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FINAL CONSIDERATIONS. 635
mercial side of it is brought so prominently into view.
"These fees are represented to us as being merely the
reward which is considered everywhere in society as un­
questionably due to a man in the successful exercise of his
talents. But it is a reward not honourable but degrading
to a teacher."*
It is the duty of the State to put an end to this system..
It should require that money received from persons attend­
ing educational establishments supported by itself should
be spent on the improvement of such establishments. How
much could be done in increasing the appliances for teach­
ing, in the support of scientific work, in the augmentation
of stipends, in short in curing the serious disease from
which, as WALTER PERRY said in the English House of
Commons, the German universities suffer—the want of
money,—if the income derived from the lecture-fees were
so employed ! A wise educational policy will attack this
problem and carry out the necessary reform while sparing
the acquired rights of the individual, thus earning the
thanks of the German people who love their universities
and are acutely sensitive to every cloud which dims the
pure light of their fame.
No human arrangements are free from faults. A strenuous
effort to improve and render perfect what already exists
constitutes the task of life. Where can such endeavours
be more justified or demanded than in dealing with the
education of doctors on whose knowledge and ability the
health and lives of men are so greatly dependent ?
" The most precious capital of states and of society is
man. Every individual life represents a definite value. To
preserve, to maintain it intact as far as possible, up to the
* H.J. v. WESSENBERG: Die Reform der deutschen Universitaten, 2 Aufi%
Wiirzburg 1886, S. 39.—So also P. FRANK (op. tit. \i, Th. r, S. 290 et seq.}
enters a protest against lecture-fees. The arguments brought forward in favour
of them by the Minister Jos. UNGER in the Austrian House of Representatives
on 28 January, 1876, have failed to convince me of the propriety of this arrangement.