156 The London University. [Feb. 



viving and clinging to them, to abandon them to their too probable fate, 

 without one warning word. 



' Turn we then for a few minutes to our first object. What is antici- 

 pated from this new and threatening institution ? Is it to exhibit 

 a model, and prove the paragon of learned establishments ? Is there no 

 lurking expectation that its example must force a reformation in those 

 ancient fabrics ? Not at all. It will neither imitate them, nor can it 

 hope to be imitated by them. They have pre-occupied the clergy and 

 the wealthy, and it neither expects nor wishes to rob them of one 

 ^ mother's son of them.' For whom then is it destined ? For those who 

 are panting for the means of gaining that very instruction, which is sup- 

 posed always to be gained at our old universities — for the opportunities 

 of learning the best and amplest sources of information, and of being 

 directed by skilful guides, where most shortly, securely, certainly to 

 slake the sacred thirst ; and whom the intolerable expense of those 

 corrupted establishments must exclude, and their growing degeneracy 

 might well deter — not gentlemen of family and fortune, but men who 

 are destined for inferior, but still respectable and responsible stations — 

 stations, which a superior education will enable them to fill with more 

 credit to themselves and efficiency to the public, or to their private 

 employers. It is, in short, for thousands, who are thirsting for know- 

 ledge, and against whom there is no reason upon earth why the foun- 

 tains of knowledge should be closed. Whether they make a good or 

 a bad use of it will primarily affect themselves ; a good use will un- 

 questionably benefit society ; and as to any bad use that may be made 

 of it, it will be time enough to think about that matter when the bale- 

 ful tendencies become visible. 



But objections are starting up on every side : one affects an interest 

 in the success, but wonders how reasonable people can be so visionary, 

 as to suppose an institution of this kind can be managed by joint-stock 

 conductors ; or, how it can be imagined some hundreds of young people 

 are to be assembled, and kept in any sort of subordination, where there 

 exists no real and acknowledged authority, and where no discipline can 

 be enforced. Let us not be startled at the phantoms, and we shall soon 

 be able to lay them. In the first place, it may be safely concluded — 

 though some will be sent by parents as they are sent to schools, and so 

 may attend reluctantly, the greater part will attend from a desire to 

 learn — learning will be their object, and employment, we may be sure, 

 will keep them orderly. In the next place, though professors and 

 tutors may have less direct authority than is possessed in public insti- 

 tutions, the general management need not, and will not leave them- 

 selves without the power of expulsion ; and we shall trust, with full 

 confidence, to the excited ingenuity of the teachers for the discovery 

 of adequate stimulus to stir the emulation of their pupils, and keep 

 them occupied. Besides, there will thei-e be no voluntary idlers ; and 

 parents, who find their sons more disposed to loiter than labour, will 

 at once remove them : why should they keep them there an hour when 

 they are doing no good? — there are no degrees — no necessities — no 

 urging desirabilities — no fashion to detain them. 



But another objector expostulates in a tone of more severity : — of 

 what utility is the learning this class of persons are likely to acquire — 

 of what use are languages, theories, sciences, to tliose who are destined 



