The efficient man is the man who thinks for himself.

Eliot graduated from Boston Latin School in 1849 and from Harvard University in 1853. Some backed the establishment of specialized schools of science and technology like Harvard's Lawrence Scientific School Yale's Sheffield Scientific School and the newly chartered Massachusetts Institute of Technology about to offer its first classes in 1865. In France for example he questioned "doctors landladies servants and tradespeople over matters that might have appeared to be far removed from his educational inquiries.

Eliot served until 1909 having the longest term as president in the university's history. He transformed the provincial college into the preeminent American research university.