mply provided with
books, should devote their leisure to the prosecution of study, and that
some effects of their studies should be manifested to the world. The
shelves of their library groan under the weight of the Benedictine
folios, of the editions of the fathers, and the collections of the
middle ages, which have issued from the single abbey of St. Germain
de Prez at Paris. A composition of genius must be the offspring of one
mind; but such works of industry, as may be divided among many hands,
and must be continued during many years, are the peculiar province of a
laborious community. If I inquire into the manufactures of the monks of
Magdalen, if I extend the inquiry to the other colleges of Oxford and
Cambridge, a silent blush, or a scornful frown, will be the only reply.
The fellows or monks of my time were decent easy men, who supinely
enjoyed the gifts of the founder; their days were filled by a series of
uniform employments; the chapel and the hall, the coffee-house and the
common room, till they retired, weary and well satisfied, to a long
slumber. From the toil of reading, or thinking, or writing, they
had absolved their conscience; and the first shoots of learning and
ingenuity withered on the ground, without yielding any fruits to the
owners or the public. As a gentleman commoner, I was admitted to the
society of the fellows, and fondly expected that some questions
of literature would be the amusing and instructive topics of their
discourse. Their conversation stagnated in a round of college business,
Tory politics, personal anecdotes, and private scandal: their dull
and deep potations excused the brisk intemperance of youth; and their
constitutional toasts were not expressive of the most lively loyalty for
the house of Hanover. A general election was now approaching: the
great Oxfordshire contest already blazed with all the malevolence of
party-zeal. Magdalen College was devoutly attached to the old interest!
and the names of Wenman and Dashwood were more frequently pronounced,
than those of Cicero and Chrysostom. The example of the senior fellows
could not inspire the under-graduates with a liberal spirit or studious
emulation; and I cannot describe, as I never knew, the discipline
of college. Some duties may possibly have been imposed on the poor
scholars, whose ambition aspired to the peaceful honours of a fellowship
(ascribi quietis ordinibus - - - - Deorum); but no independent members
were admitted b