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England's Intellectual Position . 
[August, 
sidered to reflect upon the institution. With us all this is 
different ; in a college of the normal English type the pro- 
fessors and students are obliged to “ live in,” like the hands 
of a modern gigantic drapery warehouse. Celibacy is the 
rule, by way we suppose of inducing men of high reputation 
to feel contented, and over the whole convent rules a Father 
Abbot, empowered, of his own motion, to appoint and 
dismiss officials irrespective of their standing, and to inter- 
fere with the details of all departments, however slight may 
be his qualifications to do so with benefit. 
Worse still remains : the most eminent professor, instead 
of devoting his leisure to research, is expected to undertake 
the degraded and degrading task of maintaining “good order 
and discipline among the students.” In other words, he is 
called upon, figuratively speaking, to assume the cocked hat 
and red waistcoat of Bumble ! Those who are so clamorous 
for the maintenance of “ discipline ” forget that the neces- 
sity is entirely of their own creation. Enforce “ residence ;” 
shut up a number of young men together in flat violation of 
the order of Nature ; compel the thoughtful and the studious 
to associate, will they nil they, with the idle, the reckless, 
and the profligate ; give the bully a free choice of victims — 
and the duties of the beadle must devolve upon some one. 
But disperse students through the town or neighbourhood, 
and they will no more require any special officers for the 
enforcement of “ good order ” than would an equal number 
of bank clerks or young men engaged in the Civil Service. 
Such, then, is the foremost peculiarity of the “ system of 
English education ” — a distinct “ survival ” from the days 
of ignorance which surely deserves exposure to something 
more than a mere “ serious risk ” of overthrow. 
The second characteristic of our English colleges, as 
compared with their foreign rivals, is more deeply seated, 
and will prove much less easy to reform. It lies in the very 
character of the teaching given. The German professor, 
both by precept and example, seeks to qualify his students 
to add something to the existing total of human knowledge. 
He trains them for research, for discovery ; he judges of 
their proficiency by the power they display of dealing with 
unsolved questions, —with those problems in which every 
branch of Science abounds. He makes them the partakers 
of his own investigations. The highest honours are earned 
rebus gestis. 
According to our English system all this is well-nigh 
reversed. Men study, as Prof. Huxley well expressed it, 
