Nunc tubus emittit gratos laquearia fumos;”[122]
but in late years the practice of smoking has been regularly admitted even in those sacred precincts.
Every College has its own ideal, and that of Balliol has been by a steady policy adapted to the modern spirit of work, employing the best materials not so much for learning as an end in itself as a means towards practical success in life. In this field, in the distinctions of the schools, of the courts, and of public life, it has been seldom rivalled by any other College. But it is remarkable that in the long and distinguished list of its men of mark we find, speaking only of the dead, no Statesman and not many scholars of the first rank. The College has excelled rather in its practical men of affairs, diplomatists, judges, members of parliament, civil service officials, college tutors, and schoolmasters. At the present moment it counts among former members no less than seven of her Majesty’s Judges and seven Heads of Oxford Colleges. But to show that another side of culture has been represented at Balliol in the present reign, we must not forget the band of Balliol poets, Arthur Hugh Clough, Matthew Arnold, and Algernon Charles Swinburne.
III.
MERTON COLLEGE.[123]
By the Hon. George C. Brodrick, D.C.L., Warden of Merton College.
In the year 1274, “the House of the Scholars of Merton,” since called Merton College, was solemnly founded, and settled upon its present site in Oxford, by Walter de Merton, Chancellor to King Henry III. and King Edward I. Ten years earlier, in the midst of the Civil War, this remarkable man had already established a collegiate brotherhood, under the same name, at Malden, in Surrey, but with an educational branch at Oxford, where twenty students were to be maintained out of the corporate revenues. The Statutes of 1264 were very slightly modified in 1270; the Statutes of 1274, issued on the conclusion of the peace, and sealed by the King himself, were a mature development of the original design, worked out with a statesman-like foresight. These statutes are justly regarded as the archetype of the College system, not only in the University of Oxford, but in that of Cambridge, where they were adopted as a model by the founder of Peterhouse, the oldest of Cambridge Colleges. In every important sense of the word, Merton, with its elaborate code of statutes and conventual buildings, its chartered rights of self-government, and its organized life, was the first of English Colleges, and the founder of Merton was indirectly the founder of Collegiate Universities.
His idea took root and bore fruit, because it was inspired by a true sympathy with the needs of the University, where the subjects of study were then as frivolous as it was the policy of Rome to make them, where religious houses with the Mendicant Friars almost monopolized learning, and where the streets were the scenes of outrageous violence and license. To combine monastic discipline with secular learning, and so to create a great seminary for the secular clergy, was the aim of Walter de Merton. The inmates of the College were to live by a common rule under a common head; but they were to take no vows, to join no monastic fraternity, on pain of deprivation, and to undertake no ascetic or ceremonial obligations. Their occupation was to be study, not the claustralis religio of the older religious orders, nor the more practical and popular self-devotion of the Dominicans and Franciscans, “the intrusive and anti-national militia of the Papacy.” They were all to read Theology, but not until after completing their full course in Arts; and they were encouraged to seek employment in the great world. As the value of the endowments should increase, the number of scholars was to be augmented; and those who might win an ample fortune (uberior fortuna) were enjoined to show their gratitude by advancing the interests of “the house.” While their duties and privileges were strictly defined by the statutes, they were expressly empowered to amend the statutes themselves in accordance with the growing requirements of future ages, and even to migrate from Oxford elsewhere in case of necessity. The Archbishop of Canterbury, as Visitor by virtue of his office, was entrusted with the duty of enforcing statutable obligations.
The Merton Statutes of 1274, as interpreted and supplemented by several Ordinances and Injunctions of Visitors, remained in force within living memory, and the spirit of them never became obsolete. The Ordinances of Archbishop Kilwarby, issued as early as 1276, with the Founder’s express sanction, chiefly regulate the duties of College officers, but are interesting as recognizing the existence of out-College students. Those of Archbishop Peckham, issued in 1284, are directed to check various abuses already springing up, among which is included the encroachment of professional and utilitarian studies into the curriculum of the College; the admission of medical students on the plea that Medicine is a branch of Physics is rigorously prohibited, and the study of Canon Law is condemned except under strict conditions and with the Warden’s leave. The Ordinances of Archbishop Chicheley, issued in 1425, disclose the prevalence of mercenary self-interest in the College, manifested in the neglect to fill up Fellowships, in wasteful management of College property, and so forth. The ordinances of Archbishop Laud, issued in 1640, are specially framed, as might be expected, to revive wholesome rules of discipline, entering minutely into every detail of College life. Chapel-attendance, the use of surplices and hoods, the restriction of intercourse between Masters and Bachelors, the etiquette of meals, the strength of the College ale, the custody of the College keys, the costume to be worn by members of the College in the streets, and the careful registration in a note-book of every Fellow’s departure and return—such were among the numerous punctilios of College economy which shared the attention of this indefatigable prelate with the gravest affairs of Church and State. A century later, in 1733, very similar Injunctions were issued by Archbishop Potter; and on several other occasions undignified disputes between the Wardens and Fellows called for the decisive interference of the Visitor. But the general impression derived from a perusal of the Visitors’ Injunctions is, that a reasonable and honest construction of the Statutes would have rendered their interference unnecessary, and that it was a signal proof of the Founder’s sagacity to provide such a safeguard against corporate selfishness and intestine discord, in days when public spirit was a rare virtue.
While the University of Oxford has played a greater part in our national history than any other corporation except that of the City of London, the external annals of Merton, as of other Colleges, are comparatively meagre and humble. The corporate life of the College, dating from the Barons’ War, flowed on in an equable course during a century of French Wars, followed by the Wars of the Roses. We know, indeed, that in early times Merton was sometimes represented by its Wardens and Fellows in camps and ecclesiastical synods, as well as in Courts, both at home and abroad. For instance, Bradwardine, afterwards Archbishop, rendered service to Edward III. in negotiations with the French King; Warden Bloxham was employed during the same reign in missions to Scotland and Ireland; two successive Wardens, Rudborn and Gylbert, with several Fellows, are said to have followed Henry V. as chaplains into Normandy, and to have been present at Agincourt; Kemp, a Fellow and future Archbishop, attended the Councils of Basle and Florence; and Abendon, Gylbert’s successor in the Wardenship, earned fame as delegate of the University at the Council of Constance. But the College, as a body, was unmoved either by continental expeditions, or by the storms which racked English society in the Middle Ages; and its “Register,” which commences in 1482, is for the most part ominously silent on the great political commotions of later periods. During the reign of Henry VII., indeed, occasional mention of public affairs is to be found in its pages. Such are the references to extraordinary floods, storms, or frosts; to the Sweating Sickness; to the Battle of Bosworth Field; to Perkin Warbeck’s Revolt, and other insurrectionary movements of that age; to notable executions; to the birth, marriage, and death of Prince Arthur; to the death of Pope Alexander VI., and to Lady Margaret’s endowment of a Theological Professorship. After the reign of Henry VII. the brief entries in this domestic chronicle, like the monotonous series of cases in the Law Reports, almost ignore Civil War and Revolution, betraying no change of style or conscious spirit of innovation; and it is from other sources that we must learn the events which enable us to interpret some passages in the Register itself.
Whether John Wyclif was actually a Fellow of Merton is still an open question, though no sufficient evidence has been produced to rebut