Page:Discipline and the Derelict (1921).pdf/208

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his books, and unless he takes the Dean's warning he is not long for this intellectual world.

The fusser who devotes himself to one girl is quite interesting. I do not mean here to include the young man who is mature enough to know his own mind, who is far enough along in college to think seriously of the future, and whose prospects are sufficiently definite to make it possible for him intelligently to contemplate marriage. This class of men is not a very large one but, however many or few there are, I leave them out of the question. The man I have in mind is the one who is playing with emotion, who thinks or imagines that he is in love, and who grows as restless if he must be separated from the object of his melodramatic adoration for a few hours as does an inveterate smoker deprived for a half day of his cigarettes. Such a man can never be a student. If he gets out his books for an hour in a half-hearted effort to absorb a little information he is likely to accomplish nothing. His mind wanders to the last walk he took with her or to the next engagement he has made, and his eyes are fixed dreamily upon her framed picture on his desk. He may stick to the books for a few minutes, but it is not long until he remembers, perhaps, that she is leaving Lincoln Hall at this hour, and he rushes out to meet her and to—walk home with her.

Such a man while in this state of mind has an even chance of flunking, and no chance at all of doing respectable work. He would be more useful running a soda fountain than in college and very little use anywhere. I have occasionally tried to reason with him, but I can recall very few cases where I