John Wesley, Jr. | Page 6

by the faculty or by
the dean, but by the Student Council. Would each district group please
get together at once, and select some one to represent the group on this
council?
This request being obeyed amid considerable confusion, with Marcia
Dayne appointed from the Fort Adams District, and the council
excused to draft the basic laws for the week, the faculty was introduced,
one by one.
Each teacher was given the opportunity to describe his or her course, so
that out of the eight or nine courses offered every delegate might select
two besides the two which were required of all students, and so qualify
for an Institute diploma.
J.W. found himself enjoying all this hugely. It appealed to his growing

sense of freedom from schoolboy restraint. If he did go to any of the
classes, it appeared that he could pick the ones he liked. Up to now he
had entertained no thought of any serious work, but the faculty talks
about these courses made him think there might be worse ways of
spending the week than qualifying for an Institute diploma. The whole
thing seemed to be so easy and so friendly. Of course he could see that
the study would not be much, even if he signed up for it, being just for
a week, but it might not be bad fun.
Morning Watch was an experience to J.W. He was surprised to find
himself staying awake in a before-breakfast religious meeting, and was
even more surprised to be enjoying it. Something about this big crowd
of young people stirred all his pulses, and the religion they heard about
and talked about seemed to J.W. something very real and desirable. He
thought of himself as a Christian, but he wondered if his Christian life
might not become more confident and productive. In this atmosphere
one almost felt that anything was possible.
Meal times turned out to be times of orderly disorder. J.W. and his
friends were at a table with other groups from the Fort Adams District,
and he quickly mastered the raucous roar which served the District for
a yell. Before the end of the second day his alert good nature made him
cheer leader, and thereafter he rarely had time to eat all that was set
before him, though possessed of a boy's healthy appetite. It was simply
that the other possibilities of the hour seemed more alluring than mere
food.
From the first day of the class work J.W. found himself keen for all that
was going on. There was variety enough so that he felt no weariness,
and the range of new interests opened up each day kept him at constant
and pleasurable attention. Without knowing just how, he was catching
the Institute spirit.
He walked away from the dining hall one noon with his pastor-friend,
and he talked. He had to talk to somebody, and Walter Drury contrived
to know of his need.
"Why, Mr. Drury," he said, eagerly, "I'm just finding out how little I

know about the church and real Christian work. I thought I was
something of an average Methodist boy, but if the people at home are
no better than I am, I can see how being a preacher to such a bunch is a
man's job."
"Correct, J.W." said the minister. "I find that out many a time, to my
humbling. But honestly, now, are you learning things you never knew
before?"
"Ye-es, I am," J.W. answered, "and then, again, I'm not. It seems to me
as if I had always known a lot of what we are getting in these classes,
though there is plenty of new stuff too. But until now I didn't get much
out of what I knew. I've always liked to hear you, but you're different.
As for most of the things I've heard, I just thought of it as religious talk,
church stuff, you know. It didn't seem to matter, but here it is beginning
to matter in all sorts of ways, and I can see that it matters to me."
"How, for instance?"
Well, take the class in home missions; Americanization, they call it.
Maybe you noticed that the first thing the teacher did was to divide the
class right down the middle, and tell those on the left hand--yes, I'm
one of the goats--that for the rest of the week they were to consider
themselves aliens. The others were to play native-born Americans. And
so the study started, but believe me, we aliens have already begun to
make it interesting for those natives. Some of 'em want to come over on
our side already, but they can't. A few of us have found some
immigration dope in the college library, and it is pretty strong. We'll
show up those Pilgrim