The centennial celebration which has just been celebrated at Columbia recalls to us the festivities of last fall when we were engaged in a similar undertaking, and creates in us a feeling of fellow-interest and cordiality. Columbia's situation in the heart of the city of New York gives her an opportunity to attract to herself many eminent men, and for this she is to be envied. This is an advantage which Harvard does not possess, and probably never will attain, for the course of the progress of the United States is, like that of all other countries, westward, and New England must expect to lose slowly but surely her present position of importance. New York, however, will always be a great terminus, at least she will be on the line of travel between Europe and the great West. Although Harvard must envy Columbia for this, she can revert to the past and exclaim that a university in the midst of a large city, and influenced by the rush of business affairs and every-day strife, can never be the home of the deepest thinkers and the most attentive scholars. The very fact that Columbia is in New York may work untold evil instead of countless benefits. True the atmosphere of the metropolis is a great educator, but is it not rather unhealthy when breathed in by those who work upon antiquities or upon quarternious? Philosophy needs must be influenced by the place where it originates. Utilitarian morals and intuitive methods supersede abstract ethics and deductive principles when the thinker is thrown into the whirl of a great city. There is much talk now-a-days about making university studies practical and no doubt there is much wisdom in the attempt, but bookishness has its uses and if it is not to be fostered in the colleges, it will not be fostered anywhere, and will disappear forever. That would be an evil. Four years of isolation at college is not to be desired; but Harvard, we believe, gains in being on a side road where the rumble of the continually passing trains on the trunk line is not heard; so our meditations are not interrupted and we do not become "men of the world" before our time.