What was intended to be evidence of fitness, was soon perverted to be a form of _initiation_ into an exclusive Society; whose members insisted, not upon fitness, but upon compliance with arbitrary rules. This was made especially the case with the Law, and with Medicine. The _degree_ was supposed to refer to proper qualifications for the practice of Law, and knowledge of Medicine, with its proper use in the healing art. It did nothing of the sort. It gave a _presumption_ (but by no means a true one) that its holder knew something of the ancient Roman and Greek languages: not any presumption that, in the case of Medicine, there was any knowledge of the articles of Medicine, nor of their proper use; or of the human body to which they were to be administered. Nor any, that in the Law, there was any knowledge of the Statutes, laws and customs of the Realm, nor even of its Common annals! Medicine and Law suffered from this _Sham_; because men naturally used what little they did know; and, as to the Roman tongue, _some_, and the Greek, _less_, were in their heads; and the whole practice of Medicine and Law was in their ignorant hands; what could follow, but to muddle _these_ with the useless obscurity and jargon of the unknown forms! The Priests had also thrown around the Superstition the same jargon, and kept up the requisition for a _degree_--as if any true morality and worship were necessarily connected with a _literature_, denounced by themselves as impure and _pagan_! Notwithstanding these ignorant and selfish abuses, it was impossible to make the acquisition of even such narrow learning wholly useless. It was narrow, and even hurtful, by being perverted to selfish ends, and preventing honest and independent research. Still, it did work upon some minds to better use; and it gradually evolved a better learning, when the Ancient Literature really worked in free and broader channels. The High-Castes are less indifferent to literary attainments; and learning, in a more comprehensive sense, is becoming more esteemed. It is no longer limited to verbal knowledge; to ancient, dead forms--though these are still so paramount that, if a man were to be the wisest and most learned of mankind, and was deficient in these, he could not receive a _Degree_--he would be unlearned! Useful, true and honest knowledge, outside the great Halls of Learning, is making some advance; though _in them_, the old, pedantic, and superstitious notions yet prevail. The new _Literati_, founders of a larger and truer teaching, endeavour with difficulty to get some respect and honour to attach to the _degrees_ which they timidly register. The High-Caste, in general, disregard this better knowledge, and adhere to the old Superstitions and traditions--regarding that man only as learned who has the ancient badge; though, to any useful purpose, a fool.