The Proverbial Woman

Sir: Your article on Ethel Kennedy [April 25] is a great tribute to a woman of exceeding fortitude. The only greater tribute to this virtuous woman is found in Proverbs 31: 10-31:

A perfect wife--who can find her?

She is far beyond the price of pearls.

Her husband's heart has confidence in

her,

from her he will derive no little profit.

Advantage and not hurt she brings him

all the days of her life . . .

She is clothed in strength and dignity,

she can laugh at the days to come.

When she opens her mouth, she does

so wisely;

on her tongue is kindly instruction.

She keeps good watch on the conduct

of her household,

no bread of idleness for her.

Her sons stand up and proclaim her

blessed,

her husband, too, sings her praises:

"Many women have done admirable

things,

but you surpass them all!"

Charm is deceitful, and beauty empty;

the woman who is wise is the one to

praise.

Give her a share in what her hands

have worked for,

and let her works tell her praises at

the city gates.

It's a truism that the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. If American women emulate their ideal, then Robert Kennedy's dream of a Newer World would not be far in the offing.

(THE REV.) GEORGE B. DYER, O.P.

St. Pius Priory

Chicago

Strike at the Factory

Sir: Harvard cover story [April 18] is superb!

As a Harvard College alumnus (A.B., 1939), I think your "faceless factory" analysis is apt. It is the Harvard Corporation that must go! Harvard and similar institutions should be run by scholars and scientists (faculty), some students, outside laymen.

EDWARD S. BABCOX JR.

Shaker Heights, Ohio

Sir: When Harvard, or any university, sends in storm troopers to bust the heads of innocent children seeking to discover the relationship of their university to the world, I can only conclude that the university is trying to hide evidence of various actions, various bad actions, such as expansion into surrounding urban areas, or research for the War Department (somehow the old name seems more appropriate), or connections with the CIA. Such actions are wrong; they are tantamount to murder. And just as any self-respecting citizen would act to prevent a murder, we students must act to prevent the university from committing murder in a more discreet, more scholarly fashion. If this involves shutting down the university, so be it.

JUAN JEWELL, '72

University of Chicago

Chicago

Sir: In response to such clear violations of the law, as witnessed at Harvard, "the faculty resolved, 395 to 13, that all criminal charges against the Harvard intruders be dropped." When "the faculty" stops confusing intellectual freedom with revolutionary, totalitarian tactics, when "the faculty" stops confusing idealism with vandalism and votes, 395 to 13, to press charges and prosecute violators, when those in authority finally realize that what the radicals are really crying for is a good old-fashioned American spanking--a spanking they so richly merit and deserve and have for so long been denied--then, and maybe only then, will our universities once again become peaceful and manageable institutions of higher learning. The next time you see a student radical, look deeper--you have nothing to fear but a poor lost child begging for discipline.

CHARLES J. MYSAK, '72

George Washington University

Washington, D.C.

Sir: Your two recent cover stories--"The Military Under Attack" [April 11] and "Rage and Reform on Campus" [April 18] point up the high-pitched military fever that rages in some of our nation's blood. The back-to-back publication of these reports throws some curious and unexpected light on the nature of this sickness.

Though the militant wing of Harvard's S.D.S. deplores the growing cancer of militarism in this country, they themselves seem ironically to have been touched by the disease. In last week's storming of the university's administration building, these angry students have cried havoc and let slip domestic dogs of war. Those clenched fists and distorted faces speak out louder about the underlying illness of present-day society than I think these fire-breathing radicals intended. In their fighting fire with fire, they have merely poured new fuel on the blaze.

If the pen has abdicated power to the sword in the sacred precincts of the campus, where then can free voices be heard above the clash of battle?

LAWRENCE LIPSON Harvard, '65

Yale University

New Haven, Conn.

Wager on the Black

Sir: TIME chastises the Nixon Administration [April 18] because the Negro problem is third down the list, with Viet Nam and inflation occupying first and second! Isn't it true, that even at third place it occupies a very high place when one considers the many ills before us that when solved, will go a long way toward even solving the Negro problem--if there is one. And last but not least, if we don't solve Viet Nam and inflation, the Negro along with all his brother citizens won't have to worry anyway. Let's hear it for those who hope that the Government won't do something for them instead of always worrying what they will do; and I'll wager this covers many a black American as well as the others.

WILLIAM C. HELLER

San Francisco

Old-Fashioned Fellows

Sir: TIME does great injustice to the Greek people by calling the villagers "mountain-isolated, fiercely independent, suspicious and resentful" [April 18]. The Greeks are the most friendly and open-hearted people I have ever known in traveling through Europe and elsewhere. They are one of the few genuine allies America has in the world today.

We may not agree with all that the colonels have done in the past, but history and time will tell whether their simplistic approach to government founded on love for God, country and honor was not, in the end, the most realistic and humane of all approaches. It may be that Americans will grow to envy this simplicity and straightforwardness of the colonels. It may be, too, that old-fashioned country morality is what we in the U.S.A. need most today. Rest assured, the Greek is too individualistic to allow any dictatorship to last. But his tradition-oriented philosophy does not allow him to act irrationally, either. His devout faith and his love for exercising in rational debate, his ethnic pride and personal honor, make him the least vulnerable to enslavement--if enslavement it is at the hands of the colonels. I fear more for America's sense of direction than Greece's.

KATHERINE G. VALONE

Chicago

Who Can Say the Same?

Sir: Having had the privilege of working with Dr. Edwards, doing the initial programming design for his "Stakes & Odds" game, I was delighted to read your recent report on his work [April 18].

There are, however, two points I would like to clear up. First, I suspect that Dr. Edwards must have stated more clearly than your article does that he would leave probability (or odds) estimation to men, with computers aggregating the results of those human estimates. Second, I wish to take issue with your inclusion of the common fear-allaying disclaimer, "Whatever rudimentary reason a machine possesses is owed entirely to its creator and cannot exceed it."

Surely you would not argue that the dirt-moving power of a bulldozer cannot exceed that of its maker. Why, then, cannot the thinking power of a computer exceed that of its programmer? The machine has the advantage of great speed, phenomenal concentration, superb memory and relentless attention to detail. Few men can say the same. Remember that Edison described genius as consisting of 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration. It would appear that computers are further along that road than most humans.

RONALD E. JEFFRIES Technical Director

Programming Languages Department Research and Development Division

Corn-Share Inc.

Ann Arbor, Mich.

Programs Impossible

Sir: The total hypocrisy of the CBS cancellation of the Smothers Brothers' program [April 11] can be seen in its Sunday evening schedule. The Smothers Brothers, regularly proclaiming the message of brotherhood and peace, are censored and canceled. Mission: Impossible, which follows and which regularly displays the violence and lack of human feeling we all deplore, is allowed to continue. Either the CBS censors have been watching the wrong program or compassion and humanity are to have no place in the Sunday CBS schedule.

RABBI PHILIP E. SCHECHTER

Congregation Beth Israel

of Atlantic City, N.J.

Margate City, N.J.

Sir: Congratulations to CBS-TV in canceling the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. In addition to being offensive to many Americans, this program abounds in tasteless remarks and is definitely not funny. It is refreshing to know that at least one network has the courage to say "No, no," enough is enough!

MRS. E. H. CARNEY

Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Following the Muse

Sir: Your vivid story on the art of Kenneth Noland [April 18] reminds me of a visit to the Vermont farm in South Shaftsbury now owned by the artist and his wife. I was in search not of Mr. Noland, whose painting was then unfamiliar to me, but of the former home of Robert Frost, which the Nolands have renovated and restored. This was The Gully farm, purchased by Frost as a Christmas present to himself in 1928. A barn close to the house had been converted into a studio for Noland.

As the poet said, in writing to Louis Untermeyer in January 1929, the farm looks "away to the north, so that you would know you were in the mountains." The barn as well looks away to the north, from a high point of land, and thus makes a perfect studio.

Interior Secretary Stewart Udall suggested in 1941 that the farm should be made a national shrine honoring Frost--an idea now abandoned in favor of Frost's earlier home in Derry, N.H. But if the South Shaftsbury farm is to pass to another owner, could anything be more suitable than that the new owne/ should also be a follower of the muses?

DOROTHY L. TYLER

Detroit

Sir: A new department for TIME? It should be headed "Put Ons" and should include such verbal extravaganzas as the recent review of the works of Helen Frankenthaler and the review of the work of Kenneth Noland. If you do not care to change your format, could you at least tell us in which cheek your reviewer tucks his tongue when he pens his paeans?

An educated art critic I am not, but in my years as a householder I have leafed through enough wallpaper sample books to be able to recognize most of the traditional designs at sight.

L. M. LABAR

Bethlehem, Pa.

In All Earnestness

Sir: Re Carlos Baker's biography of Hemingway [April 18]: There is no truth to the story that Hemingway and I ever came to blows. Far from it. Indeed, when I was sure Hemingway was making cracks at me, I decided to control my temper, and with considerable disdain began to spread caviar on dry toast, chatting with my friends Sir Pitt Applecore-Bart, his wife Schlubbie of the British Empire five-and-dime, and Prince Eddie Rattone, her best friend. For a moment I felt we had scored, but suddenly, in a rather loud voice, Hemingway disputed my bravery at scary movies, and naturally I saw red, slammed my way to his table, and challenged him to prove it. Unable to do so, he threw a martini olive, but it hit Schlubbie in the nose. She screamed and, if I'm not mistaken, he did, too. The ensuing confusion is impossible to recall with accuracy.

WILLIAM SAROYAN

Paris

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