"Each Man is a Piece of the Continent"

A "Listener" columnist has laughed at the titles of the Congress addresses—referring to "The Elephant and Society." But if there is one theme that is best designed to break down the "ivory tower" in which students are so often accused of locking themselves, it is that of linking every topic with the society they live in. A great statesman has said, "No one can live in society and be apart from society ; and even isolated in the timeless Sounds, a congress of students from all over the country was able to establish this thesis. Society, the community, was, related to every subject under the sun—the university, religion, Marxism, science, education, art, music, architecture, literature, the Maoris, Mr. Ormond Wilson, Mr. J. R. Marshall, etc.

Mr. F. L. Combs, who admitted having turned half a century, set the tone for the whole ten days on the first morning. The university is, and must be, bound up intimately with the society within which it exists. The student could not therefore, afford to be indifferent to politics. He remembered a university man returning to New Zealand from Spain in the 30"s with the telling remark, "Fascism is death." Under fascism the whole of free opinion so essential to a university, even objective research, is stifled. In our form of society, the student should realise that he is living under the constant menace of those conditions. It is his duty to fight for a living democracy—in fact, this is the price of his existence.

Mr. Combs, who during the days he was with us established himself as Camp Patriarch, spoke also of the anarchistic individualism of our society, and how it had penetrated the universities in the form of "cram for jam." He declared that the students owe a duty to the world in combating this spirit with one of community consciousness. He even dreamed of a university daily to counteract the hysteria and low motivation of the privately-owned press with objective reporting, and giving a forum to all views. At any rate. Congress was enthused with the idea that a vital university, must truly reflect the social and intellectual conflicts of the times, and that cloistening means fossillisation.