VIII UNIVERSITIES: ACTUAL AXD IDEAL 929 



train. They work to pass, not to know; and out- 

 raged Science takes her revenge. They do pass, 

 and they don't know. I have passed sundry ex- 

 aminations in my time, not without credit, and I 

 confess I am ashamed to think how very little real 

 knowledge underlay the torrent of stuff which I 

 was able to pour out on paper. In fact, that which 

 examination, as ordinarily conducted, tests, is sim- 

 ply a man's power of work under stimulus, and his 

 capacity for rapidly and clearly producing that 

 which, for the time, he has got into his mind. 

 Now, these faculties are by no means to be de- 

 spised. They are of great value in practical life, 

 and are the making of many an advocate, and of 

 many a so-called statesman. But in the pursuit 

 of truth, scientific or other, they count for very 

 little, unless they are supplemented by that long- 

 continued, patient " intending of the mind," as 

 Newton phrased it, which makes very little show 

 in Examinations. I imagine that an Examiner 

 Avho knows his students personally, must not un- 

 frequently have found himself in the position of 

 finding A's paper better than B's, though his own 

 judgment tells him, quite clearly, that B is the 

 man who has the larger share of genuine capacity. 

 Again, there is a fallacy about Examiners. It 

 is commonly supposed that any one who knows a 

 subject is competent to teach it; and no one seems 

 to doubt that any one who knows a subject is 

 competent to examine in it. I believe both these 



