1903-04 Volume 28 No 1–5 - Phi Delta Theta Scroll Archive

176 THE SCROLL.the control of the students into the hands of the studentsthemselves, and it naturally devolves upon the older andmore experienced among them to take the lead, and to belooked up to by the young and inexperienced. To be thusmade a man of before graduation is a mark of confidence—indeed, a compliment—to which no thinking student canfail to respond. This fact of undergraduate self-control isone of the healthiest features of the development of Americancollege life.THIS is the era of prizes—prize essays, prize stories, prizeeverything. Competition is the life not alone of trade; wecompete for football and debating teams, editorial boardsand class honors, civil place and political preferment. In-'evitably, therefore, amid the plethora of prizes, prize-winnersfail to impress from the mere fact. On the other handthe shadow of a prize need not obscure real merit. In thisnumber of THE SCROLL therefore we make bold to reproducea prize essay, on 'The Influence of the College Fraternity.'This essay took a prize offered by the New Yorkalumni association of Alpha Tau Omega, and was writtenby a member of Delta Upsilon, Stanford chapter, class of1902. We do not take space to reproduce it because we feelany need of defending the college fraternity; we give itplace in our valued columns because we want to put into thehands of all our chapters so excellent an exposition of whata chapter ought to be. While it is barely possible in somequarter or other we may be thought a doting editor, yet wehave not reached the happy stage of beheving that all ourchapters are all they ought to be. Human frailty will exhibititself in chapters as elsewhere, and we may alwayshope to accomplish a certain amount of good by preachingin an agreeable way. We know of no better method in thismatter than to point out, as the essayist has done, all theways in which some chapters are making themselves useful;are realizing the opportunities peculiar to the fraternity