The university both Bacon and the king, and strongly deprecates CHAP. VI. might well seem to have had no very serious cause for alarm, Uneasy, however, at the confidence exhibited by the townsmen, and determined apparently to leave no stone unturned. in order to ensure a victory, the authorities next proceeded to memorialise not only the attorney general', but, through him, the king himself. In an elaborate Latin letter, they aver that they foresce, in the enfranchisement of the town, the slavery of the university. For oftimes by their delight in contention,' they go on to say, 'have we learned the lesson only too clearly, with how little mercy they would trample our poverty beneath their feet, were it but once in their power to convert our resources into means for gaining allies to vex our peace.' 'It is our prayer,' says the letter, in conclusion, 'not that we may be made to shine in new honours, but that we may retain our old ones; and that we may not be trodden under foot by the ambition of those who are our neighbours and fostered at our expense. sion of the new charter. James declares grant no Cambridge that are The ornate diction and skilful flattery of this letter were that he will successful in their purpose. James responded in the same language and in like terms. The ancient municipal privileges of the town, he said, were already a sufficient source of envy. New honours would be not only superfluous but would render it an object of suspicion to the academic community. He would grant no titles of honour to Cambridge which carried with them anxiety to the university'. likely to give university. From this time we hear nothing further of the aspirations of the townsmen to be raised to the rank of citizens, nor do they seem to have been aware of the precise manner in which their endeavours had been baffled; or if aware, they deemed it prudent to adopt a more conciliatory policy, for in the the university. Letters and Life of 1 See letter of 9 Feb. 161 in greater dignity: Honorem nobis obtendunt, et auctiorem Oxonioque rivalem splendoris cumulum. Offuciae merac et hamatum lenocinium!' 2 See letter e senatu nostro frequenti 4to Idus Febr 1616': Heywood and Wright, u. 8. 11 282-4. 3 Ibid. 11 288-9; Cooper, Annals, I 111; see also State Papers (Dcm.) James the First, LXXXVI no. 70. following year Sir Francis Bacon was chosen high steward CHAP. VL of the town. Flection of poo ward of actions 201 In striking contrast to the embittered spirit which marked the relations of the university and the town, are the benefactions of Stephen Perse, M.D., a native of Norwich and one of the fellows of Gonville and Caius College. Like Caius and Butler, and others of the same profession in those days, he had acquired considerable wealth by practising as a phy sician, and at his death he bequeathed no less than £9000 for charitable purposes. Among other property, he had acquired the site on which had formerly stood the house of cook the Augustine friars in Cambridge', and here he directed in his will that there should be built a convenient house to be used for a Grammar Free School, with one lodging chamber for the Master and another for the Usher.' The master was to be a master of arts of the university, and the usher (likewise a member of the university) of bachelor standing at least. Scholars to the number of one hundred, being natives of Cambridge, Barnwell, Chesterton, or Trumpington, no more, nor any other,' were here to receive a free education. and schola In addition to this, Dr Perse founded at Caius College Peleshipe six fellowships and six scholarships; the fellows to be elected at Caus from the scholars, 'being fit scholars'; and the scholars to be elected from those on the school foundation (being fit) who had there 'been instructed and taught by the space of three years at least"." to the Other benefactions, to aid in rebuilding the college hall and in building the new university library, gave evidence that the generous and wide-minded fellow of Caius College, Library. while mainly intent on the foundation of an institution. which should confer a substantial benefit on the town and should serve to link together the academic and municipal 1 See vol. 1, p. 133. Cooper, Annals, 111 95-101. The school was erected soon after Dr Perse's death, and ordinances for its government were made by Perse's executors 10 Feb. 162. It flourished greatly in the seventeenth 3 * Ibid. m 97. Julinson. CHAP. VI. interests, was by no means unmindful either of his college or of his university. The bequest to the university library has reference to the scheme at that time in contemplation for the erection of a new building, and was to be paid by the executors within,' says the will, 'five years after my decease, so that the said library be within that time in building'.' Archdeacon The scheme, it is deserving of note, enlisted the sympathies of another enlightened benefactor in relation to school education, Robert Johnson' (a son-in-law of Lawrence Chaderton), archdeacon of Leicester, to whom the well-known foundations. at Oakham and Uppingham are indebted for their origin. But nothing was done during the reign of James, which, to quote Mr Bradshaw's expression, is an entire blank in the library, and Perse's bequest consequently lapsed. The project, in the succeeding reign, was arrested by the sudden. fate of the duke of Buckingham. Effects of the roval visit on individual minds GEORGE HERBERT, public orator, 1619-1627. Besides the more general results of the royal visits, already described, the influence they exerted over the minds. of at least two eminent members of the university must not be left unnoted. Among the fellows of Trinity at this time, was George Herbert, the poet, who in the year 1618 was apPer pointed reader of rhetoric in the university. He had come up to Trinity from Westminster School when only fifteen years of age, and had been placed by his watchful mother under the special care of Dr Neville, whose good opinion His character and regard he was fortunate enough to gain. He was disand a fellow. tinguished by his industry as a student and also by that slightly overwrought refinement of feeling which characterised him throughout life; while even his best friends could not but admit that he seemed to think too much about his dress, prided himself on his illustrious descent, and cultivated a little too assiduously the acquaintance of the great and noble. At the time of James' visit in 1615, Herbert was only 22 years old, and his imagination seems to have become dazzled by the prospect of a court career; and his graceful as a student 1 Ibid. 1 101. Luard. List of Documents relat ing to the University Library, p. 6. ↑ The University Library, p. 16. 4 Walton's Lives (ed. Dowling), p. 291. lectures G King Jame genius, under the spell of this illusion, condescended to acts CHAP. VL of gross adulation which certainly stand in singular contrast to that 'contemptus mundi' which pervades the strains of The Temple. It had become the fashion, at this time, the to flatter the scholar on the throne by lauding his public oration speeches as models of the highest oratory; and Herbert, in his chair in the school of rhetoric at Cambridge, determined to approve himself not wanting in the arts of the courtier. 'He passed by,' says the narrator, 'those fluent orators that domineered in the pulpits of Athens and Rome, and insisted to read upon an oration of King James, which he analysed, shewed the concinnity of the parts, the propriety of the phrase, the height and power of it to move affections, the style utterly unknown to the ancients, who could not conceive what kingly eloquence was, in respect of which those noted demagogi were but hirelings and triobulary rhetoricians'. It would seem that this somewhat singular method of proceeding gained the full approval of the authorities, for in the following year Herbert was elected public orator and continued to hold the office until 1627. Very shortly after James his appointment, there came down to the university library a y copy of the Basilicon Doron, with a letter in the royal auto- f graph. Herbert was delighted at the fresh opportunity thus afforded him. He not only penned a letter in admirable energy Latin returning the profusest thanks for James' gift, but here inserted in the margin at the close the following elegiac verse; May Peregrinis Academiam nostram inrisentibus, Quid Vaticanam Bollciumque objicis hospes? Unicus est nobis bibliotheca liber3. Royalty was most successfully tickled. James even condescended to enquire who was the actual author of the letter, and finding that the writer was a relative of the very same 1 Hacket, Life of Archbishop Williams, 1175. The appointment was well calculated to aid Herbert in his ambitious aims, for it seems to have been regarded as a stepping-stone, as was the case with Naunton (orator 1591-1611) and Nothersole (1611– 1619) to an official career. 'At the time of being orator,' says Herbert's biographer, 'he had learned to under- * Herbert's Remains, p. 213; Cooper, Epist. Arad., 11 537. presents the ollected ཉིན འདོན གོ མན CHAP. VI. nobleman' to whom (it would seem by accident) he had addressed the interrogation, he pronounced him the 'jewel of the university.' His high hopes. From that time, Herbert, whenever the king visited Cambridge or its vicinity, was most assiduous in his court, Is ultimate and his hopes ran high. They faded, however, with James' disappoint ment and changed Views. death; and when, a few years later, in his thirty-sixth year, the poet was inducted into his quiet parsonage at Bemerton, he had already begun, in his own words, to behold the court with an impartial eye, and to see plainly that it is made up of frauds and titles and flattery, and many other such empty, imaginary, and painted pleasures'. Perhaps, as there arose in memory his own share in the 'flattery' which he now contemned, he would at that time have fain recalled. his fulsome elegiac, and those lectures in which he had impressed on the wondering, awe-struck minds of the young Cambridge scholars, the superiority of James' artificial oration to the de Corona or the pro Marcello. In the case of Preston, the royal visit seemed likely, at one time, to be attended with very different results. The opposition which he had shewn to his pupils' participation in the performance of Ignoramus was regarded by those who disliked his new principles as convincing proof of disaffected feelings; he was no courtier,' it was said, who would envy so small a courtesie to those that had so freely offered greater unto him". These representations were not without effect; and the brilliant fellow of Queens' was now generally looked upon as one who stood but indifferently well with both the court and the academic authorities. The consciousness that such was the case only led him however to cultivate still closer relations with the Puritan party, and to apply himself with yet greater assiduity to the duties of his tutorship as well as those of the offices of dean and catechist, to which he had recently been promoted by the influence of the not ungrateful Davenant. He became intimate with some of the most eminent Puritan divines, of whom Dod 3 Clarke's Lives, u. s. p. 82. 4 Searle, Hist. of Queens' College, pp. 433-1. 1 The earl of Pembroke: Walton, u. s. p. 292. 2 Ibid. p. 313. |