[ 138 ] [Feb. 



THE LONDON UNIVERSITY. 



The London University advances, and we rejoice at it. We rejoice 

 at it, not because monopolies are incompatible with improvements, 

 though that would be reason enough for us, had it indeed any thing to 

 do with the case ; but because we regard it as another, and a most im- 

 portant step in the progress of more general cultivation. It is not be- 

 cause this institution tends to break up the exclusions of our venerable 

 universities that we rejoice, for it really has no such tendency — it 

 enters even into no sort of competition with them — it will produce 

 f :holars equally accomplished — it will produce them in greater num- 

 bers — and will assuredly promote more effectively the love of learning 

 itself! but it proposes to sap none of the foundations of their magni- 

 ficence, it is grasping at none of their privileges, nor will it labour to 

 seduce any of their admirers. We rejoice, then, not because a blow 

 may seem to be struck at their superiorities, but because it throws open 

 the approaches of a loftier and more inspiring edL.ui'on, to persons to 

 whurn such education has hitherto been inaccessible. 



The London University has no object, as a literary institution, but 

 the communication of knowledge. Oxford and Cambridge are no 

 longer thought of as places eminently possessed of the means of per- 

 fecting education, but as places where, unhappily, young men must 

 reside a certain term to qualify for certain appointments. They are the 

 destined portals through which all must pass to the service of the 

 church. They are, besides, greatly to their glory, finishing establish- 

 ments for the nobility — the fashionable receptacles for the sons of the 

 wealthy, and as many as blindly and absurdly ape the customs of the 

 higher and wealthier classes of society. To the London University 

 none will go who do not go to learn — none will go, we know, to qualify 

 —none will go for distinction's sake — and none will go because their 

 friends know no where else, for three or four years, to bestow them. 



Education, we repeat, is not the purpose of the old universities, and 

 certainly instruction cannot be said to be the business of them. The 

 real purpose is residence ; and the greater part shew their sense of the 

 irksome duty, by making the tedious days fly rapidly onward, on a round 

 of oblivious amusements. In the meanwhile, instruction is going on xn 

 the forms of it, and, to a certain extent, is always to be had there. 

 But you may do as you please : if you have no particular ardour for 

 study, it will not be forced upon you ; nobody will seduce you into it, 

 and scarcely will any thing remind you of it. Though you never glance 

 at a book, you are not out of your place : you pay your fees, and are 

 welcome. You assume the costume, and are one of them. You are 

 required to attend a daily lecture or two — attend personally, that is, 

 but mentally, as you please ; or, if you enrol yourself in the privileged 

 class — one that has multiplied prodigiously of late years, you may, in 

 the meanwhile, three times out of four, if you like, be following the 

 hounds. We are n(.t speaking adventurously ; this distinguished class 

 has a claim, by the statutes, to privileges ; and privileges, every body 

 knows, are never entrenched upon — are never lessened in practice. 



But what is to be done with young men who will not read ? Dis- 

 miss them : what have such persons to do with universities, if univer- 

 sities be really destined for study, but to interrupt its peaceable pur- 



