THE SACRIFICE OF EDUCATION. 401 



for the sake of success. His mental sympathies become bounded 

 by the narrowest horizon. " What will pay " in the examination 

 becomes his ruling thought, and he turns away from the many 

 new intellectual interests, which would spring up on all sides of 

 one who was allowed to be in love with knowledge for its own 

 sake, as from luxuries that must be sternly put aside for the sake 

 of success in the all-important examination. To a young and 

 healthy mind the constant suggestiveness that accompanies work 

 done in every branch of knowledge, the constant opening up of 

 new interests, are ih.^ great stimulants to self -development, and 

 they should be ever spurring the student on to endeavor to know 

 more and to see more clearly. We hold that these life-giving in- 

 terests can not possibly coexist with the repressing influences of 

 training for great examinations. 



3. The true value of difleerent kinds of education can not be 

 so intelligently considered and so easily measured by the public 

 when these great prizes are in existence. It is most undesirable 

 that important controversies, whether between classical and scien- 

 tific education, or between the various methods of teaching, should 

 be obscured by the serious monetary considerations that now 

 throw their shadow over all educational work. 



We do not propose to discuss here other more subtle evils, 

 which appear to many of us to result from doing work simply for 

 the sake of an all-important examination, such as the temporary 

 strengthening of the rote-faculties to the neglect of the rational 

 faculties, the rapid forgetfulness of knowledge acquired, the cul- 

 tivation of a quick superficiality and power of cleverly skimming 

 a subject, the consequent incapacity for undertaking original 

 work, the desire to appear to know rather than to know, the form- 

 ing of judgment on great matters where judgment should come 

 later, the conventional treatment of a subject and loss of spon- 

 taneity, the dependence upon highly skilled guidance, the belief 

 in artifices and formulated answers, the beating out of small 

 quantities of gold-leaf to cover great expanses, the diffusion of 

 energies over many subjects for the sake of marks, and the mental 

 disinclination that supervenes to undertake work which is not of 

 a directly remunerative character, after the excitement and strain 

 of the race ; nor will we discuss another class of evils, that falls 

 less directly on the student, such as the waste of very precious 

 time inflicted on the teacher by the drudge-work of examinations. 

 It is enough now to aflBrm that the moral effect of the system, 

 viewed broadly, is distinctly bad. We have made of our education 

 a body without a soul. Our misdirected efforts result in a system 

 which is corruptio optimi. There is no nobler influence that can 

 be brought to bear upon a young student than the desire to get 

 knowledge for the sake of understanding the world in which he 

 VOL. xxxiv. — 26 



