I think there are times when you avoid essay answers. As Steve has mentioned the fair posing, evaluation, and grading of them requires considerable energy and is subject to multiple tiers of correction. And what if the question is technical and the answer is graded on grammar?

My father recalled a math teacher who downmarked you if you didn't put a period at the end of an equation.

Meanwhile multiple choice can be good or bad depending on the nature of the subject and the quality of the test preparer. In school they varied with the teacher. On the SAT* I thought they were pretty good at getting your level of knowledge although it hurt to feel rushed. In the working world one runs into them in proving that you have familiarity with various tasks and licensing criteria. The official ones have been good, the trades ones have been ludicrously easy, because the people who put the tests together were probably not paid to make a good test and the test itself was mainly to show that you showed up for the presentation. I have been surprised on occasion.

As to the larger question of reason and renaissance, the recognition of reason is somewhat elusive. The actual Renaissance may have been a result of plague tearing apart a population that was educated to dark ages standards. Your village started dying, so you prayed, put poultices on the sores, burned a witch or a Jew or two, and possibly went to self-flagellation. I'll never forget a short story I read: "The Plague Comes to Bergamo".

At some point, a critical number of people start saying: "Enough is enough is enough."