Life — January 9, 1908 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“While there is Lite there's Hope." VOL. LI. JANUARY 9, 1908 No. 1315 Published by LIFE PUBLISHING COMPANY J.A. Mircnntt, Pres’, 17 West Thirty-first Street, New York A. Mute, Sec'y ond Treas, of Yale-Harvard football that appeared in this paper on December 12 has been hon- ored with a response from “A Yale Graduate,” in St. Louis, who College men, “after all, are litle more than boys. They are still learning not only their studies, but also the cardinal principles of life. Among these are: “Do your best in all things you under! « Never say ‘die’; “Fight the good fight”? and a few other commonplace but nevertheless admirable sayings, which the world’s history has taught us are good sayings to take to heart and to memory. Perhaps Yale does want too much to win, but it is that very spirit which is instilled into Yale boys—say from seventeen to three years of age—that makes Yale ther prominent or foremost, usually » in all he walks of life and cer- in those walks where hard fighting, in the form of competition, is fiercest. I don't cssay to take issue with you and argue, but I do want to say, what you surely must know—that for Yale to fight her hardest in ything she undertakes, is one of Yale’s maxims, That is my defense of Yale’s possi- bly too great a desire to win, Yale admits her lackof philosophical success, though she doesn’t have to, because it’s so evident. But her failure is not duc to lack of effort, for she “has done her d—dest.” In these trying and panicky times though, the man in dis- tress who gocs out and plays football to win and doesn’t sit around his office and phil- osophize, will be solvent and doing business when the clouds disappear. That's the best argument I can make for the Yale policy which you almost attack. “Almost attack,” says our correspond- ent, and is quite right. We didn’t quite dare to attack it, because there is somuch to be said in its favor. LIFE But come, good Yale-Graduate of St. Louis, let us reason together. How about your cardinal principles of life? “Do your best in all things you undertake?” T hat isa maxim familiar to every ear, but it really a sound cardinal principle? Would it be a paralyzing thought to you that as it stands—as you have stated it— it is something of a fake, and is, moreover, the particular fake which is at the bottom of all the trouble with Yale football, and Yale athletics generally, if, indeed, there is any trouble about them? We can’t do our best in everything we undertake. If we did, we would never get to the top (or near it) of anything. The whole plan of our civilized life is partial neglect of a lot of things that we do, and must do, in order to put in our best licks on some one thing, or at most, a few things, which we think it worth our while to do our best in. The very fault that would be found with Yale athletics—if one had the hardihood to find such fault—would be that Yale did her best in athletics, leaving her sec- ond best to be distributed among all the other interests that engage her. Precisely that idea about Yale is held by thousands of persons, most of whom admire her in secing what it is most Profit able to do her best in. That notion is at the bottom of the common saying that Yale could not afford to lose her athletic supremacy, because, without it, she would be nowhere, We do not share that opinion, nor yet believe that what Yale does in athletics is the best she does, but the clatter of her success in sports is so much louder in the popular ear than any other noise that comes out of her that it is not in the least surprising that that opinion prevails as it does. If her great potency and value as an institution of learning, of research, and of sound training of youth, are over- shadowed (and we really think they are) by her athletic renown, that might be a considerable reason for her friends to attack some details of her policy. ND another point: Don’t you think you overvalue the yearning to win, which you say is instilled into Yale boys between seventeen and twenty-three, as a meansof bringing Yale men to the fore- front in all the walks of life? As we see the game, larger the yearning to win— to beat the other fellows—is not only a second-rate motive, but it is not even so particularly useful in winning. Play the game for the game’s sake, let win who can. Yale gets many superior men, and trains them well in many particulars, and they go out and hammer along like the rest of us, helping anywhere they can, but, especially, it is true, helping one another. A good proportion of them make their presence in the world favor- ably known before they reach the ceme- tery, but in their processes they seem re- markably like other decent folks. We never noticed that they were greater hogs about winning than the rest of us. Take the most conspicuous Yale man now in sigk., the Hon. Wm. Taft, Yale ’78; did he ever beat any one in his life? Perhaps so, but it was because he couldn't help it. Where is a man with less inclination to use his elbows in getting ahead; where one so ready to turn aside from the chance to win something he wants to take up with some importunate duty? Much finer and bigger motives than an extravagant yearning to win have shaped the lives of the big Yale men we can think of; but others we can remember who have been carried away by the lust to win, and have won, and gone trebly- gilt to dishonorable graves. T SEEMS that Congress is being be- sought to pass a bill restoring “In God we trust” to the new gold pieces, which some objectors like to stigmatize as “godless coins.” ‘Tut, tut! We hope Congress will let those coins alone. A godless coin is no more objectionable than a godless spade, or a godless pair of boots. It is purely a secular object made and used for secular purposes. It was a mistake ever to have put on our coins a religious motto, albeit one to which in itself no wise person would object. The mistake was in mixing up secular and religious concerns, since both of them suffer from being mixed, and once con- fused it is sure to be troublesome to sepa- ratethem. If we had once got used tohav- ing “I want to be an angel” on the post- age stamps there would be a row about taking it off. ‘Render unto Casar the the things that are Cxsar’s” is the rule in these matters; a rule of highest au- thority and a curiously exact applicati