596 
the men that they see to it that their masters are educated ; for 
however democratic we may be in our ideals, history teaches, in 
a manner which admits of no denial, that leaders are the salt 
of the earth, and in these days leaders need a deal of training to 
be effective. 
Unfortunately, it too often happens that those placed in 
authority are the very last to attempt to march with the times. 
Bodies such as our Universities, the Education Department 
and the Civil Service Commissioners might have been expected 
to lead the way, to keep the most watchful eye on all that was 
happening, and to note and apply all improvements. The very 
contrary has been the case. As a rule, they have advanced 
only under severe pressure from outside, and scarcely a change 
can be credited to their initiative. It does not seem to have 
occurred to them that an Intelligence Department would be a 
desirable appendage. All suffer from the fatal blot that 
discretion and authority are vested only in a few heads of 
departments; the younger and more active spirits have no 
opportunity granted them while their minds are plastic, full of 
courage and instinct with advance; so when the time comes 
that they can act they have lost the desire through inanition. 
This is the terrible disease from which all our public offices and 
many industries suffer. It is right to accord experience its 
proper value, but it is wrong to put aside youthful energy and 
inventiveness. Our American cousins owe their advance largely 
to the recognition of these facts. 
At bottom the spirit of commercialism is the cause of much 
of the contorted action we complain of. Neither Cambridge 
nor Oxford will take the step which has long been pressed upon 
them—and never more eloquently than by the Bishop of 
Hereford in his paper read before this Section last year—to 
make their entrance examination one which would be in accord- 
ance with our knowledge and the recognised needs of the 
times, and one which would have the effect of leading schools 
generally to impart the rudiments of a sound general education. 
They cannot act together and are afraid to act singly, each 
fearing that it would prejudice its entry if it took a step in 
advance and in any way sought to influence the Schools. The 
Colleges vie with each other in securing the best scholars in 
the hope of scoring in the general competition. And the 
Schools have discovered that successes gained in examinations 
are the most effective means of advertising, and are therefore 
being turned more and more into establishments resembling 
those engaged in the manufacture of paté de foie gras, in which 
the most crammable are tutored without the least consideration | 
of the manner in which lifelong mental biliousness is engen- 
dered by the treatment. Parents, with strange perversity, 
worship the success achieved by Tom and Dick, Mary and Jane, 
and think they are doing their duty by their children in allowing 
them to be made use of—for private ends. 
has engendered, which leads to the worship for ever afterwards 
of those who have gained the prizes, instead of regarding them 
but as victors for the moment and requiring them at each step | 
to give fresh proof of power. Nothing is more unwise than the 
-way in which we overrate the pretensions of the “first class” 
man; we too often make a prig of him by so doing. Those 
who succeed in examinations are too frequently not those most 
fitted for the work of the world. A long experience has con- 
vinced me that the boys a few places down a class are, as a 
rule, the best material. Those at the top may have acquisitive 
power, but more often than not they lack individuality and the 
power of exercising initiative. We must base our judgment in 
the future on evidence of training and of general conduct, not 
on isolated examinations. If any sincerity of purpose be left 
in us, if any sense of the value of true training—of what con- 
stitutes true training—can be rescued from the scholastic wreck 
on which we find ourselves at present embarked, we must insti- 
tute some form of leaving examination which will give the 
requisite freedom to the schools and every opportunity for the 
development of individuality, and at the same time necessitate 
thoroughness of training and patient regard of every grade of 
intelligence ; leaders will show themselves and will not need to 
be examined for. Examinations as commercial enterprises must 
suffer an enforced bankruptcy. 
Racing studs must, be regarded as luxuries in schools and 
kept apart from the ordinary stables, these being regarded as 
the first charge upon the establishment, as the serious work 
of the world will fall upon their occupants. In other words, 
special provision must be made for scholars, and they must 
NO. 1719, VOL. 66] 
The worst feature | 
of the system is the narrow spirit of trades unionism which it 
NATURE 
[OcToBER 9, 1902 
| not be allowed to monopolise attention and set the pace to the 
detriment of the majority. When Carlyle made the statement 
that we had in our islands a population of so many millions, 
mostly fools, he stated what is only a half truth. He failed to 
realise that the foolishness is very largely begotten of neglect 
and want of opportunity, not innate. Our schools mostly fail 
to find out the intelligence latent in the great majority of their 
pupils, and give it little chance of developing by offering them 
a varied diet from which to select. During a long experience 
as a teacher, I have over and over again seen weaklings develop 
in course of time into strong men when they have been properly 
encouraged and an opportunity at last found for the exercise of 
their ‘‘talents.” The Briton is in this respect a most mysterious 
creature ; you never know when it is safe to call him a fool. 
All are agreed that the mistakes in the recent war were not due 
to lack of intelligence, but to lack of training. There can be 
no doubt of that. All who have taught in our colleges will, I 
am sure, agree with me that the material sent up from the schools 
is in substance magnificent, but too often hopelessly unfit to 
benefit from higher teaching. The things said of those who 
enter for the military profession are as nothing in comparison 
with what could be said of those who enter for the professions 
generally. If our young people fail to show intelligence in later 
life, it is, as a rule, because the conditions under which we place _ 
them in earlier life are such as not only to leave their intelligence 
undeveloped, but, what is far worse, such as to mar their ability. 
The best return we can make to those who did such magnificent 
service in the late war will be to take to heart the real lessons 
taught by the mistakes, and tosee to it that theirchildren and suc- 
cessors generally are trained in a happier school than that in 
which they were placed. 
Examining bodies at the present time do not appear to realise 
the full measure of their responsibility. To examine well is at 
all times a difficult task, far more difficult than to teach well. 
The examiner wields a large measure of authority, and it is 
imperative that he should exercise this wisely. | Examiners 
should therefore be chosen with extreme care and with due 
regard to their fitness for the work ; but this too rarely happens . 
the choice falls too frequently on specialists, with little know- 
ledge of educational requirements and possibilities. The exam- 
ination of boys and girls is far too often put into the hands of 
those who have no real knowledge of the species and little 
sympathy with its ways. 
There are three courses open to examining bodies—to lead, to 
maintain themselves just abreast of the times, to stagnate. Asa 
matter of fact, the last is that almostinvariably chosen—a syllabus, 
when once adopted, remaining in force year after year. Conse- 
quently, examinations tend to retard rather than to favour the 
introduction of improved methods of teaching. It is impossible 
to justify a policy which has such results. The evil effect of 
examinations would be less if the syllabus were abolished and 
the limits of examinations very broadly indicated ; this is done 
in some cases, and might be in all. The incompetent examiner 
and teacher are not in the least helped by the conventional curt 
syllabus, but the liberty of action of the competent examiner 
and teacher, and their desire to effect improvements, are 
materially limited by it. The competent examiner should know 
what is a fair demand to make of a particular class of students, 
and should be in a position to take count of the advances that 
are being made ; and the competent teacher should be able to 
do all in his power to make the teaching effective, and be secure 
in feeling that his efforts could not fail to be appreciated. To 
take my own subject, the chemistry syllabus recently laid down 
for the London Matriculation examination is quite unsuited to 
its purpose and most hopelessly behind the times. The scheme 
put forward in the report of the Committee on Military Educa-- 
tion is but a bag of dry bones. In the case of several subjects, 
the South Kensington schemes are full of the gravest faults, 
their hoary antiquity being their least objectionable feature. 
Surely a national institution, dispensing public funds, should be 
the last to hold back the nation; it should be provided with 
machinery which would enable it to march with the times. In 
making this criticism I should like to recognise the great work 
done by Sir William Abney in instituting reforms; but one 
swallow does not make a summer; a self-acting, governing 
mechanism is needed which would at all times maintain the 
balance of practice with progress. 
If we consider the process by which decisions on such matters 
are arrived at, even in the bodies representative of very large 
interes it is a curiously imperfect one. Usually very few 
