Reformation and in England

REFORMATION AND IN ENGLAND The influence of the Renaissance, and the teaching of Erasmus, who resided for some time at both univer sities, exercised a notable effect alike at Oxford and at Cambridge. The names of Colet, Grocyn and Linacre illustrate this influence at the former centre; those of Bishop Fisher, Sir John Cheke and Sir Thomas Smith at the latter. The labours of Erasmus at Cam bridge, as the author of a new Latin version of the New Testa ment, with the design of placing in the hands of students a text free from the errors of the Vulgate, were productive of important effects, and the university became a centre of Reformation doc trine some years before the writings of Luther became known in England. The foundation of Christ's college (1505) and St. John's college (I 5i I ), through the influence of Fisher with the countess of Richmond, also materially aided the general progress of learning at Cambridge. The Royal Injunctions of 1535, em bodying the views and designs of Thomas Cromwell, mark the downfall of the old scholastic methods of study at both univer sities; and the foundation of Trinity college, Cambridge, in 1547 (partly by an amalgamation of two older societies), represents the earliest conception of such an institution in England in complete independence of Roman Catholic traditions. Trinity (1554) and St. John's (1555) at Oxford, on the other hand, founded during the reactionary reign of Mdry, serve rather as examples of a transitional period.

Puritanism at Cambridge.

In the reign of Elizabeth, Cam bridge became the centre of another great movement—that of the earlier Puritanism, St. John's and Queens' being the strongholds of the party led by Cartwright, Walter Travers and others. The movement continued to gather strength ; and Emmanuel college, founded in 1584, owed much of its early prosperity to the fact that it was a known school of Puritan doctrine. Most of the Puri tans objected to the discipline enforced by the university and ordinary college statutes—especially the wearing of the cap and the surplice and the conferring of degrees in divinity. The Angli

can party, headed by such men as Whitgift and Bancroft, resorted in defence to a repressive policy, of which subscription to the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity, and the Elizabethan statutes of 157o (investing the "caput" with larger powers, and thereby creating a more oligarchical form of government), were the most notable results. Oxford, although the Puritans were there headed by Leicester, the chancellor, devised at the same time a similar scheme, the rigid discipline of which was further developed in the Laudian or Caroline statutes of 1636. It was under these respec tive codes—the Elizabethan statutes of 157o and the Laudian statutes of 1636—that the two universities were governed until the introduction of the new codes of 1858. The fidelity with which both universities adhered to the royal cause in the Civil War caused them to be regarded with suspicion by the Puritan party, and under the Commonwealth both Oxford and Cambridge were, for a brief period, in great danger owing to the distrust, which culminated among the members of the "Nominated Parlia ment" (July–Dec. 1653), of university education generally, as tending to foster contentiousness with respect to religious belief. It was even proposed by William Dell—himself the master of Caius college—to abolish the two universities altogether, as hope lessly pledged to antiquated and obsolete methods, and to estab lish in their place schools for the higher instruction throughout the country. They were saved, however, by the firmness of Crom well, at that time chancellor of Oxford, and, although Aristotle and the scholastic philosophy no longer held their ground, a marked improvement was observable both in discipline and morality among the students. At Oxford, under the influence and teaching of Dr. Wilkins, Seth Ward and John Wallis, a flourishing school of mathematics was formed.