August 15, 1901] 



NA TURE 



591 



Although my work has Iain almost entirely in the domain 

 of science, I should be the last man not to do my best to 

 encourage research in the sphere of what is generally called 

 "arts." In Germany of recent years a kind of institution 

 has sprung up which is termed a Seminar. The word may 

 be translated a "literary laboratory." I will endeavour to 

 give a short sketch on the way in which these literary 

 laboratories are conducted. After the student has attended a 

 course of lectures on the subjects to which he intends to 

 devote himself and is ripe for research, he enters a Seminar, 

 in which he is provided with a library, paper, pens and ink 

 and a subject. The method of using the library is pointed 

 <jut to him, and he is told to read books which bear on the 

 particular subject in question ; he is made to collate the 

 information which he gains by reading, and to elaborate the 

 subject which is given him. Naturally his first efforts must 

 be crude, but " c'ist le premier fas qui coille." It probably costs 

 him blame at the hands of his instructor ; after a few un- 

 successful efforts, however, if he has any talent for the 

 particular investigation to which he has devoted himself, his 

 efiorts improve and at last he produces something respectable 

 enough to merit publication. Thus he is exposed to the 

 criticism of those best competent to judge, and he is launched 

 in what may be a career in historical, literary or economic 

 research. 



Such a Seminar is carried on in philological and linguistic 

 studies, in problems of economy involving statistics, in problems 

 of law involving judicial decision, and of history in which the 

 relations between the development of the various phases in the 

 progress of nations is traced. The system is borrowed from 

 the well-known plan of instruction in a physical or chemical 

 laboratory. Experiments are made in literary style. These 

 experiments are subjected to the criticism of the teacher, and 

 thus the investigator is trained. But it may be objected that the 

 youths who frequent our Universities have not a sufficient know- 

 ledge of facts connected w^ith such subjects to be capable of at 

 once entering on a training of this kind. That maybe so : if it is 

 the case, our schools must look to it that they provide sufiicient 

 training. Even under present circumstances, however, I do 

 not think I am mistaken in supposing that a joung man or 

 woman who enters a University at the age of eighteen years 

 with the intention of spending three years in literary or 

 historical studies will not at the end of the second year be more 

 benefited by a course at the Seminar, even though it should 

 result in no permanent addition to literature or history, than 

 if he were to spend his time in mere assimilation. It is 

 not the act of gaining knowledge which profits, it is the 

 power of using it, and while in order to use knowledge it 

 is necessary to gain it, yet a training in the method of using 

 knowledge is much more important and profitable than a 

 training in the method of gainmg it. I do not know whether 

 there exists in this country a single example of the continental 

 Seminar ; there was some talk of founding such a literary 

 laboratory in University College, but, as usual, the attempt 

 was frustrated by a lack of funds ; the attempt would also 

 have been frustrated by the requirements of the present 

 system of examination in the University of London ; but there 

 is, fortiinately, good hope of changing that system and of 

 developing the minds of students on those lines which have 

 proved so fruitful where they have been systematically 

 followed. 



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 acquirements of the students whom the 

 teachers have under their charge, but the exainination should 

 play an entirely subordinate part. To aim at success 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 

 subject 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 



NO.. 1659, VOL. 64] 



of students (for I count the teacher a student) should be to do 

 their best to increase knowledge of the subject on which 

 they are engaged. That this is possible many teachers can 

 testify to by experience ; and it is the chief lesson learned 

 by a sojourn in a German laboratory. Where each student is 

 himself engaged in research, interest is taken by the students in 

 each others' work ; numerous discussions are raised regarding 

 each questionable point ; and the combined intelligence of the 

 whole laboratory is focussed on the elucidation of some difficult 

 problem. There is nothing more painful to witness than a dull 

 and decorous laboratory, where each student keeps to his own 

 bench, does not communicate with his fellow-students, does not 

 take an interest in their work and expects them to manifest no 

 interest in his. It is only by friction that heat can be produced, 

 and heat, by increasing the frequency of vibration, results, as we 

 know, in light. 



The student should look forward to his examination, 

 not as a solemn ordeal which he is compelled to go through 

 with the prospect of a degree should he be successful, but as 

 a means of showing his teacher and his fellows how much 

 he has profited by the work which he has done ; those who 

 pursue knowledge in this spirit and those, be it remarked, 

 who examine in this spirit will look forward to examination 

 with no apprehension ; not, perhaps, with joy, for after all it is 

 a bore to be examined and perhaps a still greater bore to 

 examine, but it is a necessary step for the student in gaining 

 self-assurance and the conviction of having profited by his 

 exertions, and for the teacher as a means of ensuring that 

 his instruction has not been profitless to his student. In 

 this connection I cannot refrain from remarking that that 

 genius for competition which has overridden our nation of 

 England appears to me to be misplaced. Far too much is 

 thought of the top man ; very likely the second or even the 

 tenth, or it may be the fiftieth, has a firmer grasp of his 

 subject and in the long run would display more talent. Let 

 us take comfort, however, in the thought that the day of 

 examinations, for the sake of e.xaminations, is approaching an 

 end. 



It may surprise many to learn that the suggestion that in 

 England teachers do not usually examine their own pupils 

 for degrees is, abroad, received in a spirit of surprise not 

 unmixed with incredulity. Americans and Germans to whom 

 I have mentioned this state of matters cannot realise that the 

 teacher is not considered fit to be trusted to e.xamine his own 

 pupils, and, singular to state, they maintain that no one else 

 can possibly do so with any attempt at fairness ; it appears to 

 them, as it appears to me, an altogether untenable position to 

 hold that a man selected to fill an important professorship, 

 after many years' trial in a junior position, should be suspected 

 of such (shall I say} ambiguous ideas regarding common 

 honesty that he will always arbitrate unfairly in favour of his 

 own pupils. Such a supposition is an insult to the professor, 

 and the exclusion of the teacher elevates examination to the 

 position of a fetish ; it is that, together with the Spirit of 

 emulation and competition, which has done so much to ruin 

 our English education. The idea of competitive examination 

 is so ingrained in the minds of Englishmen that it is difficult 

 for them to realise that the object of a University is, not 

 primarily to examine its pupils, but to teach them to teach 

 themselves ; and also they have still to acquire the conviction 

 that students should be found, not merely among the alumni of 

 the University, but also among all members of the staff. The 

 spirit which should prevail with us should be the spirit of 

 gaining knowledge — gaining knowledge, not for the satisfaction 

 of one's own sense of acquisitiveness, but in order to be able to 

 increase the sum total of what is known. All should work 

 together, senior and junior staff, graduates and undergraduates, 

 in order to diminish man's ignorance. 



To sum up. As it exists at present, a University is a 

 technical school for theology, law, medicine and engineering. 

 It ought to be also a place for the advancement of know- 

 ledge, for the training of philosophers, of those who love 

 wisdom for its own sake ; and while as a technical school 

 it exercises a useful function in preparing many men and women 

 for their calling in life, its philosophical faculty should impart 

 to those who enter its halls that faculty of increasing knowledge 

 which cannot fail to be profitable, not only to the intellect of the 

 nation, but also to its industrial prosperity. I regard this as the 

 chief function of a University. 



