A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 7, 8 January 1908, Page 6

A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE.

(By Robert Hall Bakewell, M.D.)

"A little knowledge Is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring." So wrote Pope, and perhaps no lines of his have been more quoted, and yet it would be difficult to find sillier or falser lines. A little knowledge can never be dangerous, if it be true knowledge, and may often be very useful where complete ignorance is very dangerous. Dynamite is a substance about whose composition and properties I know hardly anything. All I really know is that it is a most powerful explosive used in mines to break up masses of rock. Yet this my small amount of knowledge once saved mc from blowing myself to atoms, and wrecking a mine. 1 had gone with a friend and mining expert to examine a leader which had been discovered in a gold mine. This leader was very rich, but very narrow, never more than four inches wide; it had been followed for some hundreds of feet without reaching the main lode. My friend and the expert were in the drive, or whatever it is called, looking at the leader, and I was wandering about with a candle, looking all about mc. Then I saw in one corner a wooden box, containing some queer looking packages in brown paper. They were, I think aright, about six Inches long, and as thick as my finger. 1 got hold of one and was holding it quite carelessly, and wondering what it was, when the word dynamite caught my eye. I softly and gently put back the little package into its place, and quietly—very quietly— withdrew. Take another example: "A young man from the country," who has had no experience with gas, finds, on entering his bedroom in the dark, that there is a very strong and unpleasant smell. He takes a match from his pocket, and, in the usual colonial fashion, lights it by rubbing it along the course of his right sciatic nerve. He gets more light than he wanted, together with a loud explflsibn, which blows him out of the room; burns his face, hands and clothes, and knocks him silly. To him comes up his town-bred coμsin, who immediately runs to the meter and turns off the gas. His knowledge of gas is very limited indeed; he does not even know how it is made, except that it is somehow obtained fretm coal; he does not know its chemical composition, but he does know this much that if it escapes in sufficient quantity into any confined space, a compound with the air is formed, which explodes with great violence. This little knowledge protects him from injuries which he might have had while awaiting his turn to "urink deep vl the Pierian spring." I have been led to this line of thought by perusal of the examination papers for the matriculation at the University of New Zealand, and for the Junior Civil Service. I sit appalled, aghast, stupified at the amount of knowledge that is required from boj's and girls of fifteen or sixteen, the age I believe of most of tfc candidates who "sit" for these exams. Of most of the subjects I am so profoundly ignorant that I cannot even criticise the questions, much less answer them. But of some of them, I thought until I saw these questions, that I knew something. For instance of English: I have been spoaking, reading and writing English for more than seventy years, and thought I had perhaps more than a little knowledge of it,

yet I was floored by the first question in the ■matric—"State (a) the grammatical function, and (b) the apparent meaning of the word "as" in each of the following sentences: "I was as hungry as a hunter," and so on. My first puzzle was, wha-t is a grammatical function? I had to give it up; simple as the question is, I could > not think of any answer to it. But as to the apparent meaning of the word j the answer is perfectly easy; its apparent meaning is its real meaning. As means as, of course. Now, I wonder how many marks are allowed for that answer? There is nothing very special about the questions until we come to page 4, where the unhappy candidate is required to write an essay about a sheet and-a-half in length on one of the following subjects: — "The influence of climate on out-of-door amusements." "Travelling a hundred years ago, and to-day." "Every man is a debtor to his profession." —Bacon. Now, what I want to know is ho>v writing an essay on three such subjects ! as these, can be considered 1 a fair test of a person's knowledge of English? Perhaps as a medical man I ought to know what is the influence of climate j on outdoor amusements, but positively until I saw this question I had never ; given the question a thought. I suppose i I would, after half-an-hour's reflection, : write something like an essay on it, but ■ it would be trash, mere trash, and not certainly a specimen of my best English. The same might be said about the second question. The third I don't understand, i But the gems of the questions are re- j served "for medical and engineering can- ■ didates only." I "State Ferrel's law, and show how it bears on (a) the Trade winds; (b) the Gulf Stream." Just so; the question worries mc be-

cause I haven't the faintest idea who ; Ferrel is, or was, and I cannot find any i one to tell mc. I don't want to expose my ignorance to the candidate who has j lent mc the papers, or of course she < would know. The worst of it is that i the remainder of the question gives one , not the slightest hint as to the mysteri- ( ous personality, Ferrel. For how can , ] . FerrePs law, or anyone else's law "bear" i i on the Gulf Stream, or the Trade winds i .either? There is the Gulf Stream, I know it well; I have bathed in it often, !i and even supposing Ferrel was one of the ': < passengers while we were passing ! i through the stream, what could he or i his law do to it? But ever since I first : < ] read that beast of a question intended j i \ specially for medical candidates, every I , now and again the question will crop up "Who the -—— I mean, who was Ferrel, and what was, or is, his law?" i The next question for these candidates requires them to mention any six places ! owned for a time by England, but now j '• belonging to other Powers. This is easy j' . enough, but what has it to do with ! '■ English as a language? And why are; , . medical and engineering candidates spe- I < ; cially required to answer it? So of the I ; next question, "What were the causes I which led to the Seven Years' War? , Show that for England the determining . s j factor in that war was sea-power." j i J I do not consider this a fair question. ; ; I suppose that Captain Mahan's classical ' ■ j work would show that England's sea- 1 ■ power would have something to do with • the ending of that war, though I fancy ' that the change in the attitude of Russia ; had far more influence, but an3'how, no | ' examiner ought to expect that boys and . girls of sixteen have read Mahan. l I But we must pass on, for every paper < contains questions that to my mind im- ' 1 1 ply the acquisition by the candiates of an i immense quantity of perfectly useless < and unprofitable knowledge. ; ] The following question seems to mc ' ( an extraordinary one to put in a geo- j i

graphy paper. "It is said that there is a shortage in supply of grain at the present time from the principal graingrowing countries. What are these countries? What causes could lead to a shortage in each case?" Now, I would ask any journalist, how , ever well-informed he may be, whether he would be prepared to write a leader in reply to these questions at a moment's notice, and without any books of reference at hand? Again, the candidate is asked to name the longest river in each of three continents, to describe its course, to name the towns on its banks, and state the effect the river has upon the distribution of the population, the commerce and industries of the country through which it flows. To answer this question properly would require an articls of about twenty pages in the "Edinburgh" or Quarterly Review." It is impossible to give even the simplest reply to it in the time allotted to the subject. As for supposing that the candidates possess the requisite knowledge, I am prepared to say that the examiner could not find one man in New Zealand capable of answering the question offhand. Of the Latin I will only remark that it spems too difficult for a mere matriculation. All that you want for such an examination is to ascertain that the candidate understands thoroughly the telements of syntax and prosody, and can •translate easy books at sight. This is a pass, not an honour exam. The history paper is a comparatively easy one, and is confined to the period since the Revolution of IG3B, but the questions are too large and comprehensive. It is quite impossible to answer half of them properly in fiie time, and the more a candidate knows of the period, the fewer marks he will get, as he will be sure to answer too fully, and so lose marks by omitting to answer all the six questions. E.g., one question is, "In what ways did George 111. assist or retard the development of cabinet government?" Since I

first saw this question, I have thought a good deal about it, and all I can say is, "I don't know, and I don't know where \o find an answer to the question." I have, all my life, been reading histories of George the Third's reign, and memoirs or biographies of the statesmen of the period, but I cannot remember any one in Which this point was mooted. "Did he either assist or retard the development of cabinet government?" "W T ere the administrations of either the first or second Pittscabinet government? Or were they not rather examples of personal government tempered by a regard for a half-insane monarch? Is not cabinet government a thing of imieh more recent "development" than George lll.'s reign? But these are not questions for a matriculation exam. I say nothing about the papers in arithmetic or algebra, because I am so absolutely ignorant of these subjects that I cannot understand the questions at all. But what dreary, useless rubbish all this is! How much better, how much wiser, how much happier, will a boy or girl be made who can successfully answer all the questions and obtain the full allowance of marks? The knowledge that must be acquired to do this will be absolutely sterile and useless for the most part, and the small remainder could be acquired in a year easily. What beauty or grace, or pleasure, will such knowledge ever impart in any situation in life? The old system at least gave you tlie power of reading and enjoying the classics of Greece and Rome, and strengthened the powers of the mind while learning them. It formed a bond of fellowship with the scholars of all other countries, and gave to the men who acquired it a. knowledge of their native language which nothing else couW bestow. All the literature of Europe which is worthy to survive is based on that of Athens and Rome- If, for many, the time seemed wasted, and they forgot in after life most of what they had learned, still it left a certain stamp on a man which all the arithmetic and algebra and g?ography and political economy of the present day can never give, for it made a man not only a scholar, but a gentleman. Onehunga, January 6th, 1908.