PAGE TWELVE THE MICHIGAN DAILY SUNDAY, MARCH 15, 1925 University Life- ussian Philosophy-Broadly Speaking Behind the Scenes in Russian Dormitories-Where One Bed Does A Campus Pessimist Airs His Views on Life et al. For Three and the Price of a Book is 10,000,000 Rubles ing to Contribute Further if Desired Will Be Will- Life is too short .to make action worth while. If man attempts the ac- quisition of power, if he drives his creative ability to the attainment of ponderous realities-he is old, old be- fore he canpartake of the fruits of his labor. Man dies and those who follow close in line are not permitted happiness from their inheritance, for with the passage .of time, pari passu with the increasing complexity of life, I To be a student in Russia in thisv fifth year of the Soviet takes qualitiesi which few of our college students could muster. First-a student musth have vision-the vision of a Russia- to-be, and the part he is to play in itsg reconstruction; next he must have de- r termintion-to finish at all cost-- stick to it though starvation or disease may get him; courage to meett the obstacles in his path, and a desiret for knowledge which learns in spite ofa lack of most of the instruments of I education. He should have humor, and the cartoons produced by Rus- sian students show that at least some of the students have this best of all gifts. At the time the student reliefl committee was picking out the luckyt though needy students to go to the American kitchens, it was reported that one student said to a friend, "You have a suit and I have an over- coat; now if we can only find a third man with a pair of shoes we'll be all right." An American turned loose in a Rus- sion university is at loss because oft the difference in definition of terms.- They use many of our words-fac- ulties, courses, clinics, etc., but they mean something quite different. The university as a whole is composed of four parts which they designate as Faculties, Physico-Mathematical Med- ical, Juridical, and Historico-Philogi- ca. "Courses" mean year or class and have nothing to do with subjects and clinics are the practical and ex- perimental laboratories for medical students at different hospitals. As in other continental universities the system :is quite different from ours. There are lectures, reference reading, research work and confer- ence with professors, but as long as a student passes his examination it doesn't matter whether he ever at- tends a class or not. This is a for- tunate for the Russian student at the present-time, for he needs as much free time as possible to earn his bread and ro'ni, and if he can find work for the day and find books and a place to study- during the night, he thinks himself fortunate indeed. Med- ical and engineering students are less favored in this respect, as their studies are of necessity in labora- tories 'and workshops and there is little time to either earn of prepare food. Let's take a few snapshots of Rus- sian university life as it is today. First, we must find a good interpreter and good interpreters are scarcer than hen's teeth. You may find some one who knows Russian perfectly and English perfectly, but who has ideas of his, own and uses them, or you find one who is a machine and trans- lates so literally that neither you nor the other man gets any idea of what you really mean-and woe to the seardher after truth with either of these two : kinds of assistants. Then there is the man or oman who is sympathetic with both sides, 'stick- ing closely to 'what is said and yet getting across not only the sense but the spirit. We visit a Rector of two. Rectors are the presidents of the institutions and were formerly of great dignity. Now we find one remaining from the old days-crowded into two rooms of his former large, comfortable apart- ment, surrounded by books, old- mas- ters, pianos, trunks, baskets, beds, family and grandchildren trying to carry on the infinite details of an executive. He has, no personal com- plaint, only the bitter ,cry of the man who has given his life to building up a great work and sees it going to pieces from lack of equipment and re- pair. Here is a Rector of the new order, deeply sensible of his respon- sibility and sincerely trying to make of the institution under his care a a broad, democratic force for good in the country, but not knowing quite how to go about it. Next we run into the apartment of! a professor of electrical engineering. He lives with his wife, daughter-in- law and two grandchildren in two rooms of a four-room apartment, sharing with the other occupants of the apartment one of his two 'rooms for a dining room. This white-haired man, formerly a general and a pro- fessor in a Petrograd university, con- siders himself fortunate because he is still able to feed his family-and so it goes--the old professors carrying on to pass over to the next genera- tion all they know of science and truth. But let's go on with our snapshot- ting. Here is a student dormitory- one of the best. When we asked to see how the students live the reply was, "Will you see the best, the med- ium or the worst," and not being in any way mean, we answered, "Some of each, please." The "best" had been in the old days quite good. It had been built as one of the several buildings around the court for the use of the students of' the Medical school. It contained a variety (how many of other varieties several occasions we did see a stu- (Editor's Note:' it would be hard to say). dent wielding a broom. And yet in sertation, entitled1 The kitchen and the dining-room every room there were big tables in Vivamus," came to were closed, each individual getting the best light; books tattered though accompanied by' a his or her meals on a one-burner they might be, T squares, triangles, that the writer wo lin t v h nrOininowihCi t nstruments and draftis showing I in L, iJia gasoline stove or snaring Wi o ners , ucac uJ~~ not so fortunate as to own one of that ne reason for this slipshod life these, the big bitchen stove which waslthe fact of more serious things ofr whic otik was heated once a day. Some of this hich to think.,s cooking we saw going on. A big mAnd so it went, the "worst" places tiled stove, once white, was sur- hseemed to us only a little worse than rounded by ten or a dozen young men the best, and yet the students in all and women, each watching a little these holes ant hovels are lucky. kette. omeof heseketleswerofI rihe unfortunate ones are those that kettle. Some of these kettles were of live for months in railroad stations, clay, some of chipped enamel ware, Iwho move from one friend's room to but they were all alike in being ,womv rmoefin' omt and thwa land fedanother so as not to wear out their small, blackened and old and filled welcome and who live in stables as with about the same ingredients-a one young student did. There was, large quantity of water, a small quan- however, a note of pride in his voice tity of cabbage, a potato or two, that's when he told us he had found a va- all. This is- called soup and with cant stall formerly occupied by a goat black bread makes a student's chief which he now called his home. Two" meal. His other meal or meals con- girls early last fall were snugly fixed sist of tea and black bread, with now in a room, only to find it had been as- and then a dried herring or slice of signed to other students, "But," said bologna. they, "possession in Russia is quite in print, andathat, cation call forth ment", he (or she) with other articles The last paragraph to form a good im piece.) "-Education as versity training c to rise in an indiv versity advance counteract them? The following dis- by its author "Our our hands by mail, I note which stated uld enjoy seeing it , should its publi- "considerable com- would follow it up of similar nature. h of the note seems ntroduction for the presented by Uni- auses these doubts vidual-Does a Uni- a single thing to I have wondered the power of a will other than his his soul could pass. Man believed his man is robbed of the fullness of his own, and man goes out of the world soul to be something intangible and heritage by that very increase of com- against his will. Man comes and goes as a consequence was morose, melan- p exity. as the toy and plaything of Fate- choly and possessed with a desire to The optimist says, "though life be how then can man's life be other than live his earthly life for every second sad, there is joysin living it." Whence II 'comes this joy and when? The one of constant pessimism and un- I it existed. "Eat, drink, and be merry, thought is beautiful and peace giving, rest? for tomorrow we die" became man's but its actuality is questionable. It is said that God made man in his byword. That was the philosophy of When, man's life is dull aid sad, own 'image, gave him life and invest- the Middle Ages-today man }tries to there is no joy. Pessimism is real, it ed within him the germ of knowledge. falsify himself into believing that he dominates the soul, it is meditation. Around this bit of knowledge he dif- is entirely happy and content. He It is the pessimist who realizes the fused philosophy-the phlosophy of feels certain that the end of the world narrowness and gaudiness of his sur- despair, of death and of pessimism. shall never come and from such an roundings, the sheerness of earthly God's first man had all the traces of idea concludes that he is a supreme life and the hopelessness of all be- pessimistic philosophy, but as yet they being-supreme because he is positive yond. Man's philosophy of despair is were ungerminated, undeveloped and that he possesses the greater philoso- not a condition of his liver, it is a lay dormant in the innermost recess- 4 phy of life. Poor idiot that he is, man strip out of the life line that en- es of man's being. Then came wo- fools himself, for always death and circles his mental being. Always will man, and accompanying her chaos, the worms get him in the end. man wonder "What shall it profit" or death and the unfathomed beyond. Life is action and action is impossi- "to what end shall it be good?" It Man's philosophy grew, paralleled by ble if devoid of motive or hope. Beyond is his philosophy of despair; man is his knowledge, and with this new man's earthly existence there is not a dog at the table of Fate and he philsophy there sprang up in his soul action. Oblivion, peace, immobility cannot help but visualize hi-> realities the feeling of hopelessness and a fear and rest, all these are said to come from the crumbs upon the table cloth h k T him th nftor ld t t dit th_ By Renle Regnitte Man comes into this world underj will surely come again such giants of, thought. (Copyrighted 1924 by Student Life, in Foreign Countries.) . of- - o te t uut o. rte unknown. ro nm, came ne a~t The wealth of a student is gauged ten-tenths of the law, so we will sit ,realization that beyond his earthly aft by the number of potatoes helis able quiet and never leave the room un- Don't delay-Pay your Subscription 'life there was nothing-beyond was mo to bring from home in the fall and' guarded." Several weeks passed andthgraunow aditohsolyo we saw in a corner of one of the men's J they thought the danger over, so they today. dormitories one of these plutocrats. went out together one night to buy He lay on his back with his head on a some supplies too heavy for one to bag of potatoes, studying from a medi- carry. When they returned they found I cal text-book and covered by a blan- their belongings in the hall and the = ket. 'There," said our guide, "is our door fastened with a new lock. About richest student, thoughlie hasn't even the time we were being told this in-I a bed to lie on." Our trip was made cident our visit to the dormitories !unday E v eng g in June, a wonderful day for taking finished in a rout. We were standing -E pictures, but also a difficult day to in quite a group of students all talk- picture oneself what these 'same ing at once about how they had pro- rooms would look like and smell like cured the building, old and dilapidat-- in January when the windows had ed, and had put it to rights, when ab-nhedr been sealed for months and the tem- clear voice asked: "Are American perature had been near the freezing 'students just like Russian students?" Get the bunch he and point. "Alas!" said one of these Glancing hastily around the shabby =together boys, "we can't use in-k in winter, for place, but seeing only the green cam- have real steak andc din- it is always frozen." pus, immaculate buildings and cozy =n chop Our next stop was in a "medium" roores of our Alma Maters, we fled, dormitory. This was a huge building pretending not to comprehend. ner at which had 'been nearing completion I Still they come, they stay and most as a hospital before the war and had of them conquer-unless themselves;= been left for the last eight years as it ,conquered by the relentless tubercu- was, without windows, stairs, lighting losis, or some other disease which =-^ or plumbing.. The , students them- thrives on such conditions. A woman selves had wired it and "plumbed" it medical student in her last year was and put in windows here and there, taken last year to the hospital with boarding'up the other openings. It a mind deranged because of overwork was habitable, but that is all one and lack of food. Many of the stu- could say for it. Here we saw a room dents work from 10 to 4, go to classes , big enough for one occupied by three; from 5 to 3, and study late into the = Across from D. U. It. Depot one had a bed, but the other two night. Is it any wonder that they are slept on the floor-this was con- victims of tuberculosis, heart or men- venient because it made more room. tal disorders? T'hree girls sew 41 The, owner of the bed flourished a: hours a day to earn the privilege of tattered book before us and triumph- sleeping in a corner of a room and I antly told us that he had just bought then go to class after 5 P. M. and sev- e've been ser g e besorears it for 10,000,000 roubles ($2.50 at that eral men have found positiohis as itight time) and now twenty of them could watchmen, which leaves them free to = pass their examinations.- In this attend classes by day.II same building we also found four Out of the stuff of these Russian girls living so huddled together that students have come Dostoevsky, Tols- to open the door it was necessary to toy, Tchaikowsky, Mendeley, Mechni- move the bed. As a whole the women kov, and Jonkovsky, writers, musi- students' ;ooms showed signs of care cians, and scientists; and out of the and thought, while those of the men determination and the difficult search seemed simply lived in, though on for knowledge of to-day's students ____________________II1tA er ueac and o ominae e e soul of his life. er death-but life is action, not im- bility, and without action there is Don't delay-Pay your Subscription life. ttdav. 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