amount of critical capacity possessed at this period is to be found in Dr Walter Pope's Life of Barrow, appended to Dr Pope. the Life of Seth Ward. Pope was originally a student at Trinity, but afterwards migrated to Oxford. He was so fortunate as to be honoured by the friendship of both Ward and Barrow, to whom he appears to have played much the part that Boswell did to Johnson, and he vindicates his claim to the acquaintance of two such eminent men by the analogy of Horace and Mæcenas. As far as Horace is concerned some readers may possibly be disposed to question the justice of the comparison. Barrow, it appears, possessed, like Milton, the discrimination and taste (itself no mean mark of scholarship) to set a high value on Ovid. "The greater part of his poems," says Dr Pope, "were written in Hexameter and Pentameter verses, after the manner of Ovid, whom he had in great esteem, preferring him even before the Divine Virgil; I have heard him say, that he believed Virgil could not have made the Metamorfosis so well as Ovid has, concerning which there have often been betwixt us several sharp but not bitter disputes." Stimulated by the example of his illustrious friend, Dr Pope appears to have made one or two private attempts himself in elegiac verse composition, but, judging from his tone, we should fear with only indifferent success. He felt very probably the want of "Bland" and the Gradus ad Parnassum, and still more of that facility which rarely comes in after life. "It is next to an impossibility," he exclaims somewhat sulkily, "to write either good sense or Latin in that sort of metre, wherein so many hobbling dactyls knock against one another." Unsuccessful in his efforts at rivalling Ovid, Dr Pope next betakes himself to undermining the poet's reputation. Barrow, being by this time in his grave, was not likely to take up the cudgels or to feel offence. We are accordingly favoured with a speci, 60 CAMBRIDGE IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. [CHAP. II. men of Mr Pope's critical sagacity. Some dozen feeble lines are selected from different parts, and the careless elegancies of the Latin poet are subjected to an ordeal of a solemn and ponderous nature; a very butterfly is broken on the wheel; we seem to see some clodhopper inspecting Titania's veil. The following example will probably suffice our readers : Ovid, introducing a description of the Milky Way, characterises it in the following very passable couplet;— "Est via sublimis, cœlo manifesta sereno Lactea nomen habet, splendore notabilis ipso." ""Tis evident," says Dr Pope, "that 'lactea' ought to be in the same case with 'nomen.' Whereas had he made the verse thus he might have mended it ;— 'Nomen habens a lacte et lactis nota colore," " with which exquisitely Ovidian hexameter we take our leave of the ingenious critic. We come, then, to the conclusion that the classical culture of this period was characterised rather by learning than by scholarship. The colloquial jargon that, under the name of Latin, was spoken on every public and formal occasion, and the extent to which authors very remote from a pure style of either Greek or Latin were studied, may sufficiently explain the fact. With the commencement of the century the standard of classical elegance and purity seems rather to have declined when compared with that attained by Erasmus and Buchanan. What, however, the scholarship of the time lacked in exactness and refinement it gained in erudition. Many a competent classical scholar of the present day has rarely inspected authors just known to him by name, which were then perused and re-perused with ardour. Of the very marked effects of these studies, and their influence on the religious and philosophic thought of the time, we shall speak more fully in another place. CHAPTER III. INFLUENCE OF CAMBRIDGE STUDIES DISCERNIBLE IN THE PART I. Influence on Manner. THE preceding chapters, though necessarily limited in their treatment of the subject, will have enabled us to form some estimate of the general character of the studies of our University at the commencement of the seventeenth century; we have now to enquire what fruit those studies bore, and to endeavour to trace their influence, as far as it may be legitimately inferred, in the character and writings of the most distinguished graduates of the time. Among the most noticeable, though not the most important, of these effects, is one which will readily occur to every student, however superficially versed in the literature of that day—the mannerism to which these studies gave rise. Mannerism of A wide rather than an accurate range of reading being then the first ambition of the classical student, it was his next object to impress upon his readers or hearers the extent of his researches. Nor were his auditory generally so far on terms of equality with himself that his learning might safely rely for its recognition on the spirit which it infused into his discourse, and the halo of classic wisdom which it threw around his thoughts. A century later, the the period. poet Gray, whose attainments were probably little inferior to those of Selden or Barrow, could pen stanzas wherein breathes in almost every line the influence of the richest stores of the lyric and dramatic genius of Greece, and letters which irresistibly recall to us the grace of Cicero, the epigrammatic diction of Pliny, and the philosophic tones of Seneca, with scarce a direct quotation or allusion throughout, in the tranquil assurance that the classic air, unseen but felt, which pervaded every page, would not fail to meet with the recognition of that chosen circle whose appreciation was all he cared to gain. Such was not the privilege of the learned writers who adorn the first half of the seventeenth century. The enthusiasm, indeed, which at that time actuated the study of the learned tongues, was widely different from, though we may doubt whether it exceeded, that of the English scholar of the present day. The reasons are obvious. In that literature the writers of the period found-not simply the links which bind the present to the past, the records which still preserve, often, it is true, with a beauty that time has dimmed, but still with inimitable grace of form and outline, creations of human thought destined to immortality, and the fashions of a civilization which can never return-but they found also their credentials of belief, their authorities for opinion, and the standards to which they had been taught habitually to refer for models of taste and expression. Nor was this all. It has been urged of late, by some of those who condemn the large amount of attention still bestowed on classical studies, that the value of classical learning must inevitably diminish as the results of modern discovery and thought continue to progress: its value may remain positively the same, but relatively it must decrease. Without stopping to examine how far this theory will hold good, we may safely assume that its converse is undeniable. In proportion as we find our literature dwindle in importance and extent, as we retrace its growth during the last three centuries, so do the languages of Greece and Rome assume a correspondingly higher value. It was not merely that they embodied, at the period we are now considering, nearly all that was accepted as authoritative in opinion and excellent for example, that Latin was moreover the recognised medium of communication among the learned throughout Europe; but the literature of our own tongue could not then, as now, afford in many respects a compensating store of instruction and delight to those who were debarred from a direct acquaintance with the treasures of antiquity. It is impossible, perhaps, in the present day to adequately realise a time, when not simply the constant stimulus of newspapers and magazines was wanting, but the greater part of that literature of which we as a nation are so justly proud was still unborn; when Chaucer and Spenser were as yet the only really national poets; when Shakspeare and Ben Jonson were slowly rising into notice; when the Inductive Philosophy, although attracting attention, was far from commanding deference or assent; when, throughout the long list of divines who adorn our Church and still live in their influence on posterity, Hooker is almost the only name that had as yet appeared. The only modern literature indeed of any recognised value at that time was the Italian, and it is needless to point out of how little avail that literature would then be to the majority of our forefathers. Such considerations as these will serve to explain how it was that so great a value, often indeed a fictitious and mistaken one in its conception, became gradually associated with the study of Greek and Latin. Those languages were then the outward and visible sign of a mystic community, the Urim and Thummim of a sacred priesthood, a |