the same time conferred for extraordinary attainments in the same departments; and after that we might avail ourselves of every impulse that nature has placed at our command for bringing into full activity the higher powers of the intellect-of those differences, for example, which arise from the original constitution of individual minds, and the tastes inspired, either by accidental circumstances, or the continual contemplation of a future professional career. Of such aids we deprive ourselves, if our system, realizing, as it were, with respect to the mental frame, the fable of Procrustes, forces all, until about the age of two-and-twenty, to conform to one uniform course of study.

Were the careful cultivation of the various sciences thus contemplated once introduced into our universities, we feel confident that many would resort thither who cannot now afford to defer to a late period the commencement of their professional studies. The accession of these would soon be followed by that class who, though they may not be prevented from residing by inadequacy of fortune, are nevertheless deterred at present by an apprehension that the society of our universities might inculcate ideas of somewhat too elevated a tone, and such as would prove incompatible with their future station in life, and their ultimate happiness. A far more numerous body of persons, who cannot with prudence support the expense of the present style of living at Oxford and Cambridge, would swell the number, drawn from the classes which have been before mentioned as now so feebly represented. To these, the retrenchment of expenditure would not consist in reductions of the present fees for tuition, &c.; on the contrary, these fees are too small, and might be greatly raised, in perfect consistency with an economical residence; but the style of living would be rendered less extravagant, and that without disparagement to the independence of the less affluent, who would find a sufficient number of their equals to keep them in countenance.

It is true that, although the number of under-graduates in our national seats of learning is inconsiderable, the colleges cannot accommodate them at present; and at Oxford, where none are permitted to enter who cannot reside within the walls, at least for the greater portion of their time, a delay of many years must often be submitted to before entrance, after an university education has been decided upon. At Cambridge, students have been permitted to reside in the town: indeed, if this had not been the case, the public inconvenience would have been so great, that Parliament would most probably have been called on to interfere; for regulations adopted at Oxford and Cambridge may be of great national concern, so long as they have the exclusive privilege of granting degrees, to which certain rights are attached, in all the learned professions. When the age of our English under-graduates

is considered, as also the extensive jurisdiction exercised by our universities over the towns in which they are situated, we are half inclined to suspect that the idea, that confinement to separate colleges is indispensable to good academical discipline, has been carried much too far. However that may be, the rent of the new buildings at Cambridge is far too high for young men who do not enjoy ample fortunes, and no one can expect them to prove favourable to such an increase in the number of students, as would render the residence in our universities much better proportioned than it now is, to the wealth, population, and intelligence of the country. We declare this opinion most unwillingly, for we admire the architecture of these new edifices, and regret that, during the last three centuries, such homage has been so rarely paid to science. If the munificent endowment of colleges, like the grandeur of Gothic cathedrals, be destined to remain for ever among the peculiar characteristics of what Gibbon harshly termed 'the dark age of false and barbarous science,'* let us not retard the advancement and diffusion of sound learning, by imitating the splendour of our ancestors, when we cannot boast their public spirit. We are aware how much of censure and of warning may be conveyed in this observation of ours to the founders of scientific institutions, since the commencement of this century-whether of those already established, or of those projected in our metropolis and our provinces.

As the office of tutor at Cambridge and Oxford has been always, and that of professor almost invariably, filled by persons chosen from among the fellows of colleges, and as such might still be the case, under the change of circumstances contemplated by us, it is almost self-evident that the condition of that body would be materially altered for the better by measures tending to augment the total amount of fees of tuition. But we feel assured that the private and worldly advantages accruing to the fellows of colleges from an accession of new members, attracted, as these would certainly be, by every new adaptation of our academical institutions to the interests and exigencies of society-would, to say the least of the matter, keep pace with the public good flowing from the same cause. The business of college-tutor cannot certainly be characterized at present as one of great profit, especially when we consider the labour which it imposes. We have sometimes known, in the smaller colleges at Oxford, some difficulty to arise in prevailing on any of the fellows to accept the office; so that their liability to serve was looked upon as a burden. But, although the situation is in general much sought after, it is not so enviable to persons desirous of pecuniary emolument, still less to those who aspire to literary fame, as to afford cause of

Gibbon's Life and Opinions.

anxiety

anxiety when any innovations are proposed. The fees of a college-tutor's class are rarely so considerable as to enable him, by their aid alone, to maintain a family respectably in his station in society. But even should this happen to be the case, his celibacy as tutor is strictly enforced; for this office is only held with a fellowship, and the forfeiture of this last is inevitably incurred by marriage. But should the professorships ever become as lucrative as, under proper regulations, they might be made-should the inadequate salaries of some, and the classes of all, be raised, as, under proper management, might be effected-if the university, moreover, were enabled to endow a greater number of chairs, as would soon be the case,-many fellows who now devote their time to private tuition would be competitors for these chairs, and would attach themselves, at an early period after graduation, to separate departments of science. It is unnecessary for us here to recapitulate our reasons for believing that, in so doing, they would individually advance more rapidly their own intellectual progress, as well as that of their pupils.

Hence, then, might we supply, at the expense of very little interference with existing forms, and without at all contravening the spirit of any institutions now in force, the two grand desiderata in our present academical system; we mean the systematic distribution of the various branches of instruction between different teachers, and the permanent devotion of the latter to the art of teaching throughout life. Lord Bacon has, with great judgment, observed, of professors, that they should be so remunerated, that the ablest man may be content to appropriate his whole labour, and continue his whole age in that function. His proportion must be answerable to the competency he might expect from the practice of a profession; for if you will have sciences flourish, you must observe David's military law, which was, that those which staid with the carriage should have equal part with those who were in the action.'* The frequent removal of fellows to professorial chairs would not merely improve their own individual fortunes, (and, inter alia, enable them to marry); but, in a degree not less remarkable, promote the interests and accelerate the preferment of the remaining members of their ancient order. These might then cherish hopes of succeeding to a college living before the prime of life had been wasted in cloistered obscurity, and ere the age had arrived when it would be fortunate for them if the ancient papal prohibitions of matrimony could be renewed.

Our space does not permit us at present to enlarge more fully or more specifically upon the changes which might have the effect of

Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Book I.

gradually

gradually replenishing our universities with a concourse of students, such as we learn from history once thronged thither. But, perhaps, the task would be superfluous. At Cambridge, ever since the institution of the mathematical tripos, there has existed great emulation among the students, and the measures adopted at a later period have secured a greater diffusion of industry, so that all that remains to be done is to pursue consistently the same course, and to extend the range of studies still farther. With regard to Oxford, although it was much later before the work of reform commenced there, yet it has proceeded so rapidly that we can do little more than recommend the present state of things to the serious attention of those enlightened individuals, who are old enough to remember when that series of decisive measures which has already renovated so large a portion of their ancient academical system was first entered upon,-who have themselves been instrumental in rendering the splendid inheritance bequeathed to them by their ancestors, so much more conducive to the noble ends for which it was designed; who have redeemed so many of the fatal consequences of the negligence, the folly, and the degeneracy of preceding generations-and who, by accommodating their institutions more nearly to the temper and spirit of these times, have entirely changed the habits and the mental cultivation of that body, on whose perseverance in the course thus adopted the progress of future improvement must depend. If, desponding for a moment, they look for encouragement in their career, they may cast back their eyes on the revolution accomplished by their own efforts, in the short space of the last thirty years; and reflect how comparatively insignificant are the obstacles still to be surmounted, while the results to be anticipated are far more splendid, and, in their influence on the national welfare, far more extensively important. These men, at the close of the last century, found their seat of learning in a state resembling the province of Delhi, when the late Marquis of Hastings first entered upon his Indian administration. That territory, with vast tracts of the surrounding country, had of old been traversed by large canals for irrigating the land-splendid monuments of the power and magnificence of the Mogul emperors: but the indolence of after-ages had suffered these noble works to fall into complete decay. For many years were British skill and perseverance applied to repair them; and no sooner was the task accomplished-no sooner was the last intercepting mound removed, than the waters of the Jumna flowed again through the long deserted channels, and instantly restored to a depopulated region the most luxuriant fertility.

ART

ART. IX.-De Vere; or, the Man of Independence. By the Author of Tremaine. 4 vols. London. 1827.

THE

HE work before us stands out so advantageously among the lighter productions of the present season, that some notice of it seems due to the author. Our notice, however, must be a brief one; for we have of late devoted more space to novels and romances than most of our readers may be disposed to approve of; and we are not aware that there is anything in the structure of De Vere which could justify our making its appearance the pretext for entering anew into any general discussion of the principles of that species of composition.

We must, however, make one general remark; which is, that they are widely mistaken who conceive that, because the field of romance is capable of being much extended, there is any prospect of extending it to classical advantage in the absence of the faculties which have called its existing domains into successful cultivation. All the classics of this branch of literature have drawn largely upon their own personal observation and experience in life; but these would have availed them little had they not possessed high faculties of imagination, and been, through them, enabled to fuse their materials of all kinds into an artist-like unity of form and purpose; investing actual events and real persons with the colours of poetry, and blending old things with new so thoroughly as to merit the praise of creation.

This seems to be sadly lost sight of at present. One man has - made a campaign; another has danced at Almack's; a third has sat in the House of Commons: and why, they say to themselves, should we not write military, fashionable, political romances? As well might a man equip himself extempore with the materiel of a painter's handywork, hire a group of passengers from the streets, and begin to cover his canvass. Here, as elsewhere, the old maxim holds-Life is short and art is long. A note-book of reminiscences and anecdotes, however rich, will no more enable a man of feeble imagination to make a novel, than a collection of state-papers and annual registers will enable a man who has no philosophical grasp and scope of intellect, to produce a history.

It is this deficiency of imaginative power that alone prevents the author of Tremaine from taking his place among the classics of English romance. He has, indeed, much of the romantic in his feelings, but he has little of the genius of romance; which, as we have already said, (and, in the preface to De Vere, he tells us he is of the same mind,) is essentially the same with the genius of poetry. He writes, in spite of some affectations, with elegance even in his quaintnesses he reminds us of Mackenzie;