462 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



In these our three eldest foundations we are to seek the primitive 

 constitution and the teaching system of our universities. In essen- 

 tials, they were the same ; only between the dates of Glasgow and 

 Old Aberdeen occurred two great events. One was the taking of Con- 

 stantinople, which spread the Greek scholars with their treasures over 

 Europe. The other was the progress of printing. In 1451, when Glas- 

 gow commenced, there was no printed text-book. In 1494, when King's 

 College began, the ancient classics had been largely printed ; the early 

 editions of Aristotle in our library show the date of 1486. 



Our universities have three well-marked periods ; the first anterior 

 to the Reformation ; the second, from the Reformation to the begin- 

 ning of last century ; the third, the last and present centuries. Con- 

 fining ourselves still to the Faculty of Arts, the features of the pre- 

 Reformation university were these : 



First, as regards the teaching body. The quadrennial arts' course 

 was conducted by so-called regents, who each carried the same stu- 

 dents through all the four years, thus taking upon himself the burden 

 of all the sciences a walking encyclopaedia. The system was in full 

 force, in spite of attempts to change it, during both the first and the 

 second pei'iods. You, the students of arts, at the present day, encount- 

 ering, in your four years, seven faces, seven voices, seven repositories 

 of knowledge, need an effort to understand how your predecessors 

 could be cheerful and happy, confined all through to one personality ; 

 sometimes juvenile, sometimes senile, often feeble at his best. 



Next, as regards the subjects taught. To know these you have 

 simply to know what are the writings of Aristotle. The little work 

 on him by Sir Alexander Grant supplies the needful information. The 

 records of the Glasgow University furnish the curriculum of Arts soon 

 after its foundation. The subjects are laid out in two heads Logic 

 and Philosophy. The Logic comprised first the three Treatises of the 

 Old Logic ; to these were now added the whole of the works making 

 up Aristotle's " Organon." This brought in the Syllogism and allied 

 matters. There was, also, a selection from the work known as the 

 " Topics," not now included in logical teaching, yet one of the most 

 remarkable and distinctive of Aristotle's writings. It is a highly- 

 labored account of the whole art of disputation, laid out under his 

 scheme of the Predicables. The selection fell chiefly on two books 

 the second, comprising what Aristotle had to say on Induction, and 

 the sixth, on Definition ; together with the " Logical Captions," or 

 Fallacies. Disputation was one of the products of the Greek mind ; 

 and Aristotle was its prophet. 



Now for Philosophy. This comprised nearly the whole of Aris- 

 totle's Physical treatises his very worst side together with his Met- 

 aphysics, some parts of which are hardly distinguishable from the 

 Physics. Next was the very difficult treatise " De Anima," on the 

 Mind, or Soul and some allied psychological treatises, as that on 



