He had little sympathy with either text-book science or with mere examinations. “I have far more confidence,” he wrote, “in the one man who works mentally and bodily at a matter than in the six who merely talk about it. Nothing is so good as an experiment which, whilst it sets error right, gives an absolute advancement in knowledge.” In another place he wrote:--“Let the imagination go, guarding it by judgment and principles, but holding it in and directing it by experiment.” For book-learned chemistry and mere chemical theory, apart from experimental facts, he had an undisguised contempt. Writing to General Portlock on the subject of chemical education, he stated that he had been one of the Senate of the University of London appointed to consider especially the best method of examination. They had decided on examination by papers, accompanied by _vivâ voce_. “We think,” he added, “that no numerical value can be attached to the questions, because everything depends on _how they are answered_.” Then, referring to the teaching at Woolwich, he says, “My instructions always have been to look to the note-books for the result.” “Lectures alone cannot be expected to give more than a general idea of this most extensive branch of science, and it would be too much to expect that young men who at the utmost hear only fifty lectures on chemistry should be able to answer with much effect, in writing, to questions set down on paper, when we know by experience that daily work for eight hours in _practical laboratories_ for _three months_ does not go very far to confer such ability.” [Sidenote: SCIENCE AND THE UNIVERSITIES.] He had, at an earlier date, declined to be appointed as examiner in the University. He had previously declined the professorship of chemistry in University College; and he had also declined the chemical chair in the University of Edinburgh. This was not, however, from any want of sympathy with university work, or failure to appreciate the ideal of a university as a seat of learning. Writing to Tyndall, in 1851, about another university--that at Toronto--he said: “I trust it is a place where a man of science and a true philosopher is required, and where, in return, such a man would be nourished and cherished in proportion to his desire to advance natural knowledge.” At the same time he had an exceeding repugnance to the custom of expecting candidates for professorial chairs to produce “testimonials” of their qualifications. When his intimate friend Richard Phillips was a candidate for the very chair which Faraday refused at University College, Faraday declined on principle to give a testimonial. “I should indeed have thought,” he added, “his character had been known to be such that it would rather have been degraded than established by certificates.”