To every man who undertakes the tutelage of younger minds is given the opportunity, perhaps the best opportunity within human society, to win for his name, for his abilities, even for his eccentricities, a profoundly sentimental reverence. This reverence of pupil for teacher all ages of civilized men share in common nostalgic felicity. It persists in a time and among men who conscientiously harbor cynicism. It is, in short, an inescapable adjunct to discipleship. It is not, however, an inescapable adjunct to professorship. Every teacher, it is true, receives some small portion--his due as an officer, as an adult. But to very few is it given in full measure. And to these few is applied an adjective as hackneyed in its ordinary use as it is intense here. They are "great" teachers.

William Graham Sumner was a great teacher. Mr. Keller is an apt, therefore a reverent, pupil. And in this little book, the disciple has painted the master and the man, wholly, alive, with appropriate sentiment. Mr. Keller disclaims all intent of order. One by one, indiscriminately, he picks out the characteristics of his subject and illustrates them with anecdote and incidental background. The result, as we shall see, is something more than a vivid memoir.

Sumner's delivery, according to Mr. Keller, was "plain, hard and ruthless... I do not recall that he told a single story in his classes... He never made concessions to the youth and flightiness of his students." Class work was a serious business; order and dignity were next to Godliness. Let Mr. Keller illustrate:--

One year, toward the end of his teaching career, Sumner's class was very large. "There had been, off and on, noise and inattention that had irked him sore. Toward the end of the year either the disorderly repented... or else feared reprisals; in any case there was bought for Sumner a large silver loving cup... Sumner took the cup and set it down on the table... he looked over the class in silence... without exhibiting any pleasurable emotion whatsoever. At length he spoke: I'm not accustomed to make valedictories, but one seems called for this time.' He stopped... and spoke with restrained emphasis. 'I've--been--counting--the hours till I got rid of you.' He paused to let that sink in; then castigated the class... for their disrespect and ill conduct... He concluded: 'But perhaps this indicates a better disposition: and I will say this: I will try to think as well of you as I can, for the rest of my life.' Slight pause. 'The question for the day is...'"

If Sumner was an "opener of minds," his method was that described by Mr. Keller of "speaking out the truth as a basis of understanding." His phraseology was that of a plain speaking man, courageous in all his intellectual and personal relations, tart when tartness was due and effective. Examples are only too copious; "What are we teachers of Greek going to do if Greek is no longer required?" asked a colleague. "Do?" retorted Sumner. "Learn something else and teach it. I've had to do that, twice in my life." Or again, mordantly, to the class, "In the colonies, during inflation, you might see creditors fleeing madly from debtors who were chasing them to pay them with bushel-basket fuels of dirty paper."... Most famous of all, perhaps, is his address, immediately consequent upon the taking of the Philippines. The lecture was entitled, "The Conquest of the United States by Spain."

For those accustomed to polite academic society, this vigorous honesty is somewhat startling, somewhat refreshing. As Mr. Keller doubtless hoped, it blasts away the common sophistry which is the delight of modern professorial dignity and which resides within the debate over "research" and teaching. Typically enough, Sumner, eschewing the word research, maintained that, "Far from being detrimental to teaching, diligent and incessant study, was an indispensable requisite to it. This he took as axiomatic and spent no time talking about it." In form, this is a book of reminiscences; it is a sentimental document, the clear portrait of a great teacher. But it is more than that. It is a primer, an object lesson, in college teaching, and in the debt which is the college professor's to his community. Mr. Keller's thin volume belongs on the desk of every man who claims an interest in American University Education.