threatened superiority of the German bagman has asserted itself even
more and more; the "teaching of literature" has planted a terrible
fixed foot in our schools and colleges. But perhaps the weight usually
assigned to this kind of corroboration is rather imaginary. That a
thing has happened does not prove that it ought to have happened,
except on a theory of determinism, which puts "conduct" out of sight
altogether. There are those who will still, in the vein of
Mephistopheles-Akinetos, urge that the system which gave us the men
who pulled us out of the Indian Mutiny can stand comparison with the
system which gave France the authors of the _débâcle_; that the
successes of Germany over France in war have no necessary connection
with education, and those of Germany over England in commerce,
diplomacy, &c., still less. They will even go further--some of
them--and ask whether the Continental practices and the Arnoldian
principles do not necessitate divers terribly large and terribly
ill-based assumptions, as that all men are _educable_, that the value
of education is undiminished by its diffusion, that all, or at least
most, subjects are capable of being made educational instruments, and
a great many more.

On the other hand, they will cheerfully grant that Mr Arnold never
succumbed to that senseless belief in examination which has done, and
is doing, such infinite harm. But they will add to the debit side that
the account of English university studies which ends the book was even
at the time of writing so inaccurate as to be quite incomprehensible,
unless we suppose that Mr Arnold was thinking of the days of his own
youth, and not of those with complete accuracy. He says "the
examination for the degree of bachelor of arts, which we place at the
end of our three years' university course, is merely the
_Abiturienten-examen_ of Germany, the _épreuve du baccalauréat_ of