The Evening Star SATURDAY, JUNE 5, 1875.

Evening Star, Issue 3832, 5 June 1875, Page 2

The Evening Star SATURDAY, JUNE 5, 1875.

•'mb of the most interesting part* of T)r Coughirev’s valuable lecture was that which deals with the subject of (Simulations We are not at all inclined to gr?nt that his viewsj could be considered just, if they were applied to matters outside of hi own particular province. We feel sure that Dr Cocghtrky as much as anyone is a firm believer in the value of the maxim nt sutor ultra crepidam. If the Professor.means, as we think he does mean, when he says that he “holds examinations by themselve, to be altogether insufficient tests,” thata very great deal more than the mere memory of facts, than the ability to perform certain mental processes, that something more, in short, than the possession of mental culture is requin d to make a man fit to act as a doctor, or a lawyer, or a tailor, then we quite acre; with him. If, however, he means that an examination will not decide whether a man has attained a certain amount of mental culture or not, we must a : together disagree with him We should Ike those who pretend to look upon examinations as inefficient tests of mental power and culture, to tell us how. f>r instance, they would propose to find whether a young man had had his faculties so far train-d that he could grasp the reasonings and understand the processes of elementary geometry, if not by means of an examination. V\ hat some of these self appointed educational Bolons wish to be done is, in effect, something like this. "• young man is a candidate for a university degree : one of the subjects of which he has to show a competent knowledge is possesses this knowledge or not, he should be asked, if we may believe tne per ons referred to, whether he has been a member of a college, whether he has attended lectures regularly, whether he has been taught by a certain kind of teacher oi not and so forth. As well might he he asked wlietiver he had yet cut his eye teeth, whether he bad had the, measles, or whether his mother knew he was out. All the.-e questions -fc ie first as well as the last—are utterly irrelevant. The thing to he decided in such a case is—does the candidate posse-s a certain amount «f mental culture, or doea he not ? An answer to such a que tion may be at once obtained in the simplest and most direct way. Ask the candidate to demonstrate a couple of propositions, and to work out a couple of deductions. If he can do this, then he is a mathematician posse sin ,' a certain well-defined amount of ability ; if he cannot, then he does not possess' it; the thing is as simple as simplicity itself, or as those who maintain that examinations are not an efficient test of mental training. Of course it may, and no doubt often does seem good to certain people to endeavour to unduly bolster up,- to “ foster,*’ we believe is the favorite word,-such institutio is as the University by trying to make them narrow and exclusive. It such people could only find something else to meddle with, we have no doubt that the University would get on very well without their support ; with it, vve fear, it is not unl.kely that this institution may' have cause to say before long ‘ ; tiave me I from my friends.”