144

140

140

140

7. Clare Hall (founded 1326): 1 master, 17 fellows, and 36

scholars; these, together with students, etc., making a total of 8. Peter House (founded 1257): 1 master, 17 fellows, and 21

scholars and bible-clerks; these, together with students, etc.,

making a total of ...
9. Pembroke College (founded 1343): 1 master, fellows, and

scholars: these, together with students, etc.. making a to

tal of
10. King's College (founded 1441): had, on the foundation, 1 pro-

vost, 70 fellows and scholars, 3 chaplains or conducts, 1 mas-
ter of choristers, 6 clerks, 16 choristers, 6 poor scholars, 13

senior fellows' servitors, and a few others, making a total of . 11. Sidney Sussex College (founded 1598): 1 master, 12 fellows,

and 29 scholars; these, together with students, etc., making a

total of . 12. Corpus Christi College or Benet College (founded 1351): 1 mas

ter, 12 fellows, and 14 scholars; these, with students, etc.,

making a total of 13. Jesus College (founded 1496): 1 master, 16 fellows, and 22

scholars; these, together with students, etc., making a total of 14. Magdalen College (founded 1519): 1 master, 10 fellows, and 20

scholars; these, with students, etc., making a total of . 15. Catharine Hall (founded 1475): 1 master, 6 fellows and 8

scholars ; these, together with students, etc. making a total of 16. Trinity Hall (founded 1350): 1 master, 12 fellows, and 14 scholars; these, with students, etc., making a total of .

Total No. in all the Colleges ?

140

.

140

120

90

56

56

2911

.

From this list it appears that Christ's College, if not the largest of the Colleges in Cambridge, was far from being the smallest. Its reputation fully corresponded with its rank and proportions. Among the eminent men it had sent forth it could count the Reformer Latimer, and the antiquary Leland (himself a pupil of St. Paul's School), several distinguished prelates of the sixteenth century, Harrington, the translator of Ariosto, and the heroic Sir Philip Sidney. It appears still to have kept up its reputation as a place of sound learning. “It may without flattery be said of this House,” says Fuller, “Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all,' if we consider the many divines who in so short a time have here had their education.” At all events, it was one of the most comfortable Colleges in the University; substantially built; with a spacious inner quadrangle, a handsome dining-hall and chapel, good rooms for the fellows and students, and an extensive garden behind, provided with a bowling-green, a pond, alcoves and shady walks, in true academic taste.

In the year 1624–5, when Milton went to Cambridge, the total population of the town may have been seven or eight thousand. Then, as now, the distinction between “town” and “gown” was one of the fixed ideas of the place. While the town was governed by its mayor and aldermen, and common-council, and represented in Parliament by two burgesses, the University was governed by its own statutes as administered by the Academic authorities, and was represented in Parliament by two members returned by itself. The following is a list of the chief authorities and office-bearers of the University in the year 1624-5:

Chancellor : Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, elected 1614.
High Steward: Sir Edward Coke, the great lawyer, elected 1614.
Vice-Chancellor of the Year: Dr. John Mansell, head of Queen's College.

Proctors of the Year: William Boswell of Jesus College and Thomas Bould of Pembroke.

HEADS OF COLLEGES IN 1624-5. 1. Peter House: Dr: Leonard Mawe, Master; elected 1617; a Suffolk-man by birth; educated at Peterhouse ; appointed Regius Professor of Theology in 1607: had afterwards been chaplain to Prince Charles, and had accompanied him to Spain; at a later period (1625) was transferred to the mastership of Trinity College, and ultimately (1628) became Bishop of Bath and Wells, in which dignity he died, 1629. ?

2. Clare Hall: Dr. Thomas Paske, Master; elected 1621.

3. Pembroke College: Dr. Jerome Beale, Master; elected 1618, and held office till 1630.

4. Gonville and Caius College : John Gostlin, M. D., Master (this being one of the few colleges where custom did not require the Master to be a Doctor of Divinity); elected 1618; a Norwich-man by birth; educated at Caius: admitted M. D., 1602; afterwards Regius Professor of Physic in the University; was Vice-Chancellor of the University in 1618–19, and again in 1625–6, in which year he died. “He was,” says Fuller, “a great scholar, eloquent Latinist, and rare physician;" “ a strict man in keeping and magistrate in pressing the statutes of college and university” — in illustration of which Fuller says that in his Vice-Chancellorship it was penál for any scholar to appear in boots.” 5. Trinity Hall: Clement Corbet, LL. D., Master; elected 1611, and held office till 1626.

6. Corpus Christi, or Benet College: Dr. Samuel Walsall, Master; elected 1618, and held office till his death in 1626.

7. King's College : Dr. Samuel Collins, Provost; elected 1615; a Buckinghamshire

man by birth; educated at Eton and then at Cambridge, at King's College; presented to the living of Braintree in Essex, 1610; King's Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, 1617, and afterwards Prebendary of Ely and parson of Somersham. He died in 1661. According to Fuller, he was “one of an admirable wit and memory, the most fluent Latinist of our age; so that, as Caligula is said to have sent his soldiers vainly to fight against the tide, with the same success have any encountered the torrent of his tongue in disputation.” From what Fuller says farther, Collins seems to have been specially popular as a man of eccentric and witty ways. He was also known as a polemical author. "

8. Queen's College: Dr. John Mansell, President: elected 1622, and held office till 1631.

9. Catharine Hall: Dr. John Hills, Master; elected 1614, and held office till his death in 1626.

10. Jesus College : Dr. Roger Andrews, Master; elected 1618, and held office till 1632.

11. Christ's College : Dr. Thomas Bainbrigge, Master; elected 1620, and held office till 1645 ; of whom more hereafter.

12. St. John's College : Dr. Owen Gwynne, Master, elected 1612, and held office till his death in 1633. He was a Welshman by birth ; had been a Fellow of St. John's; and vicar of East Ham in Essex from 1605 to 1611. In 1622 he was preferred to the archdeaconry of Huntingdon, then vacant by the promo, tion of Laud to the bishopric of St. David's. The College, Baker says, was very much mismanaged in his time, though it had the good fortune to send forth during his prefecture three alumni no less famous than the Earl of Strafford, Lord Fairfax, and Lord Falkland. He left, says Baker, nothing to the College but his name; and “that adds little lustre to our annals.”

13. Magdalen College: Barnaby Gooch, LL.D., Master; elected in 1604, and held office till his death in 1625-6.

14. Trinity College : Dr. John Richardson, Master; elected 1615, and held office till his death in 1625; succeeded by Mawe.

15. Emanuel College : Dr. John Preston, Master; elected 1622, and held office till his death in 1628. Of all the heads of Colleges this was the one whose presence in Cambridge was the most impressive. Born in Northamptonshire in 1587, Preston was admitted a student of King's College, Cambridge, in 1604, and afterwards removed to Queen's College, of which he became a fellow in 1609. “ Before he commenced M. A.," says Fuller, "he was so far from eminency as but a little above contempt: thus the most generous wines are the most muddy before they fine. Soon after, his skill in philosophy

rendered him to the most general respect of the University.” He had, during the earlier part of his College-life, “received some religious impressions” from a sermon by a Puritan preacher, which had the effect of making him all his life a tenacious adherent of the Calvinistic theology and Puritan church-forms. When King James first visited Cambridge in 1614, Mr. Preston was appointed to dispute before him, and he acquitted himself so wonderfully that his preferment in the church would have been certain “had not his inclinations to Puritanism been a bar in his way.” As it was, he devoted himself to an academical life; making it his business to train up the young men committed to him in the principles of Puritanism, and so, as well as by the Puritan tone of his public lectures and sermons, becoming conspicuous in a University where most of the heads and seniors tended the other way." He was,” says Fuller, “ the greatest pupil-monger in England in man's memory, having sixteen fellow-commoners (most heirs to fair estates) admitted in one year at Queen's College. As William the Popular of Nassau was said to have won a subject from the King of Spain to his own party every time he put off his hat, so was it commonly said in the College that every time when Master Preston plucked off his hat to Dr. Davenant the College-master, he gained a chamber or study for one of his pupils.” When he was chosen Master of Emanuel in 1622, he was still under forty; and he was then made D. D. He carried most of his pupils from Queen's to Emanuel with him; and, as Master of Emanuel he kept up the reputation of that house as the most Puritanical in the University. Holding such a post, and possessing such a reputation, it was natural that he should be regarded by the Puritans of England as their leading man; and accordingly he was selected by the Duke of Buckingham as the medium through whom the Puritans were to be managed. “Whilst any hope,” says Fuller, “none but Doctor Preston with the Duke; set up and extolled; and afterwards set by and neglected, when found useless to the intended purpose.” During the days of his favor at Court he had been appointed chaplain to Prince Charles. When Milton went to Cambridge the eclipse of the Puritan Doctor's fortunes as a courtier had begun ; but he was still at the height of his reputation with the Puritans — none the less that he was reported to have stood firm against the temptation of a bishopric. He also still held the important position of Trinity lecturer; and this position, together with that of preacher at Lincoln's Inn, enabled him to promulgate his opinions almost as authoritatively as if he had been a bishop. Had he lived longer it is probable he would have played a still more important part in English history. Summing up his character, Fuller says, “ He was a perfect politician, and used lapwing-like, to flutter most on that place which was farthest from his eggs. He had perfect command of his passion, with the Caspian Sea never ebbing nor flowing, and would not alter his composed face for all the whipping which satirical wits bestowed upon him. He never had wife, nor cure of souls, and, leaving a plentiful, but no invidious estate, died A. D. 1628, July 20.” He left not a few writings.

1

held office till his death in 1643. He was a native of the county of Durham; became a scholar of Christ's College, Cambridge, and then a fellow of Emanuel, whence he was preferred to the Mastership of Sidney Sussex. In 1621 he was appointed Margaret Professor of Divinity, which office he held along with his Mastership. He was a learned man, and was reputed to be of Puritan leanings till Puritanism came into the ascendant. Fuller, who had known him as a pupil, gives this description of him in comparison with his contemporary Collins of King's: “Yet he was a Moses not only for slowness of speech, but otherwise, meekness of nature. Indeed, when in my private thoughts I have beheld him and Dr. Collins (disputable whether more different or more eminent in their endowments), I could not but remember the running of Peter and John to the place where Christ was buried. In which race John came first, as the youngest and swiftest to the grave; but Peter first entered into the grave. Doctor Collins had much the speed of him in quickness of parts ; but let me say (nor doth the relation of a pupil misguide me) the other pierced the deeper into the underground and profound points of Divinity."!

Besides the above-named sixteen men (or, including the Proctors, eighteen), with whose physiognomies and figures Milton must necessarily have become acquainted within the first month or two of his residence at the University, we are able to mention a few others of the Cambridge notabilities of the time, with whom he must, ocularly at least, have soon become familiar.

There was Mr. Tabor of Corpus Christi, the Registrar of the University, who had held that office since 1600. There was old Mr. Andrew Downes, Fellow of St. John's, Regius Professor of Greek in the University," an extraordinarily tall man, with a long face and a ruddy complexion and a very quick eye;" always rather slovenly and eccentric in his habits, and now somewhat doting (he told one of his pupils confidentially that the word cat was derived from kai, " I burn"), but with the reputation of being “a walking library and a prodigy in Greek. There was Robert Metcalfe, a Fellow of John's since 1606, and now Regius Professor of Hebrew. As Public Orator of the University there was a man of no less mark than George Herbert, the poet, already an object of general admiration on account of his genius and the elegant sanctity of his life, though his fame as an English poet was yet to be acquired. He had formerly held for a year (1618–19) the office of Prælector of Rhetoric; and had then rather astonished the University by selecting for analysis and comment, not an oration of Demosthenes or Cicero, as was usual, but an oration of King James, whereof "he shewed the concinnity of the parts, the propriety of the phrase, the height and