to change my point of view. So, that isn't the
issue. But if the State University life is able to beat me before I get
to sawing bones at all, I'd make a pretty missionary doctor if I ever
landed in foreign parts, wouldn't I?"
Marcia could find nothing to say; perhaps because her thoughts were busy
with other and more personal aspects of Joe's plans for the future.
And as Joe's people were completely oblivious to everything except the
startling change that had come over him, and were abundantly able to
send him to three universities at once if necessary, Joe Carbrook was as
good as enrolled.
Marty and J.W. did not find the future opening up before them so easily.
Marty, for all he could not imagine the way opening before such as
himself, was all eagerness about the nearest Methodist school, which
happened to be the one where the Institute had been held, Cartwright
College. It was named, as may be supposed, in honor of Peter Cartwright,
that pioneer Methodist preacher who became famous on the same sort of
schooling which sufficed for Abraham Lincoln, and once ran against
Lincoln himself for Congress. J.W. was not specially eager to look for a
college education anywhere. Why should he be, since he was expecting to
go into business?
The two had many a discussion, Marty arguing in favor of college for
everybody, and J.W. admitting that for preachers and teachers and
lawyers and doctors it was necessary, but what use could it be in
business?
"But say, J.W., you're not going to be one of these 'born a man, died a
grocer' sort of business men," urged Marty. "Broad-minded--that's your
future, with a knowledge of more than markets. And look at the personal
side of college life. Haven't you heard Mr. Drury say that if he hadn't
anything else to show for his four years at college than the lifelong
friendships he made there it would have been worth all it cost? And you
have reason to know he doesn't forget the studies."
"That's all right, Marty," J.W. rejoined. "I don't need much convincing
on that score. I can see the good times too; you know I'd try for all
the athletics I could get into, and I guess I could keep my end up
socially. But is all that worth my time for the next four years,
studying subjects that would be no earthly good to me in business, in
making a living, I mean? The other boys in hardware stores would have
four years the start of me."
"But don't you remember, J.W., what our commencement speaker said on
that very point? He told us we had to be men and women first, no matter
what occupations we got into. And he bore down hard on how it was a good
deal bigger business to make a life than to make a living. In these days
the most dangerous people, to themselves and to all of us, are the
uneducated people."
"Yes, I remember," J.W. admitted. "'Cultural and social values of
education,' he called that, didn't he? And that's what I'm not sure of.
It seems pretty foggy to me. But, old man, you're going, that's settled,
and maybe I'll just let dad send me to keep you company, if I can't find
any better reason."
"That's all very well for you to say, J.W.," Marty retorted, with the
least little touch of resentment in his tone. "You'll _let_ your dad
send you. My dad can't send me, though he'll do all he's able to do, and
how I can earn enough, to get through is more than I can see from here."
But J.W. asserted, confidently: "There's a way, just the same, and I
think I know how to find out about it. I haven't been a second assistant
deputy secretary in the Sunday school for nothing. You reminded me of
the commencement address; I'll ask you if you remember Children's Day?
It came the very next Sunday."
"Yes, I remember it; but what of it?"
"Well, my boy, we took up a collection for you!"
"We did? Not much we did, and anyway, do you think I'd accept that sort
of help? I'm not looking for charity, yet," and Marty showed the hurt he
felt.
"Steady, Martin Luther! I wouldn't want you to get that collection
anyway; it wasn't near big enough. But don't you know that every
Children's Day collection in the whole church goes to the Board of
Education, and that it has become a big fund, never to be given away but
always to be loaned to students getting ready to be preachers and such?
It's no charity; it's the same broad-minded business you want me to go
to college for. I can see that much without getting any nearer to
college than the Delafield First Church Sunday School. You borrow the
money, just as if you stepped up to a bank window, and you agree to pay
it back as soon as you can after you graduate. Then it goes into the
Fund again, and some other boy or girl borrows it, and so on. More than
twenty-five thousand students have borrowed from this fund. About
fifteen hundred of 'em got loans last year. Ask the preacher if I'm not
giving you this straight."
Marty had no immediate way of testing this unusual wealth of
information, so he said, "Well, maybe there's something in it. I'll talk
to Brother Drury about it, anyway."
That observing man was quite willing to be talked to. When Marty
presented himself at the study a few days later he found the pastor as
well prepared as if he had been expecting some such interview, as,
indeed, he had.
He told Marty the story of the Student Loan Fund--how it originated in
the celebration of the Centenary of American Methodism, in 1866, and how
it had been growing all through the years, both by the annual Children's
Day offering and by the increasing return of loans from former students.
Then he explained that this Fund, and many other educational affairs,
were in the hands of the Church's Board of Education. This Board, Marty
heard, is a sort of educational clearing house for the whole church, and
especially for Methodist schools of higher learning. It helps young
people to go to college, and it helps the colleges to take care of the
young people when they go, of course always using money which has come
from the churches. It has charge of a group of special schools in the
South, and it sets the scholastic standards to which all the church's
schools and colleges must conform. Besides looking out for these
interests it helps the school to provide courses in the Bible and
Christian principles, and it furnishes workers to serve the colleges in
caring for the religious life of the students.
Marty listened carefully, and with no lack of interest, but when the
minister paused the boy's mind sprang back to his own particular
concern.
"But, Mr. Drury, can any student borrow money from that fund?"
"Well, no," said the preacher, "not every student. Only those who are
preparing for the ministry or for other careers of special service. They
have to show that the loan will help them in preparing to be of some
definite Christian value when they graduate. That won't affect you; you
can borrow, not all you could use, perhaps, but enough to be a big help.
How much do you expect to need?"
"Why," answered Marty, "I hardly know. I hadn't really thought it
possible I could go. But dad says he'll let me have all he can, and they
tell me a fellow can get work to do if he's not particular about easy
jobs. I'm pretty sure I could manage, except for tuition and books,
but----"
"Then you may as well consider it settled," said the pastor, "Cartwright
College will welcome you on those terms, or I'll know the reason why.
And I think you can count on J.W. going with you."
J.W. was not hard to convince. His parents were all for it. The pastor
had no intention of overdoing his own part in the affair, and contented
himself with a suggestion that disposed of J.W.'s main objection.
J.W. had been saying to him one day, "I know I should have a good time
at college, but I should be four years later getting into business than
the other boys."
"That depends on what 'later' means," replied Mr. Drury. "You would not
need four years to catch up, if college does for you what I think it
will. Besides, you're intending to be a Christian citizen, I take it,
and that will be even more of a job than to be a successful hardware
man. Colleges have been operating these many years, to give young people
the best possible preparations for a whole life. Remember what John
Milton said: I care not how late I come, so I come fit.' You want to
come to your work as fit as they make 'em, don't you?"
And J.W. owned up that he did. "I don't mean to be a dub in business,
and I've no right to be a dub anywhere. Me for Cartwright, Brother
Drury!"
Another day's work in the laboratory. Walter Drury knew how to be
patient, yet every experience like this was a tonic to his soul. And now
he must be content for a time to let others carry the work through its
next stages, though he would hold himself ready for any unexpected
development that might arise.
So it befell that J.W. and Marty started to Cartwright, and a week later
Joe Carbrook went off to the State University.
The day after they had matriculated, J.W. and Marty were putting their
room to rights--oh, yes, they thought it would be well to share the same
room--and as they puttered about they reviewed the happenings of the
first day. They had made a preliminary exploration of the grounds and
buildings, revisiting the places which had become familiar during
Institute week, and living over that crowded and epochal time.
Marty, scouting around for something to do, had discovered that he could
get work, such as it was, for ten hours a week, anyway, and maybe more,
at thirty to fifty cents an hour. He had a little money left after
paying his tuition, and the college registrar assured him that the loan
from the Board of Education would be forthcoming. Therefore the talk
turned on money.
"That tuition bill sure reduced the swelling in my pocketbook, Marty,"
remarked J.W., as he examined his visible resources.
"What do you think it did to mine?" Marty observed quietly. "I'm still
giddy from being relieved of so much money in one operation. And yet I
can't see how they get along. Look at the big faculty they have, and all
these buildings to keep up and keep going. When I think of how big a
dollar seems to me, the tuition looks like the national debt of Mexico;
but when I try to figure out how much it costs the college per student,
I feel as though I were paying lunch-counter prices for a dining-car
dinner. How _do_ they do it, J.W.?"
"Who told you I was to be looked on in the light of a World Almanac, my
son? I could give you the answer to that question without getting out of
my chair, but for one small difficulty--I just don't know. Tell you
what--it's a good question--let's look in the catalogue. I'd like to
find information in that volume about something besides the four
centuries of study that loom before my freshman eyes."
So they looked in the catalogue and discovered that Cartwright College
had an endowment of $1,750,000, producing an income of about $80,000 a
year, and that the churches of its territory gave about $25,000 more.
They learned also that most of the buildings had been provided by
friends of the college, with the Carnegie Library mainly the gift of the
millionaire ironmaster. They learned also that about $500,000 of the
endowment had been raised in the last two years, under the promise of
the General Education Board, which is a Rockefeller creation, to provide
the last $125,000. The college property was valued at about half a
million dollars.
"And there you are, Martin Luther, my bold reformer," said J.W.,
cheerfully. "The people who put up the money have invested about two and
a half millions on you and me, and the other five hundred students, say
about $250 a year per student. And we pay the rest of what it costs to
give us a college career, $125 to $175 a year, depending on our taste in
courses. I remember I felt as if the John Wesley Farwell family had
almost gone broke when dad signed up for $1,000 on that last endowment
campaign. I thought the money gone forever, but I see now he merely
invested it. I've come to Cartwright to spend the income of it, and a
little more. Five or six people have given a thousand dollars apiece to
make a college course possible for each of us. There's some reason in
college endowments, after all."
And Marty said, "One good I can see in this particular endowment is that
anybody but a selfish idiot would be glad to match four years of his
life against all the money and work that Christian people have put into
Cartwright College."
"I hope you don't mean anything personal by that remark," J.W. said,
with mock solemnity, "because I'm inclined to believe you're more than
half right. It reminds me again of what Phil Khamis said. I'm beginning
to think I'll never have a chance to forget that Greek's Christian
remark about Christians."
By being off at school together J.W. and Marty gave each other
unconfessed but very real moral support in those first days when a lone
freshman would have known he was homesick.
But another antidote, both pleasant and potent, was supplied by the
Epworth League of First Church. It had allied itself with the college
Y.M.C.A.--and for the women students, with the Y.W.C.A.--in various
ways, but particularly it purposed to see that the first few Sundays
were safely tided over.
So the two chums found themselves in one of the two highly attractive
study courses which had been put on in partnership with the Sunday
school. It was in the early afternoon of one of the early Sundays that
J.W. called Marty's attention to a still more alluring opportunity.
"Looky here, Marty, it's raining, I know, but I've a feeling that you'd
better not write that letter home until a little further on in the day.
What's to stop us from taking a look at this League fellowship hour
we're invited to, and getting a light lunch? We don't need to stay to
the League meeting unless we choose, though we're members, you know."
Marty picked up the card of invitation which J.W. had flipped across the
table to him, and read it.
"Well," he commented, "it reads all right. Let's try it."
Out into the rain they went and put in two highly cheerful hours,
including one in the devotional meeting, so that when Marty at last sat
down to write home, he produced, without quite knowing how, a letter
that was vastly more heartening when it reached the farm than it would
have been if he had written it before dark.
Joe Carbrook set out for the State University in what was for him a
fashion quite subdued. Before his experience at the Institute he would
have gone, if at all, in his own car, and his arrival would have been
notice to "the sporty crowd" that another candidate for initiation into
that select circle had arrived.
But Joe was enjoying the novelty of thinking a little before he acted.
Though he would always be of the irrepressible sort, he was not the same
Joe. He had laid out a program which surprised himself somewhat, and
astonished most of the people who knew him.
He knew now that he would become, if he could, a doctor; a missionary
doctor. No other career entered his mind. He would finish his college
work at the State University, and then go to medical school. He would
devote himself without ceasing to all the studies he would need. Not for
him any social life, any relaxation of purpose. Grimly he told himself
that his play days were over. They had been lively while they lasted;
but they were done.
Of course that was foolish. If he had persisted in any such scholastic
regimen, the effort would have lasted a few days, or possibly weeks; and
then in a reaction of disgust he might easily have come to despair of
the whole project.
Fortunately for Joe and for a good many other people, his purpose of
digging into his books and laboratory work and doggedly avoiding any
other interest was tempered by the happenings of the first week.
Doubtless he would have made a desperate struggle, but it would have
been useless. Not even conversion can make new habits overnight, and in
his first two years at college Joe had been known to teachers and
students alike as distinctly a sketchy student, wholly inexpert at
concentrated effort.
And so, instead of becoming first a grind and then a discouraged rebel
against it all, he had the immense good fortune to be captured by an
observant Junior whom he had met while they were both registering for
Chemistry III.
"You're new here," said the Junior, Heatherby by name, "and I've had two
years of it. Maybe you'll let me show you the place. I'm the proud
half-owner of a decidedly second-hand 'Hooting Nanny,' you know, and I
rather like bumping people around town in it."
That was the beginning of many things. Joe liked it that Heatherby made
no apologies for his car, and before long he discovered that the other
half-owner, Barnard, was equally unaffected and friendly. It was
something of a surprise, though, to learn that Barnard was not a
student, but the youthful-looking pastor of the University Methodist
Church, of late known as the Wesley Foundation.
"I'm not up on Methodism as I should be," said Joe to Barnard, a day or
two later, "and I may as well admit that I never heard before of this
Wesley Foundation of yours. Is it a church affair?"
"Well, rather," Barnard answered. "It is just exactly that. You know, or
could have guessed, that a good many of the students here are from
Methodist homes--about a fourth of the whole student body, as it
happens. And our church has been coming to see, perhaps a bit slowly,
that although the State could not provide any religious influences, and
could certainly do nothing for denominational interests, there was all
the more reason for the church to do it. That's the idea under the
Foundation, so to speak, and the work is now established in nine of the
great State Universities."
"Yes, I see," Joe mused, "but just what is the Foundation's duty, and
how do you do it?"
Barnard laughed as he said, "We do pretty near everything, in this
University. We have a regular Methodist church, with a membership made
up almost entirely of faculty and students. The town people have their
own First Church, over on the West Side. Our church has its Sunday
school, its Epworth League Chapter, and other activities. We try to come
out strong on the social side, and in a little while, when our Social
Center building is up--we're after the money for it now--we can do a
good deal more. There is plenty of demand for it."
"That's all church work, of course. I suppose you have no relation to
the University, though," Joe asked, "studies and all that?"
"Yes, indeed, and we're coming to more of it, but gradually. We are
already offering courses in religious subjects, with teachers recognized
by the University, and credit given. It's all very new yet, you know,
but we're hoping and going ahead."
"I should think so," said Joe with emphasis. "But where does the money
come from for all this? It must be Methodist money, of course; who puts
it up?"
"Oh, the usual people," said Barnard. "A few well-to-do Methodists have
provided some of it, but the really big money has to come from the
churches--collections and subscriptions and all that. This sort of work
is being done in forty-odd other schools, where the Wesley Foundation is
not organized. The money comes officially through two of the benevolent
boards."
"Yes?" queried Joe. "I've often heard of 'the benevolences,' but I never
thought of them as meaning anything to me. How do they hook up to a
proposition like that?"
"Well," said Barnard, "the Board of Education, naturally, is interested
because of the Methodist students who are here. And the Board of Home
Missions and Church Extension is interested because at bottom this is
the realest sort of home mission and church extension work."
"Do these boards supply all the money you need?" was Joe's next
question.
"No, not all at once, anyway," Barnard answered. "We're needing a good
deal more before this thing really gets on its feet; and when our people
know what work can be done in State schools, and what a glorious chance
we have, I think they'll see that the money is provided. The students
are there, half a hundred thousand of them, and the church must be there
too."
"Well," Joe said, "I admire the faith of you. And I want to join. You
know, although I'm a mighty green hand at religious work, I've got to go
at it hard. There's a reason. So please count me in on everything where
I'm likely to fit at all. I didn't tell you, did I, that I'm headed for
medicine?--going to be a missionary doctor, if they'll take me when I'm
ready. Maybe your Foundation can do something with me."
Barnard thought it could, and the next two years justified his
confidence. Joe Carbrook, as downright in his new purpose as he had been
in his old scornful refusal to look at life seriously, quickly found a
place for himself in the church and the other activities of the
Foundation. It saved him from his first heedless resolution to study an
impossible number of hours a day, and from the certain crash which would
have followed. It gave him not a few friends, and he was soon deep in
the affairs of the League and the church. Besides, it made possible some
special friendships among the faculty, which were to be of immense value
in later days.
While Joe Carbrook was fitting himself into the life of the University
and the Wesley Foundation, the chums at Cartwright were quite as busy
making themselves a part of their new world. As always, they made a
good team, so much so that people began to think of them not as
individuals, but as necessarily related, like a pair of shoes, or collar
and tie, or pork and beans. And, though the old differences of
temperament and interest had not lessened, the two had reached a fine
contentment over each other's purposes. J.W. was happy in Marty's
preacher-plans, and Marty believed implicitly in the wisdom of J.W.'s
understood purpose to be a forthright Christian layman.
But it was not all plain sailing for J.W. Nobody bothered Marty; he was
going into the ministry, and that settled that. Among the students who
went in for religious work were several who could not quite share
Marty's complacence over J.W.'s program. They thought it strange that so
active a Christian, with the right stuff in him, as everybody
recognized, should not declare himself for some religious vocation.
And from time to time men came to college--bishops, secretaries,
specialists--to talk to the students about this very thing. There was a
student volunteer band, in which were enrolled all the students looking
to foreign mission work. The prospective preachers had a club of their
own, and there was even a little organized group of boys and girls who
thought seriously of social service in some form or another as a career.
Now, J.W., before the end of sophomore year, had come to know all, or
nearly all, of these young enthusiasts. Some of them developed into
staunch and satisfying friends. If he had run with the sport crowd,
which was always looking for recruits, or if he had been merely a hard
student, working for Phi Beta Kappa, he might have been let alone. But,
without being able to wear an identifying label, he yet belonged with
those who had come to college with a definite life purpose.
Just because nobody seemed to realize that being a Christian in business
could be as distinct a vocation as any, J.W. was at times vaguely
troubled, in spite of his confident stand at the Institute. He wondered
a little at what he had almost come to feel was his callousness. Not
that he was uninterested; for Marty he had vast unspoken ambitions which
would have stunned that unsuspecting youth if they had ever become
vocal; and he never tired of the prospects which opened up before his
other friends. He kept up an intermittent correspondence with Joe
Carbrook, and found himself thinking much about the strange chain of
circumstances which promised to make a medical missionary out of Joe. He
more than suspected that Joe and Marcia Dayne were vastly interested in
each other's future, and he got a lot of satisfaction out of that. They
would have a great missionary career.
No; he was not unfeeling about all these high purposes of the boys and
girls he knew; and if he could just get a final answer to the one
question that was bothering him, his college life would need nothing to
make it wholly satisfying. He had early forgotten all his old reluctance
to put college before business.
Marty knew something of what was passing in J.W.'s mind, and it
troubled him a little. He thought of tackling J.W. himself, and by this
time there was nothing under the sun they could not discuss with each
other freely. But he did not quite trust himself.
At last he made up his mind to write to their pastor at home. He knew
that for some reason Mr. Drury had a peculiar interest in J.W. and was
sure he could count on it now.
"I know J.W.'s bothered," he wrote, "but he doesn't talk about it. I
think he has been disturbed by hearing so much about special calls to
special work. We've had several lifework meetings lately, and the needs
of the world have been pretty strongly stated. But the stand he took at
the Institute is just as right for him as mine is for me. Can't you
write to him, or something?"
Walter Drury could do better than write. He turned up at Cartwright that
same week.
It happened that three or four prospective preachers and Christian
workers had been in their room that afternoon, and J.W. was trying to
think the thing through once more. He recalled what his pastor had said
at the camp fire, and his own testimony on Institute Sunday in the
life-service meeting, after Marcia Dayne had put it up to him. But he
was making heavy weather of it. And just then came the pastor's knock at
the door.
There was a boisterous welcome from them both, with something like
relief in J.W.'s heart, that he would not, could not speak. But he could
get help now. For the sake of saying something he asked the usual
question. "What in the world brings you to Cartwright?"
"Oh," said Pastor Drury, "I like to come to Cartwright. Your President's
an old friend. Besides, why shouldn't I come to see you two, if I wish?
You are still part of my flock, you know."
So they talked of anything and everything. By and by Marty said he must
go over to the library, and pretty soon J.W. was telling his friend the
pastor all that had been disturbing him.
"It all began in the summer before I came to college, at the Institute
here, you know, when you spoke at the camp fire on Saturday night."
"I remember," the pastor replied. "You hadn't taken much interest in
your future work before that?"
"No real interest, I guess," J.W. admitted. "I'd always taken things as
they came, and didn't go looking for what I couldn't see. I was enjoying
every day's living, and didn't care deeply about anything else. Why,
though I've been a Methodist all my life, you remember how I knew
nothing at all about the Methodist Church outside of Delafield, except
what little I picked up about its Sunday schools by serving as an
assistant to our Sunday school secretary. And when I began to hear, at
the Institute, about home missions and foreign missions, about Negro
education and other business that the church was doing, I saw right off
that it was up to us young people to supply the new workers that were
always needed. But, even so, only those who had a real fitness for it
ought to offer themselves, and I thought too that something else would
be needed. I wasn't any duller than lots of other church members--even
the older ones didn't seem to know much more about the church outside
than I did. You would take up collections for the benevolences, but if
you told us what they meant, we didn't pay enough attention to get the
idea clearly, so as to have any real understanding. I suppose the
women's societies had more. I know my mother talks about Industrial
Homes in the South, and schools in India--she's in both the societies,
you know--but that is about all."
"And it seemed when I began to find out about things, Mr. Drury, that if
our whole church needed workers for all these places, it needed just as
much to have in the local churches men and women who would know about
the work in a big way, and who would care in a big way, to back up the
whole work as it should be backed up. So, when you spoke at the camp
fire it was just what I wanted to hear, and when I was called on, I made
that sort of a declaration the next day at the life decision services."
"Yes I remember that too," said Mr. Drury, "and I remember telling Joe
Carbrook that you had undertaken as big a career as any of them."
"That's what I kind of thought too," said J.W., simply, "but rooming
with Marty Shenk--he's going to make a great preacher too--keeps me
thinking, and I know about all the students who are getting ready for
special work, and lately I've been wondering----"
"About some special sort of work you'd like to do?" Mr. Drury prompted.
"No; not that at all. I'm just as sure as ever I'm not that sort. If
only I can make good in business, there's where I belong. But can a
fellow make good just as a Christian in the same way I expect Marty
Shenk to make good as a Christian preacher?"
The pastor stood up and came over to J.W.'s chair. "My boy, I know just
what you are facing. It is a pretty old struggle, and there's only one
way out of it. God hasn't any first place and second place for the
people that let him guide them. A man may refuse his call, either to go
or to stay, and then no matter what he does it will be a second best.
But you--wait for your call. For my part, I think probably you've got
it, and it's to a very real life. If you and those like you should fail,
we should soon have no more missionaries. And if the missionaries should
fail, we should soon have no more church. God has little patience with a
church that always stays at home, and I doubt if he has more for a
church that doesn't stand by the men and women it has sent to the
outposts. It is all one job."
There was much more of the same sort, and when J.W. walked with his
pastor to the train the next morning, the only doubt that had ever
really disturbed him in college was quieted for good.
Walter Drury went back to Delafield and his work, surer now than ever
that the Experiment was going forward. He knew, certainly, that all this
was only the getting ready; that the real tests would come later But he
was well content.
* * * * *
It was early football season of the junior year. The State University
took on Cartwright College for the first Saturday's game, everybody well
knowing that it was only a practice romp for the University. Always a
big time for Cartwright, this year it was a day for remembering. Joe
Carbrook, who had been graduated from the University in June, and was
now a medical student in the city, drove down to see the game. For
loyalty's sake he joined the little bunch of University rooters on the
east stand. Otherwise it was Cartwright's crowd, as well as Cartwright's
day.
To the surprise of everybody, neither side scored until the last
quarter, and then both sides made a touchdown, Cartwright first! A high
tricky wind spoiled both attempts to kick goal, and time was called with
a score at 6-6. Cartwright had held State to a tie, for the first time
in history!
Joe came from the game with the chums and took supper with them. The
whole town was ablaze with excitement over its team's great showing
against the State, and the talk at table was all of the way Cartwright's
eleven could now go romping down the schedule and take every other
college into camp, including, of course, Barton Poly, their dearest foe.
The boys were happy to have Joe with them, he looked so big and fine,
and had the same easy, breezy bearing as of old. Nor had he lost any of
that frank attitude toward his own career which never failed to
interest everybody he met. After supper they had an hour together in the
room.
"Those boys in the medical school surely do amuse me," he laughed. "When
I tell 'em I'm to be a missionary doctor, which I do first thing to give
'em sort of a shock they don't often get, they stand off and say, 'What,
you!' as if I had told 'em I was to be a traffic cop, or a trapeze
artist in the circus. Some of 'em seem to think I'm queer in the head,
but, boys, they are the ones with rooms to let. When the others talk
about hanging out a shingle in Chicago or Saint Louis or Cleveland or
some other over-doctored place, I tell 'em to watch me, when I'm the
only doctor between Siam and sunrise! Won't I be somebody? With my own
hospital--made out o' mud, I know--and a dispensary and a few native
helpers who don't know what I'm going to do next, and all the sick
people coming from ten days' journey away to the foreign doctor!" And
then his mood changed. "That's what'll get me, though; all those
helpless, ignorant humans who don't even know what I can do for their
bodies, let alone having any suspicion of what Somebody Else can do for
their souls! But it will be wonderful; next thing to being with him in
Galilee!"
There was a pause, each boy filling it with thoughts he would not speak.
"Where do you expect to find that work, Joe?" J.W. asked him.
The answer was quick and straight: "Wherever I'm sent, J.W., boy," he
said. "Only I've told the candidate secretary what I want. I met him
last summer in Chicago, and there's nothing like getting in your bid
early. He's agreed to recommend me, when I'm ready, for the hardest,
neediest, most neglected place that's open. If I'm going into this
missionary doctor business, I want a chance to prove Christianity where
they won't be able to say that Christianity couldn't have done it alone.
It _can_!"
Then, with one of those quick turns which were Joe Carbrook's devices
for concealing his feelings, he said, "And how's everything going at
this Methodist college of yours? Your boys put up a beautiful game
to-day, and they ought to have won. How's the rest of the school?"
Both the boys assured him everything was going in a properly
satisfactory fashion, but Marty had caught one word that he wanted Joe
to enlarge upon.
"Why do you say 'Methodist college'? It is a Methodist college; but is
there anything the matter with that?"
Joe rose to the mild challenge. "Don't think I mean to be nasty," he
said, "but I can't help comparing this place with the State University,
and I wonder if there's any big reason for such colleges as this. You
know they all have a hard time, and the State spends dollars to the
church's dimes."
"Yes, we know that, don't we, J.W.?" and Marty appealed to his chum,
remembering the frequent and half-curious talks they had on that very
contrast.
J.W. said "Sure," but plainly meant to leave the defense of the
Christian college to Marty, who, to tell the truth, was quite willing.
"There's room for both, and need for both," said that earnest young man.
"Each has its work to do--the State University will probably help in
attracting most of those who want special technical equipment, and the
church colleges will keep on serving those who want an education for its
own sake, whatever special line they may take up afterward: though each
will say it welcomes both sorts of students."
This suited Joe; he intended Marty to keep it up a while. So he said,
"But why is a church college, anyway?" And he got his answer, for Marty
too was eager for the fray.
"The church college," he retorted with the merest hint of asperity, "is
at the bottom of all that people call higher education. The church was
founding colleges and supporting them before the State thought even of
primary schools. Look at Oxford and Cambridge--church colleges. Look at
Harvard and Yale and Princeton and the smaller New England
colleges--church colleges. Look at Syracuse and Wesleyan and
Northwestern and Chicago. Look at Vanderbilt, and most of the other
great schools of the South. They are church colleges, founded, most of
them, before the first State University, and many before there was any
public high school. The church college showed the way. If it had never
done anything else, it has some rights as the pioneer of higher
learning."
J.W. had been getting more interested. He had never heard Marty in
quite this strain, and he was proud of him.
"That's a pretty good answer he's given you, Joe," he said with a
chuckle. "Now, isn't it?"
"It is," admitted Joe. "I reckon I knew most of what you say, Marty, but
I hadn't thought of it that way before. Now I want to ask another
question, only don't think I'm doing it for meanness; I've got a reason.
And my question is this: granting all that the church schools have done,
is it worth all they cost to keep them up now; in our time, I mean?"
"I think it is," Marty answered, quieter now. "They do provide a
different sort of educational opportunity, as I said. Then, they are
producing most of the recruits that the churches need for their work.
Since the churches began to care for their members in the State
Universities, a rather larger number of candidates for Christian service
are coming out of the universities, but until the last year or two
nearly all came, and the very large majority still comes, and probably
for years will come, from the church colleges. And there's another
reason that you State advocates ought to remember. Our Methodist
colleges in this country have about fifty thousand students. If these
colleges were to be put out of business, ten of the very greatest State
Universities would have to be duplicated, dollar for dollar, at public
expense, to take care of the Methodist students alone. When you think of
all the other denominations, you would need to duplicate all the State
Universities now in existence if you purposed to do the work the church
colleges are now doing. And if you couldn't get the money, or if the
students didn't take to the change, the country would be short just that
many thousand college-trained men and women. The whole Methodist Church,
with the other churches, is doing a piece of unselfish national service
that costs up into the hundreds of millions, and where's any other big
money that's better spent?"
When Marty stopped he looked up into Joe's good-natured face, and
blushed, with an embarrassed self-consciousness. "You think you've been
stringing me, don't you?"
"Now, Marty," Joe spoke genially, "don't you misunderstand. I said I had
a reason. I have. My folks have some money they want to put into a safe
place. And they like Cartwright. I do too, but--you know how it is. I
want to be sure. Anyhow I'm glad I asked these questions. You've given
me some highly important information; and, honestly, I'm grateful. You
surely don't think I'm small enough to be making fun of you, or of
Cartwright. If I seemed to be, I apologize on the spot. Believe me?" and
there was no mistaking his genuine earnestness.
"Of course I believe you, old man," Marty rejoined, just a wee bit
ashamed. "Forgive me too, but I've been reading up on that college thing
lately, and it's a little different from what most people think. So you
got me going."
"I'm glad he did," said J.W. "It makes me prouder than ever of
Cartwright College." And, as he got up he said, as though still at the
game, "The 'locomotive' now!" and gave Cartwright's favorite yell as a
solo, while Marty and Joe grinned approval and some students passing in
the street answered it with the "skyrocket."
* * * * *
There is material for a book, all mixt of interest varying from very
light comedy to unplumbed gloom, in the life of two boys at college--any
two; and some day the chronicles of the Delafield Duo may be written;
but not now.
Senior year, with its bright glory and its seriously borne
responsibilities. It found Marty a trifle less shy and reticent than
when he came to Cartwright, and J.W., Jr., a shade more studious. Marty
would miss Phi Beta Kappa, but only by the merest fraction; J.W. would
rank about number twenty-seven in a graduating class of forty-five.
Marty had successfully represented his college twice in debate, and J.W.
had played second on the nine and end in the eleven, doing each job
better than well, but rarely drawing the spotlight his way.
Curiously enough, you had but to talk to Marty, and you would learn that
J.W., Jr., was the finest athlete and the most popular student in
school. Conversely, J.W., Jr., was prepared to set Cartwright's debating
record, as incarnated in Marty, against that of any other college in the
State. What was more, he cherished an unshakable confidence that the
"Rev. Martin Luther Shenk" would be one of the leading ministers of his
Conference within five years.
And so they came to commencement, with the Shenk and the Farwell
families, Pastor Drury, and Marcia Dayne in the throng of visitors. Mr.
Drury rarely missed commencements at Cartwright, and naturally he could
not stay away this year. The Farwells thought Marcia might like to see
her old schoolmates graduate, and the boys had written her that they
wanted somebody they could trot around during commencement week who
might be trusted to join in the "I knew him when" chorus without being
tempted to introduce devastating reminiscences. And Marcia, being in
love with life and youth, had been delighted to accept the combined
invitation. She was not at all in love with either of the boys, nor they
with her. They thought they knew where her heart had been given, and
they counted Joe Carbrook a lucky man.
"Tell us, Marcia," said J.W., Jr., one afternoon, as the three of them
were down by the lake, "how it happens you went to the training school
instead of the normal school last year."
"That's just like a man," said Marcia. "Here am I, your awed and
admiring slave, brought on to adorn the crowning event of your
scholastic career, and you don't even remember that I finished the
normal school course in three years, and graduated a year ago!"
Marty rolled over on the sand in wordless glee.
"Aw, now, Marcia, why----" J.W., Jr., boggled, fairly caught, but soon
recovering himself. "You must have been ashamed of it, then. I do
remember something about your getting through, now you mention the fact,
but why didn't I receive an invitation? Answer me that, young lady!"
"Oh, we educators don't think commencement amounts to so much as all
that. With us, you know, life is real, life is earnest, and so forth.
But I'll tell you the truth, J.W. I knew you couldn't come, either of
you, and I was saving up a little on commencement expenses; so I left
you--and a good many others--off the list. I needed the money, that's
the simple fact; And the reason you didn't see me at home last summer
was because I was busy spending the money I had saved on your
invitations and other expensive things."
Marty usually waited for J.W., but the idea which now occurred to him
demanded utterance. "Say, Marcia, I think it's fine of you to be
studying dispensary work and first aid."
"How did you know?" Marcia demanded.
"Never mind; I saw Joe Carbrook in Chicago when we went through on our
way to the Buckland-Cartwright debate, and I guessed a good deal more
than he told me, which wasn't much."
"Marty," said Marcia, her face aglow and her brave eyes looking into
his, "there's nothing secret about it. When Joe gets through medical
school we shall go out together to whatever field they choose for him.
The least I can do is to get ready to help."
"Is that why you've been going to training school?" asked J.W. They had
so long been used to such complete frankness with each other that the
question was "taken as meant."
"Yes, J.W., it is," said Marcia. "Joe has been doing perfectly splendid
work in his medical course, and they say he will probably turn out to be
a wonderful all-round doctor--everybody is surprised at his
thoroughness, except me. I know what he means by it. But, of course, he
has little time for training in other sorts of religious work, and so,
ever since last June, I've been dividing my time between a settlement
dispensary and the training school. Why shouldn't I be as keen on my
preparation as he is on his, when we're going out to the same work?"
"You should, Marcia--you should," J.W. agreed, vigorously, "and we're
proud of you; aren't we, Marty? I remember thinking two years ago what
fine missionary pioneers you two would make. Only trouble is, we'll
never know anything about it, after we've once seen your pictures in
_The Epworth Herald_ among the recruits of the year. If you were only
going where a feller could hope to visit you once every two years or
so!"
Marcia looked out across the lake, but she wasn't seeing the white sails
that glided along above the rippling blue of its waters. In a moment she
pulled herself together, and observed that there had been enough talk
about a mere visitor. "What of you two, now that your student
occupation's gone?"
"Tell her about yourself, Marty," said J.W. "She knows what I'm going to
do." And for the moment it seemed to him a very drab and unromantic
prospect, in spite of his agreement with Mr. Drury that all service
ranks alike with God.
Marty was always slow to talk of himself. "It isn't much," he said. "The
district superintendent is asking me to fill out the year on the Ellis
and Valencia Circuit--the present pastor is going to Colorado for his
health. So I'm to be the young circuit-rider," and he smiled a wry
little smile. He had no conceit of himself to make the appointment seem
poor; rather he wondered how any circuit would consent to put up with a
boy's crude preaching and awkward pastoral effort.
But J.W., Jr., was otherwise minded. A country circuit for Marty did not
accord with his views at all. Marty was too good for a country church,
he argued, mainly from his memories of the bare little one-room
meetinghouse of his early childhood. In his periodical trips to the farm
he had seen the old church grow older and more forlorn, as one family
after another moved away, and the multiplying cars brought the town and
its allurements almost to the front gate of every farm.
So J.W. had tried to say "No," for Marty, who would not say it for
himself. It was one of the rare times when they did not see eye to eye.
But it made no difference in their sturdy affection; nothing ever could.
And Marty would take the appointment.
Commencement over, for the first time in many years the chums went their
separate ways, Marty to his circuit, and J.W. home to Delafield. Then
for a little while each had frequent dark-blue days, without quite
realizing what made his world so flavorless. But that passed, and the
young preacher settled down to his preaching, and the young merchant to
his merchandising; and soon all things seemed as if they had been just
so through the years.
To J.W. came just one indication of the change that college had made.
Pastor Drury, though he found it wise to do much of his important work
in secret, thought to make use of the college-consciousness which most
towns possess in June, and which is felt especially, though not
confessed, by the college colony. The year's diplomas are still very new
in June. So a college night was announced for the social rooms, with a
college sermon to follow on the next Sunday night. The League and the
Senior Sunday School Department united to send a personal invitation to
every college graduate in town, and to every student home for the
vacation. They responded, four score of them, to the college-night call.
As J.W. moved about and greeted people he had known for years he began
to realize that college has its own freemasonry. These other graduates
were from all sorts of schools; two had been to Harvard, and one to
Princeton; several were State University alumni. Cartwright was
represented by nine, six of them undergraduates, and the others
confessed themselves as being from Chicago, Syracuse, De Pauw, three or
four sorts of "Wesleyan," Northwestern, Knox, Wabash, Western Reserve,
and many more.
Not even all Methodist, by any means, J.W. perceived; and yet the
fellowship among these strangers was very real. They spoke each other's
tongue; they had common interests and common experiences. He told
himself that here was a suggestion as to the new friends he might make
in Delafield, without forgetting the old ones. And the prospect of life
in Delafield began to take on new values.
On the next Sunday night not so many college people were out to hear Mr.
Drury's straight-thinking and plain-spoken sermon on "What our town asks
of its college-trained youth"; and a few of those who came were inclined
to resent what they called a lecture on manners and duty.
But to J.W. the sermon was precisely the challenge to service he had
been looking for. It made up for his feeling at commencement that he was
"out of it." It completed all which Mr. Drury had suggested at the
Institute camp fire four years ago, all that he himself had tried to say
at the decision service on the day after the camp fire; all that the
pastor had urged two years ago when J.W., Jr., confessed to him his new
hesitations and uneasiness.
The pastor had not preached any great thing. He had simply told the
college folk in his audience that no matter where they had gone to
school, many people had invested much in them, and that the investment
was one which in its very nature could not be realized on by the
original investors. The only possible beneficiaries were either the
successive college generations or the communities in which they found
their place. If they chose to take as personal and unconditional all the
benefits of their education, none could forbid them that anti-social
choice; but if they accepted education as a trust, a stewardship,
something to be used for the common good, they would be worth more to
Delafield than all the new factories the Chamber of Commerce could coax
to the town.
And to those who might be interested in this view of education, Pastor
Drury said: "Young people of the colleges, you have been trained to some
forms of laboratory work, in chemistry, in biology, in geology--yes,
even in English. I invite you to think of your own town of Delafield as
your living laboratory, in which you will be at once experimenters and
part of the experiment stuff. Look at this town with all its good and
evil, its dying powers and its new forces, its dullnesses and its
enthusiasms, its folly and wisdom, its old ways and its new people, its
wealth and want. Do you think it is already becoming a bit of the
kingdom of God? Or, if you conclude that it seems to be going in ways
that lead very far from the Kingdom, do you think it might possess any
Kingdom possibilities? If you do, no matter what your occupation in
Delafield, Delafield itself may be your true vocation, your call from
God!"
For John Wesley Farwell, Jr., it was to become all of that.