All very well. But, as Elizabeth Barrett Browning asked,
Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers?
'Yes,' I hear you ingeminate; 'but what about Examinations? We
thank you, sirs, for thus relieving and guiding us: we
acknowledge your excellent intentions. But in practice you hang
up a bachelor's gown and hood on a pole, and right under and just
in front of it you set the examination-barrier. For this in
practice we run during three years or so, and to this all the
time you are exhorting, directing us--whether you mean it or not,
though we suspect that you cannot help yourselves.' Yes; and, as
labouring swimmers will turn their eyes even to a little boat in
the offing, I hear you pant 'This man at all events--always so
insistent that good literature teaches _What Is_ rather than
_What Knows_--will bring word that we may float on our backs,
bathe, enjoy these waters and be refreshed, instead of striving
through them competitive for a goal. He _must_ condemn literary
examinations, nine-tenths of which treat Literature as matter of
Knowledge merely.'