"Which of the German universities would be the best adapted to my
purpose?" is the question of many an American student, who, having gone
through the usual course in the United States, looks abroad for the
completion of his scientific or liberal studies. Of Göttingen and
Heidelberg he will often have read and heard; the reputation of the
comparatively new university of Berlin will not be unfamiliar to him;
but of Tübingen, Würzburg, Erlangen, Halle, or Bonn, even, he will
perhaps know little more than the name. In the majority of the
last-named places, foreigners, especially his own countrymen, are rare;
none of his friends have studied there; they have followed the current,
since the last century, and spent their time in Göttingen or Heidelberg,
perhaps a winter in Berlin. They have found these institutions good, and
affording every facility for study; but would not Munich, or Leipzig, or
Jena, or any other one of the twenty-six universities of Germany, better
answer the purpose of many a student?
During the last winter, in many conversations with a retired professor
in Berlin, who manifested a special interest in American institutions,
mainly in the American educational system, he was very particular in
inquiring as to what we meant by our term _College_. He had read the
work of the historian Raumer on America, and declared that from this he
could get no notion whatever as to what the term meant with us. The very
same thing occurs daily in the United States in regard to foreign, or,
more properly, the Continental universities. Accustomed as we are to the
prevalence of the tutorial system, the use of text-books,--in many parts
of the Union not defining clearly the difference between the terms
University, College, Institute, and Academy, giving the first name often
to institutions having but one faculty, and that at times incomplete,
with no theological, and often no law or medical department, forgetting
that the University should, from its very name, be as universal as
possible in its teachings, comprehending in its list of studies the
combined scientific and literary pursuits of the age,--we are apt to
look upon foreign schools of learning as similar in nature and purpose
to our own, differing not in the quality or specific character of the
teaching, but rather in the scope and extent of the branches taught. Yet
nothing is farther from the truth. The result is, that many a one starts
for Europe full of hope, to seek what he would have found better at
home,--or, when prepared and mature for European travel, is left to
chance or one-sided advice in the choice of a locality in which to
prosecute further studies. Often with only book-knowledge of the
language of the country, accident will lead him to the very university
the least adequate to his purpose.
Having now spent some time in four of the leading German universities,
and contemplating a longer stay for the purpose of visiting others, the
writer has thought that some general remarks might call attention to
points often disregarded, and serve to give some insight into the nature
of the institutions of learning of the country,--rather aiming to
characterize the system of higher education as it now exists than to
give detailed historical notices, including something of student-life,
and the professors,--in fine, such observations as would not be likely
to be made by a general tourist, and such as native writers deem it
unnecessary to make, presupposing a knowledge of the facts in their own
readers.
The German universities are the culminating point of German culture.
They concentrate within themselves the intellectual pith of the country.
Dating their foundation as far back as the fourteenth century, as
Prague, Vienna, and Heidelberg,--or established but of late years in
the nineteenth, as Berlin, Bonn, and Munich,--they attract to themselves
the mental strength of the land, forming a focus from which radiates,
whether in Theology, Science, Literature, or Art, the new world of
thought, which finds its way to remotest regions, often filtered
and unacknowledged. They number among their professors the most
distinguished men of the century, whether poets, philosophers, or
divines. All who lay claim to authorship find in the lecture-room a
firm stand and rank in society, as Government is ever ready to insure a
life-position to distinguished scholars. To mention only a few
examples of men who would scarcely be thought of in a professorial
career,--Schiller was Professor of History in Jena, Rückert Professor in
Berlin, Uhland in Tübingen.
In nothing can Germany manifest a better-grounded feeling of national
pride than in this, its university system. Politically inert, divided
into petty states, powerless, the ever-ready prey of more active or
ambitious neighbors, it has played a pitiful _rôle_ in the world's
history, with annals made up of petty feuds and jealousies and
tyrannical meannesses, never working as one people, save when driven to
extremity. With countless differences of dialect, manners, customs, it
is one and national in nothing save in its literature, and feels that,
through the high culture of its scholars, through the new paths its
men of science have opened, through the profound investigations of
the learned in every sphere, it holds its place at the head of every
intellectual movement of the age. It feels that its universities are the
laboratories whence issue the thoughts whose significance the world is
ever more and more ready to acknowledge. France even, selfish and proud
of its past supremacy in all things, has within the last quarter of a
century laid aside much of its exclusiveness, and a Germanic infusion is
perceptible through all the mannerism of the latest and best productions
of the French school. Comparatively of late years is it, that the
English mind has fairly come in contact with this German culture. Its
first loud manifestation may be heard in the prose of Carlyle and his
school; yet even now its influence has permeated our whole literature so
much, that, when reading some of our latest poetry, tones and melodies
will come like distant echoes from the groves on the hillsides where
warble the nightingales of Germany.
A most unpractical people, however, the Germans, who have been so active
in almost every possible field of speculation, have produced nothing
which could give one unacquainted with their university system a true
notion of its workings and actual state. Much has been written on
Pedagogy, its history general and special, the common schools and
gymnasia; but until 1854 there was not even a general work on the
history of the universities. To Karl von Raumer, former Minister of
Public Worship in Prussia, we owe the first _Beitrag_, as he modestly
calls it, the fourth volume of his "History of Pedagogy" being devoted
exclusively to these. Partly made up of historical sketches, partly
narrations of the writer's personal experience as student from 1801, as
professor in various places from 1811, it does not aim and is but little
calculated to give a clear idea of the system itself. Special works, as
the one of Tomek on Prague, and of Klüpfel on Tübingen, do exist,
but otherwise nothing but personal observation can be made use of.
Statistics, every information, in fine, concerning the present
intellectual wealth of the nation, must be acquired either orally, or
from the catalogues, programmes, and hundreds of local pamphlets that
are issued yearly. The work of the Rev. Dr. Schaff, "Germany, its
Universities, Theology, and Religion," (Philadelphia, 1857,) rather aims
to characterize the nature and tendency of German theology, the latter
part being taken up with interesting and well-written sketches of the
leading divines.
Before proceeding to these high-schools themselves, let us glance at the
general system of German education. In spite of political differences,
there exists much uniformity in this throughout the Confederation. The
German States are exceedingly _paternal_ in the care they take of their
subjects. They extend their parental supervision even to the family
interior, every relation of life regulated by fixed laws, and even
after death the inhumation must be conducted the forms and with the
precautions prescribed. The new-born child _must_ be baptized within
six weeks after birth. If the parents neglect it, Government sees to
it,--unless they claim the privileges of Israelites, in which case the
rites of their religion must be followed. Between his sixth and
seventh year the child _must_ enter some school or receive elementary
instruction at home. So far is education compulsory; beyond, it is
optional. When duly prepared, he enters, if the parents desire it, the
Government Gymnasium or Lyceum, answering pretty much to our College; it
fits the youth for entering the University. It confers no degrees; only,
at the conclusion of the studies, an _Examen Maturitatis_ takes place.
The youth is then declared ripe for matriculation. Without having
undergone this examination, he can never become a regular student. Even
should he have attended regularly any of the many private academies, or
the _Realschule_, where thorough instruction is given, but with less
special, though no slight attention to Latin and Greek, and more to
mathematics and practical branches, even then he must acquire from
one of the gymnasia the exemption-and-maturity-right. In the slang of
student-life, the gymnasiast is styled a _Frog_, the school itself
a _Pond_; between the time of his declaration of maturity and his
reception as student, he is called a _Mule_.
The course is no light one the candidate has gone through,--nine or ten
years of classical training, Latin the whole time, Greek the last six or
seven years, Hebrew the last four, generally optional, though in many
cases required at future examinations. The modern languages have not
been neglected: French he has pursued seven years, English or Italian
the last three or four. Beside all these, the elements of Philosophy,
Moral and Natural, History, Mathematics, etc. In fine, the certificate
of maturity would in most cases equal, in many surpass, what our
colleges is styled the degree of A.M. Of course, the parallel must not
be understood as existing with respect to many of the older institutions
in the United States, which presuppose, in the entering freshman, a
preparatory course of several years.
The classical training so strictly required of natives who enter
these high-schools is not so rigidly inquired into in the case of
foreigners,--though in this respect the regulations differ in various
states. In Prussia and generally, the passport is all-sufficient; but
in Würtemberg, a diploma or some certificate of former studies must be
exhibited before admission. The officers of some of the universities, as
Tübingen, for instance, are very particular in enforcing all the rules,
inquiring of the applicant, whatever be his age or nationality, whether
he has a written permission from his parents to study abroad and in
their university, whether he has the money necessary to pay the debts he
may contract, and such other minute questions as will strike an American
especially as particularly impertinent. The precaution is carried
so far, that, when no positive information is given as to means of
subsistence, the letter of credit must be delivered into the hands
of the beadle as security. Yet such little incidents are but slight
annoyances at most, which a little good-humor and desire to conform to
the habits and ways of doing of the country will remove. He who goes
abroad always ready to bristle up against what does not exactly conform
to his preconceived ideas of propriety, measuring and weighing all
things with his own national weights and measures, will be continually
making himself disagreeable and unhappy, and in the end profit little by
his absence from home.
The conclusion of the training-system in the gymnasia usually occurs
before the nineteenth or twentieth year. With the reception of the
certificate of maturity the youth may be said to have donned the virile
toga. He enjoys during his university years a degree of liberty such as
he never enjoyed before, never will enjoy again when his student-days
are over. Having taken out his matriculation-papers, and given the
_Handschlag_ (taken the oath) to obey the laws of the land and the
statutes of the university, he has become a student,--a _Fox_, as the
freshman is styled,--he chooses his own career, his own professors,
hears the lectures he pleases, attends or omits as he pleases, leads the
life of a god for a triennium or a quadrennium, fights his duels, drinks
his beer, sings his club-and-corps songs.--But of student-life more in
due time.--There is no check, no constraint whatever, during the whole
time the studies last. At the expiration of three or four, sometimes
even five years, an examination takes place before the degree of Doctor
can be conferred,--not a severe one by any means, confined as it is to
the special branch to which the candidate wishes to devote himself.
In the Medical and Law Departments it is more serious than in the
Philosophical. This examination is followed by a public discussion in
presence of the dean and professors of the faculty, held in Latin, on
some thesis that has been treated and printed in the same language by
the candidate. His former fellow-students, and any one present that
wishes, stand as opponents. This disputation, whatever may have been its
merits in former days, has degenerated in the present into a mere piece
of acted mummery, where the partakers not only stutter and stammer over
bad Latin, but even help themselves, when their memory fails utterly,
with the previously written notes of their extempore objections and
answers. The principal requisite for the attainment of the Doctor's
degree, when the necessary amount of time has been given, in the
Philosophical Faculty at least, is the fees, which often mount quite
high.
From the ranks of such as have attained this _title_, for so it should
be called, every office of any importance in the State is filled.
Through every ramification of the complicated system of government,
recommendations and testimonials play the greatest _rôle_,--the first
necessary step for advancement being the completion of the university
studies--And by public functionaries must not be understood merely those
holding high civil or military grades. Every minister of the Church,
every physician, chemist, pharmaceutist, law-practitioner of any
grade, every professor and teacher, all, in fact, save those devoting
themselves to the merely mechanical arts or to commercial pursuits, and
even these, though with other regulations, receive their appointment or
permission to exercise their profession from the State. It is one huge
clock-work, every wheel working into the next with the utmost precision.
To him who has gone so far, and received the Doctorate, several
privileges are granted. He has claims on the State, claims for a
position that will give him a means of subsistence, if only a scanty
one. With talent and industry and much enduring toil, he may reach the
highest places. He belongs to the aristocracy of learning,--a poor,
penniless aristocracy, it may be, yet one which in Germany yields in
point of pride to none.
We proceed to the Professors. It is within the power of all to attain
the position of Lecturer in a university. The diploma once obtained, the
farewell-dinner, the _comilat_, and general leave-taking over, the man's
career has commenced in earnest. If he turn his attention to education,
he may find employment in some of the many schools of the State. Does he
look more directly to the University, he undergoes, when duly prepared
on the branches to which he wishes to devote himself, the _Examen
Rygorosum_, delivers a trial-lecture in presence of his future
colleagues, and is entitled to lecture in the capacity of a
_Privat-Docent_. As such be receives no remuneration whatever from
Government; his income depends upon what he receives from his hearers,
two to six dollars the term from each. All who aspire to the dignity of
Professor must have passed through this stage; rarely are men called
directly from other ranks of life,--though eminent scholars,
physicians, or jurists have been sometimes raised immediately to an
academical seat. After a few years, five or more, the _Privat-Docent_
who has met with a reasonable degree of success may hope for a
professorship,--though many able men have remained in this inferior
position for long years, some even for life. If their hearers are but
few, they resort to private lessons, to book-making, anything that
will aid them in maintaining their position, always with the hope that
"something must turn up."
The _Privat-Docent_ system, though condemned by some, has been much
extolled by many German writers. It is, say the latter, a warranty for
the freedom of teaching, no slight point In a country where all is
subservient to the political rulers, forming men for the professorship,
and giving them a confidence in their own powers, as they must rely
exclusively for their support on the income they receive from their
hearers. From among their number are chosen those constituting the
regular faculties; and thus there are ever at hand men ready to fill the
highest places upon any vacancy, men not new or inexperienced, but whose
whole life has been one training for the position they may be called to
occupy.
The _Privat-Docent_ may be raised directly to a seat in the faculty, but
more generally he passes through the intermediate stage of _Professor
Extraordinarius_. The Professors Extraordinary receive no, or at most a
very small, income from the State; they are merely titled lecturers,
and nothing more; yet in their ranks, as well as among the more modest
_Privatim-Docentes_, are often found men of the greatest learning, whose
names are known abroad, whose contributions to science are universally
acknowledged, whose lecture-rooms are thronged with students, while the
halls of some of the regular professors may be left empty. No vacancy
may have occurred in their department,--or, as is unfortunately
oftener the case, some political reasons may be the occasion of their
non-advancement.
We come to the regular faculty of the university, the _Professores
Ordinarii_. They enjoy the fullest privileges, are appointed for life,
and receive beside the tuition-fees regular incomes. They may be elected
to the Academic Senate and to the Rectorship, the Rector or Chancellor
not being appointed for life, but changing yearly,--the various
faculties being represented in turn. He is styled _Rector Magnificus_.
The faculties are usually four in number. In several universities,
of late, a fifth has been created,--the _Staatswissenschaftliche_,
Cameralistic; so that in institutions where both Catholic and Protestant
Theology are represented, there are in fact six faculties. The
Philosophical Department stretches over so wide a field, that, were it
separated into its real divisions, as Philosophy proper, Philology,
History, the Mathematical and Natural Sciences, the faculties would
extend far beyond the present number. In France, it is divided into
a _Faculté des Lettres and a Faculté des Sciences._ The present
comprehensive use of the term is but an extension of the Middle-Age
division of the liberal arts into the Trivium,--Grammar, Rhetoric,
Dialectics,--and the Quadrivium,--Arithmetic, Music, Geometry, and
Astronomy,--as expressed in the verse,--
"Lingus, tropus, ratio, numerus, tenor,
angulus, astra."
The term _Magister Artium Liberalium,_ so often met with, refers to
these. Those pursuing these studies were denominated _Artisti._ As the
number of studies increased, the name was changed, and the department
now includes all branches not ranged under one of the heads of Theology,
Law, or Medicine; so that every student, whatever his pursuits may be,
if he does not confine himself exclusively to them, will wish to hear
one or more courses of lectures in this faculty.
The Professors Ordinary and Extraordinary, together with the
_Privat-Docents_, form the active force of the German university. In
Tübingen are _Repetenten_, who lecture or comment on classical and
Biblical writers and form classes in the ancient or modern languages.
Those teaching the modern languages exclusively are styled _Lectors_.
The title, _Professor Honorarius_, as of Gervinus in Heidelberg, is
conferred merely as a mark of honor, the bearer lecturing only when he
pleases. To complete this enumeration, it may not be unnecessary to
state, connected with each university are masters for riding, fencing,
swimming, gymnastics, and dancing, regular places appointed for these
exercises, beside access to museums, the university library, scientific
collections, etc.
The number of professors--and under this name we include the three
divisions of lecturers--varies from forty to one hundred and seventy and
upwards, according to the size and importance of the institution. In
Berlin, last winter, there were one hundred and sixty-nine; in Erlangen,
but forty-four; in Munich, one hundred and eleven. The University
of Kiel, with not one hundred and thirty students, numbers fifty
professors. These each deliver at least one course of lectures; most
deliver more,--some as many as four or five. In Prussia, each is
required by law to read one course, at least, gratis (_publice_);
otherwise the lectures are _privatim_, a fee being paid by the
hearer,--say four or five dollars on the average for the term. The
_privatissime_ are private lessons or lectures, the when and where to be
settled with the lecturer himself.
The year is divided into two terms, varying somewhat in different
places. The summer session is the shorter of the two, lasting from near
the middle of April till August, when the long vacation takes place. The
winter semester usually commences in October and lasts till the latter
part of March.
As to the scope and variety of the lectures, it is unlimited, and varies
yearly. In Berlin, during the winter semester of 1859-60, there were
no less than three hundred and forty-six courses in all, besides the
clinics, demonstrative and practical courses, philological exercises,
and the like. These were divided as follows:--
In Theology . . . . . . 38
" Law. . . . . . . . 56
" Medicine . . . . . . 78
" Philosophy . . . . . 174