e given to the undergraduates at Cambridge, England.
--_Crabb's Tech. Dict._

SOPHISTER. Greek, [Greek: sophistaes]. In the University of
Cambridge, Eng., the title of students who are advanced beyond the
first year of their residence. The entire course at the University
consists of three years and one term, during which the students
have the titles of First-Year Men, or Freshmen; Second-Year Men,
or Junior Sophs or Sophisters; Third-Year Men, or Senior Sophs or
Sophisters; and, in the last term, Questionists, with reference to
the approaching examination. In the older American colleges, the
Junior and Senior Classes were originally called Junior Sophisters
and Senior Sophisters. The term is also used at Oxford and Dublin.
--_Webster_.

And in case any of the _Sophisters_ fail in the premises required
at their hands, &c.--_Quincy's Hist. Harv. Univ._, Vol. I. p. 518.

SOPHOMORE. One belonging to the second of the four classes in an
American college.

Professor Goodrich, in his unabridged edition of Dr. Webster's
Dictionary, gives the following interesting account of this word.
"This word has generally been considered as an 'American
barbarism,' but was probably introduced into our country, at a
very early period, from the University of Cambridge, Eng. Among
the cant terms at that University, as given in the Gradus ad
Cantabrigiam, we find _Soph-Mor_ as 'the next distinctive
appellation to Freshman.' It is added, that 'a writer in the
Gentlemen's Magazine thinks _mor_ an abbreviation of the Greek
[Greek: moria], introduced at a time when the _Encomium Moriae_,
the Praise of Folly, by Erasmus, was so generally used.' The
ordinary derivation of the word, from [Greek: sofos] and [Greek:
moros] would seem, therefore, to be incorrect. The younger Sophs
at Cambridge appear, formerly, to have received the adjunct _mor_
([Greek: moros]) to their names, either as one which they courted
for the reason mentioned above, or as one given them in sport, for
the supposed exhibition of inflated feeling in entering on their
new honors. The term, thus applied, seems to have passed, at a
very early period, from Cambridge in England to Cambridge in
America, as 'the next distinctive appellation to Freshman,' and
thus to have been attached to the second of the four classes in
our American colleges; while it has now almost ceased to be known,
even as a cant word, at the parent institution in England whence
it came. This derivation of