452 APPENDIX. 



fessor of Zoology in Oxford and Cambridge, whose public 

 lectures would at least serve "just to put the taste for this 

 study into the mental mouths of the young disciples, to be fol- 

 lowed up when they shall have quitted college." The stigma 

 on the Government, and on the lay members of the universities, 

 for thus long neglecting to promote this science, may be cheaply 

 redeemed by the former remitting its abominable stamps upon 

 Degrees taken in Arts, viz. three guineas, I believe, upon the 

 A.B., and six on the M.A. degree. These sums are paid by 

 hundreds of clerical parents, who at great cost and homefelt 

 sacrifice educate one son for the church. Now these are taxes, 

 doubly and trebly faulty, as being pat tial, if not oppressive ; 

 and, unlike the newspaper tax, are obstacles in the road to ob- 

 taining that " sound learning and religious education," and 

 that " useful knowledge," also, which colleges profess and are 

 intended specially to promote, " for fit supply to serve God in 

 Church and State."* I have not the means at hand of esti- 

 mating correctly the produce of these taxes ; but, from an old 

 Cambridge Kalendar of the year 1827, I learn that about 200 

 persons then took the degree of M. A. This gives 1 200 guineas 

 for one degree, in one only of our universities. So that, for all 

 degrees in Oxford, Cambridge, and Dublin, I will assume 5000 

 is annually paid into the national treasury, which repays back 

 less than one fifth, or 1000/., to ten Professors in Cambridge. 

 This is the sum total of national help to that university. Here, 

 then, is a fund for endowing ten professorships of 500/. per 

 annum, on any of the more neglected sciences, — " a refuge for 

 the destitute," — such as many an able and languishing son of 

 science would gladly accept, and for which he would fearlessly 

 and cheerfully devote his services. Let the Government, then, 

 remit the tax, but not, as now, pay and appoint the professors. 

 Let all the graduates pay the same sums as before, but into the 

 university chest : and, so paying, let all (that will) exercise a 

 right of voting in person or by proxy for any candidate, whether 

 he be a member or not, at the time, of the university. Let 

 these Professors be actual masters and lecturers in their science 

 — not sinecure dignitaries of the scientific world, but labourers 



* Quoted from Canonical prefatory Prayer before Assize and Visitation 

 Sermons, &c 



