University for Degrees. It will, of course, be impossible to frame a scheme which shall be suited to all the varieties of talent and attainments which will exist in a numerous body of students; and I have already said something of the means by which a general College System may be adapted to pupils of various degrees of ability and industry. But it is not necessary, nor is it desirable, that prescribed College studies should occupy the whole of the student's time of study. The more active and intelligent minds will find additional employment for themselves in favourite provinces of literature and science. Moreover, in addition to the course of instructions and Examinations appointed for the general mass of students, the Universities offer, to the more able and more ambitious among them, occasions and temptations to exertion, in the various prizes which have been at various times established; these prizes being, for the most part, held forth as the rewards of individual exertion, and not connected with any progressive Scheme of College and University teaching. I speak of Medals for Prize Poems, of University Scholarships, and the like. Such prizes are proper objects of ambition to those students who, by their previous attainments, or their energy, are able to strive for them without too much interrupting their participation in the general scheme of College and University teaching. But to make such prizes the student's main object in his University career, is to run into the errour which we have already mentioned (177). It is to look upon the University, not as a teaching, but as a prizeawarding body. The fatal consequences of the prevalence of such a view with regard to the general position of the University, we have already spoken of. We may add, that the effect upon the mind of the candidate himself is entirely adverse to the progress of his intellectual Education. He who employs his time at the University in a series of struggles for detached prizes,

is likely to go backwards, rather than forwards, in his intellectual culture, while this his practice continues. For the preparation for an examination or a prize, has, in its immediate influence, little that improves the mind. On such occasions, knowledge is acquired by forced efforts, for a temporary purpose, is imperfectly assimilated, and is soon lost again. In such a course, there is no connected system of study, no intellectual progress, no pursuit of knowledge and truth for its own sake. A University life, filled with such attempts, is a career of ambition, of which the objects are trifles, because they are stripped of their educational value. In order that the students may not be too much occupied with these merely occasional objects, it is desirable that the progressive scheme of studies which is sanctioned by the Colleges and by the University, should be invested with such dignities, honours, and advantages, as to make it the main object of the great body of the students;-the guide which regulates their studies, and the source from which they hope to derive their most valuable and most valued distinctions.

189 The views which I have brought forwards and attempted to establish in the preceding pages, offer many maxims which are applicable to the present state of Classical and Mathematical Teaching in the University of Cambridge;—some of them applying in support and confirmation of our present practices; others of them pointing out changes by which our system might become more efficacious in promoting a Liberal Education among our students. I shall take the liberty of tracing more particularly the application of remarks of the latter kind, in a spirit as far removed as possible from any willingness to find fault, or levity in proposing change. I have already said that several important changes have recently been introduced into the system. of this University; others are still suggested; and it appears proper to consider what is the general ten

dency of these changes, and whether it leads to a result of which we approve. I have endeavoured to lay down principles by which we may form some judgment on such points. But in order to apply these principles, I must place before the reader a general view of the recent changes which have been made in the Educational System of this University. After such a survey, we shall, I trust, be enabled to see how we may preserve what is beneficial in the tendencies of our recent changes, and how we may avert the evils which have been pointed out in the preceding pages as the results of errours in Educational Legislation.

CHAPTER III.

ON THE RECENT AND PRESENT CONDITION OF CLASSICAL AND MATHEMATICAL EDUCATION AT CAMBRIDGE.

SECT. 1. Of Recent Changes in the Educational System of Cambridge

190 THE preceding remarks on the subjects of Educational study, and on the methods of Teaching such subjects, are, for the most part, general, and apply to all Institutions of the nature of Colleges and Universities. They have been stated however with a more special reference to the present condition of the University of Cambridge: and several of them will, I hope, be found to have a useful bearing upon the circumstances of that condition, and the matters which may come under discussion with reference to that subject. In order to prepare the way for such an application of what I have said, I must give some account of changes which have taken place in the University system in late years.

191 The system of the University, till within a few years, was one in which Logical Disputations on certain selected philosophical Questions were the main exercises: such Disputations being held both for the purpose of familiarizing the students with the doctrines of the received Philosophy, and of assigning due distinction to the best proficients in the art of disputation.

When the students had been duly exercised in this art for the appointed time in the Public Schools of the University, (for which they were prepared by

frequent Disputations in their own Colleges,) they were examined in the Public Schools by the Proctors, Moderators, and other Regent Masters of Arts; and their fitness for the Bachelor's Degree thus ascertained. The phraseology of our common University language, and of our formal documents, still indicates this state of things. Those who obtain our highest mathematical honours, are Wranglers or Disputants; those who are on the point of being candidates for the Bachelor's Degree are Sophists, or Sophs; also Questionists: the Supplicat for such a degree certifies that the candidate has performed all the Responsions, Oppositions, and other exercises, required; and he is presented by the Father of the College and admitted by the Vice-Chancellor as idoneus ad respondendum questioni.

192 In order that the reader may have a fixed point of departure, by reference to which he may understand the more recent changes, I will copy Dr Jebb's account of the exercises and examinations of the University as they existed in his time, that is in 1772. This account was applicable with little alteration till the change effected by the Grace of 1827.

After stating the manner in which the names of the students are collected in a book by the Moderators, Dr Jebb proceeds: "These Moderators are annually chosen upon the tenth of October. Their proper office is to preside, alternately, at the public exercises of the students; and to examine them, at the time of their offering themselves for their degree.

"These public exercises are held in the afternoon, for five days in the week during term time; the moderator appearing a little before two, and frequently continuing in the schools till the clock strikes four.

66

Upon the first Monday after the commencement of the January term, the Moderator, whose turn it is to preside, gives written notice to one of the students