THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW ZEALAND.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 421, 6 March 1880, Page 10

THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW ZEALAND.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW ZEALAND MAIL. Sir, —A telegram from Christchurch in your issue of to-day informs us that the Senate of the New Zealand University has determined to apply for powers to grant honorary degrees. This learned body has already made mistakes not a few, but surely it never took a more extraordinary, a more unwise, or a more objectionable step than this. For, I. The power to grant honorary degrees is not, I believe, possessed by any university of modern origin in the British Empire. The University of London, on which that of New Zealand is modelled, I know does not possess this power, and the same is the case, I believe, with the Australian Universities. It is true the power to confer degrees without ex mination is possessed and exercised by the two ancient foundations of Oxford and Cambridge, but the circumstances of these vast and ancient corporations are so utterly different from those of the recently created New Zealand University that the argument from analogy will not apply. On the contrary, so far from taking rank with Oxford and Cambridge the New Zealand University would be liable to comparison with some unhonored corporations in the l : nited States of America that are pleased to call themselves Universities, but are glad to advertise their existence by conferring their honorary degrees on anj> man o’f. note in the United Kingdom who is foolish enough to accept and wear them. 2. The degree itself will be depreciated in value. A University degree is an unique honor; it is a guarantee to the public that the possessor of it has been a hard and successful student ; has undergone a considerable amount of mental discipline, has given evidence of considerable intellectual power, and has acquired a certain amount of knowledge ; but if the proposed innovation be carried out, a University degree will cease to be a guarantee of this. It will speak with an uncertain sound ; some will obtain the honor who, whatever their other merits may be, have given no proof that they possess these special qualifications, and successful students will go before the public with their characters imperfectly attested, an injustice to them, and a discouragement to learning. The proposed change will be a particularly retrogade step for the New Zealand University, as hitherto its ideal has been a high one ; in the judgment of many an unreasonably high one. 3. But the gravest objection to the project is that its tendency will inevitably be to alter and lower the statusof the University by giving it a political character, and even acorrupt character. The Senate will have certain honors at its disposal which itsmembers may confer at their will on their political friends, and for which, in return, people will be apt to suppose they will receive an equivalent. And though the high character of its members might reduce this suspicion to a minimum, the suspicion would still exist —a fact that would be fatal to the influence of the University ; or, if this be denied, yet the

mere possession of the power asked for wonli subject the to a kind of pressure to which it ought to be a stranger. . Not to take up more of your space, it is sufficient to point out that a University exis 9 for a definite purpose, to encour go the youth of the land to scale the arduous heights of learning and Bcieuce, and not to reward merit in general amongst the citizens. It can only do the latter at the expense of the former—a most suicidal policy. —I arc, &c., John Gammell. Wellington, February 26, 1880.

TO THE EDITOR OE THE NEW ZEALAND MAIL.

g IKj Mr. Gammell put so well in his letter the other dayreasons which have occurred to me, for withholding such a power as that of honorary degrees from the New Zealand University Senate, as at present constituted, that 1 will not do more than suggest that in the event of the Senate seeking to acquire this power by an act of legislation for I presume that will be necessary—that a petition signed by the graduates of the University be sent to the Governor praying him to disallow it, and if that should fail, that the Secretary of State for the Colonies be petitioned to withhold his assent from any amendment of the present letters patent in that direction. I am, &c.,

W. H. West.