A WEEKLY ILLUSTRATED JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 



' ' To the solid ground 

 Of Nature trusts the mind which builds for aye." — Wordsworth 



GRESHAM COLLEGE. 

 R. GOSCHEN— speaking on behalf of the London 

 Branch of the Lecture Society which was started 

 Prof. James Stewart, of Cambridge, for the pur- 

 of giving remunerative employment to some of 

 younger graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, and 

 the same time of affording instruction and amuse- 

 snt of an intelligent character to such audiences 

 the larger manufacturing towns afford— has publicly 

 fed the claim of the Society to enter upon Gresham's 

 ritage, and by the aid of the funds still in the hands of 

 trustees, and of such moneys as those trustees may 

 ik it incumbent upon them to restore to the Gresham 

 list, to carry out the purpose of that great founder, who, 

 hundred and fifty years ago, bequeathed property, now 

 led at several millions sterling, for the purpose of 

 laintaining a College of Professors in London. There is 

 * question as to what were the intentions of Gresham, nor 

 .:> to the disgraceful nature of the transactions by which 

 his trustees— the Corporation of London and the Mercers' 

 Company — a little more than one hundred years ago 

 were enabled to seize the property of the trust, and, with 

 the sanction of an Act of Parliament, to assign a mere 

 fraction of it to the payment of half a dozen lecturers, 

 whilst appropriating the bulk of it to their individual and 

 corporate use. 



It is beyond question that the existing representatives 

 of the Corporation of London and the Mercers' Company 

 are ashamed of the neglect and spoliation of which their 

 predecessors, in a corrupt age, were guilty. They would 

 be glad to assign the money with which they at present 

 pay so-called " Gresham Professors," and even a large 

 additional sum, representing the misappropriated trust 

 funds, to an institution more truly representing Gresham's 

 purpose than the lecture-room now existing at the back 

 of Mercers' Hall, in the heart of the City, could they 

 be assured that any one of the various plans which 

 have been from time to time urged upon them was really 

 a wise and true method of carrying out. that purpose. 

 Vol. XXXIX.— No. 992. 



We venture to think that Mr, Goschen has merely 



added to the perplexity in which Gresham's trustees find 



themselves by his ill-timed proposal that his Lecture 



Society should be supported by the funds disposed of by 



those trustees. The lectures given by this Society are, 



we feel assured, excellent in their way, and we do not 



doubt that they give a large amount of pleasure and of 



useful information to the persons who attend them. We 



are aware that the lectures are more serious in scope 



than the series of popular lectures frequently arranged by 



lecture associations, and consist of short courses, in 



which one teacher is able at some length to explain the 



outlines of his subject, instead of isolated lectures by 



numerous individuals on disconnected topics. It is only 



reasonable that any public or semi-public institution, 



. having a lecture-theatre at its disposal, should encourage 



j so excellent a Lecture Society as Mr. Goschen's, by 



I giving it the use of rooms from time to time. Thus the 



I various Vestry Halls of London may be (and we believe 



j have been) made use of. The London Institution in 



Finsbury Circus, University and King's Colleges, and the 



University of London could easily lend a lecture-theatre 



, from time to time to Mr. Qo%c\itvi!'=> proteges as they have 



I to other similar Societies. And it is not unfitting that 



Gresham's trustees should lend the little-used theatre of 



the Gresham Professors for the same purpose. When, 



\ however, Mr. Goschen and his friends take advantage of 



' this hospitahty to urge that not only should Gresham's 



theatre be lent to them, but that Gresham's money 



j should be assigned to the support of their lecturers, it 



I seems to us that an unwarrantable pretension is put for- 



i ward, and one which is to be deprecated on very special 



i grounds. Those grounds are as follows. 



I Gresham's foundation was assigned by him to the sup- 



I port of a body consisting of seven learned men, to whom 



j he proposed to furnish, not a mere fee for a short course 



j of lectures, but a life-provision — in fact, a residence, 



■ laboratories, and the means of research, as well as a 



I stipend, at the highest rate at which such persons were 



paid three hundred years ago, as shown by the payments 



I made to the Professors and College officials of Oxford 



and Cambridge. Gresham assigned his own palace and 



garden, situated where Old Broad Street at present runs, 



