244 ESSAYS BIOGRAPHICAL AND CHEMICAL 



discourages young men, unless they are especially 

 endowed by Nature, from pursuing the study of mathe- 

 matics with the object of cultivating a gift for that 

 subject. Especially gifted men occasionally turn up, and 

 those who possess mathematical insight are able to profit 

 by the instruction of the professor in developing some 

 special branch of the subject. Mathematical problems, 

 he tells me, are numerous, but they demand such an ex- 

 tensive knowledge of what has already been done that 

 very few persons who do not devote their lives to the sub- 

 ject are able to cope with them, and it is only those who 

 are born with a mathematical gift who can afford to 

 devote their lives to mathematics, for the standard is high, 

 and the prizes are few. 



Many, I suppose, who are at present listening to me 

 would be disappointed were I not to refer to the functions 

 of a University with reference to examinations. A long 

 course of training, lasting now for the best part of seventy 

 years, has convinced the population of London that the 

 chief function of a University is to examine. Believe me, 

 the examination should play only a secondary part in the 

 work of a University. It is necessary to test the acquire- 

 ments of the students whom the teachers have under 

 their charge, but the examination should play an entirely 

 subordinate part. To be successful in examinations is 

 unfortunately too often the goal which the young student 

 aims at, but it is one which all philosophical teachers 

 deprecate. To infuse into his pupils a love of the sub- 

 ject which both are at the same time teaching and learn- 

 ing, is the chief object of an enthusiastic teacher; there 

 should be an atmosphere of the subject surrounding them 

 an umbra perhaps I should call it an aura; for it 

 should exert no depressing influence upon them. The 

 object of both classes of students (for I count the teacher 

 a student) should be to do their best to increase know- 



