nance was introduced into the statute book,* for the appointment of a course of lectures, to which all students were admitted, but which all Bachelors of Arts were obliged to attend: their subjects were, for the first year arithmetic and music; for the second, geometry and perspective; and for the third, astronomy. A grace also was passed in 1528 for substituting grammar in the place of philosophy, at the public disputations held every Friday during term.

At this time also a barbarous Latin jargon was the vehicle of written, and in great measure of oral instruction also, being spoken in public assemblies, in the schools, in the senate-house, and even in private colleges. The highest aim of mathematical knowlege was the investigation of unprofitable secrets, and the cultivation of judicial astrology: even Aristotle himself, that idol of scholastic disputants, was studied only through the mist of his translators and commentators, the number of whom became multiplied to such a degree, that Patricius reckons up near 12,000 about the end of the 16th century.

Such was the general state of learning in our universities, when the blessed light of the Reformation burst through the gloom which hung over the avenues of real knowlege. That great event was accompanied by the revival of a purer literature, which was quickly established by a phalanx of scholars at Cambridge; and then the absurdities of that scholastic theology, which had so long enslaved the intellect of mankind, were successfully combated; the best authors of Greece and Rome were taught and illustrated by critical and philological erudition; whilst

* See Statuta Antiq. p. 65.

the archives of Christianity were purified under their auspices, and truth was re-instated on the throne of her supremacy. From the dawn of science in the reign of Henry VIII., the day-spring of knowlege brightened throughout that of his son and successor. At the accession of Queen Mary indeed, ignorance and superstition for a time resumed their sway, and many of the great restorers of learning felt the severity of that fate which threw them on times, when literature rose or fell with court factions, or changed according to the disposition of princes and the alteration of religion.

True religion however, and knowlege, its best companion, revived with fresh lustre under the auspices of Elizabeth and the direction of her sage counsellor Burleigh, a statesman who had happily imbibed excellent principles during his residence at St. John's College; a seminary which about this time acquired that distinguished reputation for theological attainments which it has so nobly supported through succeeding generations.*

In that happy era, the statutes which prevail at this day in the university, were, after diligent revisions and amendments, finally established. We may pass over that part of them which relates to its incorporation, as our business is with those alone which relate to the advancement of a learned and religious education. These weighty interests indeed had been very successfully attended to in the statutes of Henry VIII. and of his amiable but short-lived successor; wherein we find that the theological professor

* Barrow alludes to this well-deserved fame of his rival college, when speaking of Mr. H. Lucas, who had been a member of St. John's. See Opusc. p. 79.

was ordered to read publicly the scriptures only; the philosophical lecturer was confined to the problemata, moralia, or politica of Aristotle, to Pliny, and to Plato: the arithmetic of Tunstall and Cardan, together with Euclid's geometry, was selected for the professor of mathematics: the elenchi of Aristotle, the topica of Cicero, and the works of Quintilian, for the reader in rhetoric and logic; whilst the Greek professor was obliged to expound the writings of Homer, Demosthenes, Isocrates, Euripides, or any other of the purest classical authors. The order of study prescribed to the students was as follows:

To the first year arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and geography to the second, logic; and to the third and fourth, philosophy. During this course, each candidate for the degree of A.B. was obliged to keep two opponencies and two acts in the public schools, as well as to undergo the customary examination.

An extended progress in the above named sciences, together with public disputations, as well as an assiduous attendance on those held by Masters of Arts during three years, was exacted from all Bachelors of Arts before they proceeded to their next degree; neither was the Master who aspired to a higher degree of academical dignity, permitted to remain idle: he was remanded to the study of theology for the next five years, with a daily attendance on the Hebrew lecture, besides his acts, opponencies, sermon, and clerum, which were all demanded before be could take his degree of B.D. If he aimed at the highest step, that of Doctor in Divinity, (which at this time was held in little less estimation than a patent of nobility,) he was obliged to attend daily the divinity lectures, during four years of probation, besides a variety of other exer

cises: even after this last degree, post tot naufragia, pericula, and examina, (as the old statute book expresses it,) he was under the necessity of preaching a Latin sermon, and of holding an annual disputation in the schools some dubious and subtile question," if he resided in the University.

66

on

In the last body of statutes given to the university by Queen Elizabeth, A. D. 1570, the principal alterations therein made relate only to discipline; none are observable in those connected with the studies of the youth, and very few with those of superior standing. The disputations in the Sophs Schools were arranged almost after the same manner in which they now exist, and a Moderator Scholæ, together with two Examiners of the Questionists, was appointed; but a more correct idea may be formed of the method of study pursued at this period, from an extract taken out of a scarce work published at Cambridge, in the year 1769, from a vellum MS. intitled "a projecte contayninge the state, order, and manner of government of the University of Cambridge, as now it is to be seen in the three and fortieth yeare of the Raigne of our Most Gracious and Soveraigne Lady Queen Elizabeth." After a full account of all the officers of the University, we come to the article of "Lecturers for the instruction of the younger sort of scholars, as namely,

One Rethoricke
Lecturer.

One Logic
Reader.

To read the precepts of Rethoricke in one of the common scholes, in such sorte as is fit for younge scholers at their first coming to the University. To teach the use of Logicke by publique readeing in the scholes unto such as are of the 2nd and 3rd years continuance.

Reader.

To read a Philosophie Lecture, either

One Philosophie) of morale, politique, or natural philosophie, unto the Sophisters and Bacchelers of Arte, thereunto resorting by statute.

One Mathematical
Reader.

To read the arte of Arithmeticke, of Geometrie, of Cosmograpie, or of Astronomy, in such sort as is fit for his auditory, being also of Sophisters and Bacchelers of Arte."

These four lecturers still exist under the title of Barnaby Lecturers, whose office was no sinecure in the times of which we are treating, although it has now lapsed into the official duties of the college tutor. Similar instructions to those above quoted are given for the direction of Readers in Divinity, Hebrew, Greek, Civil Law, and Medicine, instituted by King Henry VIII., and who are called "Lecturers for the increase of knowlege in the more ancient students," as well as the Divinity Reader, and an University Preacher, who is ordered "to preache at Paule's Cross, and at other places thereunto named and appointed:" both of these offices were founded by Lady Margaret, mother of King Henry VII. Although an evident improvement had now taken place in academical studies and discipline, and although the pursuits of science were, in a great measure, detached from that scholastic method which had so long held reason in chains, still there was too much time and labor expended in subtile questions and vain disputations, held more for the sake of confuting an antagonist and the gratification of literary vanity, than for the promotion of real knowlege. The greatest philosophers, and the highest characters of the age, frequently indulged in the exercises of this palæstra