essentially contested

«And yet perhaps, after all, it is better for a country that its seats
of learning should do more to suppress mental growth than to encourage
it. Were it not for a certain priggishness which these places infuse
into so great a number of their alumni, genuine work would become
dangerously common. It is essential that by far the greater part of
what is said or done in the world should be so ephemeral as to take
itself away quickly; it should keep good for twenty-four hours, or even
twice as long, but it should not be good enough a week hence to prevent
people from going on to something else. No doubt the marvellous
development of journalism in England, as also the fact that our seats of
learning aim rather at fostering mediocrity than anything higher, is due
to our subconscious recognition of the fact that it is even more
necessary to check exuberance of mental development than to encourage
it. There can be no doubt that this is what our academic bodies do, and
they do it the more effectually because they do it only subconsciously.
They think they are advancing healthy mental assimilation and digestion,
whereas in reality they are little better than cancer in the stomach.»