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such it really is. Whether these improvements go far enough, or too far, belongs not to this place; my business being to describe what our colleges are, not what they should be.

The institution, it is true, has not met all the wishes of complainers against old institutions: but there appears something of an effort to meet them half way. Some may, indeed, think (there being, as yet, no livings) that sufficient inducements will not be held out to the sons of the church; some, that this circumstance will prevent too many hangers-on for preferment: at all events, this college will not be overstocked with clerics; room will be made for a quick succession to fellowships; both fellows and professors will be effective members; and, being all of some profession, they will, by a timely prudence, be able to find their proper places in the world: .the lectures of the professors will not, like the old college professorships, (most of which are now' mere sinecures, and scarcely known to exist) be confined to the college; but thrown open to the University. These are evidently attempts at improvement, and, even in the judgment of complainers themselves, will do credit to the memory of those who planned them.

As to the founder-It does not appear, on the face of the business, that he immediately falls under the censure of Mandeville, who reckons among the wicked and mean such as found colleges, or add riches to those already rich, to the exclusion of relatives, and the extinction of the dearer charities of life. We see him first regarding his relations, though even distant as second cousins, and all their issue. The founding and endowing of a college is a dernier resort; a course of prudence, or a pro

cess of expedience. What other inducements might be lodged in his breast,-whether respect for literature, a feeling of public spirit, or the scintillations of secret ambition, this we do not know, and, perhaps, no one can tell; and therefore, in conclusion, though we protestants do not say masses for the souls of founders and benefactors, nor place them in the calendars of our saints, nor even hang a solitary prayer round their portraits

Diua par sa grace ait mercy de son ame.

AMEN.

knowing, "that as the tree falls, so it lies,"—still the University, no doubt, will pay Sir George Downing the due honour of a founder, his College find pleasure in recording their obligations, and his own provisions, in the regular course of events, prevent his name from being soon forgotten.

2 After the orthography of the MS. The text alludes (according to the usual prayer for the soul) to the line under the beautiful original portrait of Henry V. in the famous illuminated MS. in Bene't College Library. See Mr. Tyson's account of it.

APPENDIX.

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To attempt what it is impossible to execute, is a madness; and to profess that, wherein both our conscience and our reader's must have borne their testimony against the falsehood, would have been something worse. the preceding History, then, there was no aim at a complete account of all our learned men; and to acknowledge it defective, where it does not profess to be perfect, will be no derogation to it.

To speak the truth, many wilful omissions have been made. These pages, both for time and for limits, were put under restraint. Much has been sacrificed, to brevity; something to an after-attempt; and not a little in obedience to a voice, to which many a greater literary undertaking has been obliged to yield a.

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Two or three names, however, that stole away through unguardedness, from my memory, shall be supplied,-being intended for insertion.

John Godwin, A. M. barely mentioned under Queen's, claims a more particular notice. He was a politician and divine of his own school. He wrote on the Imprudence of fighting against God, and in Vindication of the Execution of Cha. I. He was a puritan, but propagated the Arminian doctrines, with great zeal, among the Calvinists.

a Plura Meditanti aurem vellit Operarum festinatio; quæ etiam fortasse non pauca reliquerit Lectoribus excusanda: quibus si hæc quali acunq. arridere viderimus; et alia post hæc hujusmodi, si non potiora, majori saltem cura, in lucem producenda, speramus. Rerum Angl. Script. Tom. i. Lectori.

Though a republican, he was ejected from his living by the Parliament; and though strict for communion, he was strenuous against the Baptists. To say the least, he was the most determined controversialist, if not the most voluminous writer, of his age. The principal of his works are, Redemption redeemed, folio; a treatise on Justification, 4to. Cata-baptism, a treatise, on Infant Baptism, 4to. with 4tos. 8vos. and pamphlets in abundance. He died in 1665, aged 72.

T. Doolittle, fellow, A. M. of Pembroke Hall, did a great deal: he was an active tutor, and a ready writer, a zealous, practical preacher, and great catechist. He was a Calvinist, and author of various theological tracts; of which the most considerable are, one, on the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper; another, on the Sufferings of Christ. He was ejected, after the Restoration, from the living of St. Alphage, in London.

Arthur Jackson, A. M. of Trinity, was author of 4 volumes of Annotations on the Bible. Samuel Ogden, A. B. of Christ's, was an eminent scholar, and wrote on the separate Existence of the Soul, and on Justification. Samuel Shaw, A. M. of St. John's, an eminent schoolmaster of the Free-school in Ashby de la Zouch, Leicestershire, wrote Sermons, Meditations, and two Comedies, that used to be acted by his scholars. He died 1695. Samuel Clark, A. M. fellow of Pembroke Hall, wrote Annotations on the Bible, with various other works on the Bible.-All these were puritans, ejected from their several livings, after the Restoration.

John Milner, B. D. by royal mandate; fellow of St. John's ", a learned nonjuring clergyman, wrote a Col

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2 A very particular account of him thay be seen in Wilson's History of Dissenting Churches.

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lection of the Church History of Palestine, from Christ to the Time of Dioclesian, and a Defence of Archbishop Usher. He held the vicarage of Leeds, in Yorkshire, but refusing to take the oath to King William, he was obliged to resign it. Mr. Manning, of Queen's, was distinguished as a Saxon scholar, and published an edition of Lye's Saxon Dictionary. As a divine, though respectable, he was not very orthodox, and was one of the petitioners for relief, in the case of Subscription to the 39 Articles.

Dr. Erasmus Darwin, (M. B. St. John's, 1755) was an eminent physician, and an admired, though rather too fine, a poet. He wrote The Botanic Garden, a Poem, in two parts, containing, in polished rhimed verse, (Part 1), The Economy of Vegetation, (Part 2), The Loves of the Plants, with Philosophical Notes, according to the Sexual System of Linnæus; and the Shrine of Nature, a Philosophical Poem. He also wrote a philosophical work, in prose, entitled Zoonomia, and a Plan for a Lady's Boarding School. A Critique was published on the Zoonomia, by Dr. Brown, professor of moral philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, and his Life has been written by Miss Seward.

G. Atwood, F. R. S. A. M. 1772, of Trinity, a distinguished mathematician, wrote a Treatise on Rectilinear Motion and Rotation of Bodies, with a Dissertation on the Structure of Arches: and in Mr. Lunn's Catalogue for 1809 were advertised 3 folio and 5 quarto volumes in MS. of his Extracts and Original Remarks on the different Branches of the Mathematics.

Joseph Milner, A. M. 1773, of Catharine Hall, was an eminent schoolmaster and divine, of Hull, in Yorkshire, author of several volumes of Sermons, and Theo

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