NATURE 



495 



THURSDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1874 



THE UNIVERSITIES COMMISSION REPORT* 

 II. 



XT has of course been always well known that the 

 endowments of Oxford and Cambridge have been by 

 law restricted, till within the last few years, to members 

 of the Established Church ; but to the outside world it 

 will probably be a surprise to learn from this Report how 

 far-reaching have been the consequences of this restric- 

 tion, and how deep is the ecclesiastical character which 

 has been thus imprinted upon a large portion of the 

 academical wealth which the nation imagines to be at its 

 own free disposal. It must be premised that in this 

 respect, as in so many others, Oxford furnishes far more 

 matter for comment than Cambridge, so that the follow- 

 ing illustrations will be mainly taken from the former 

 University ; and also that it is regularly in the most 

 wealthy Colleges that ecclesiastical objects receive a dis- 

 proportionate amount of pecuniary aid : two circum- 

 stances which point to the conclusion that it is superfluity 

 of income which causes the interests of education and 

 learning to be cast into comparative neglect. 



The synoptical tables at the end of this volume state 

 that the Oxford Colleges have in their gift or annexed to 

 their Headships 436 benefices of the returned annual 

 value of 187,000/. It is notorious that these returns are 

 considerably below the gross amount actually received, 

 but as they stand they represent a sum equal to more 

 than two-thirds of the total amount which these same 

 Colleges receive from their corporate endowments. The 

 proportion at Cambridge is not quite so large. Some of 

 the Colleges have exercised their statutory powers of sell- 

 ing their advowsons, but to no great extent, and it is yet 

 a moot legal point whether the money produced from 

 such sales can be diverted to purely secular objects. It 

 is noticed, however, by the Commissioners, that in one or 

 two cases such money has been carried to the ordinary 

 account, and that in others it has been appropriated to 

 purposes which otherwise must have been paid for out of 

 the corporate revenue. The proper disposition of the 

 wealth represented by these advowsons is clearly one of 

 those questions which should not bo left to the varying 

 and self-interested action of the individual Colleges, but 

 must be resolutely faced by Parliament, and if it be 

 decided in the way which the progress of modern 

 opinion seems most disposed to favour, there will re- 

 sult a very large increase on the total of 260,000/. a 

 year mentioned last week as the clear sum available 

 in the reconsideration of the endowments of Oxford. 

 According to another heading in the synoptical tables 

 the total sum of 8,600/. is expended upon the College 

 chapels at Oxford, a total which will probably not be con- 

 sidered too large, when it is also stated that.out of it are 

 maintained the great choral services at Magdalen, New, 

 and Christ Church, at an average of more than 2,000/. 

 each. This sum, however, deserves quotation, if only out 

 of contrast with the item which follows under the head of 

 " Library," which amounts at Oxford to the bare pittance 

 of 1,300/. Here also the amounts expended at Cam- 

 bridge upon the ecclesiastical and secular estabhshments 



* Continued from p. 476. 



Vol. X. — No. 260 



stand in a similar proportion. It is true that the libraries 

 are awarded something besides from Trust funds and 

 from fees on graduation, but the circumstance that their 

 wants are so conspicuously put into the second place is 

 most significant of the general tone of feeling prevalent 

 at the Universities on these matters. 



Another item in these tables is headed " Subscriptions 

 and Pensions," amounting at Oxford to close upon g,ooo/., 

 which may not perhaps seem an extravagant expenditure 

 for the owners in fee of so much landed property ; yet 

 it will be viewed with much suspicion by those who know 

 how feeble College meetings are in their resistance to the 

 importunities of past members of their body seeking pecu- 

 niary help for all those objects which the Church of 

 England takes upon itself to perform in rural parishes. 

 The part of this subject, however, which is destined to 

 attract the largest amount of public attention is that 

 which has reference to the augmentation of College bene- 

 fices out of corporate income, a process by which, as was 

 before tolerably well known, the clerical fellows, forming 

 as they do a majority in the governing bodies, provide 

 comfortable pensions for their own declining years, and at 

 the same time evince their interest in the general welfare of 

 the Church. The extent, however, to which this process 

 has been carried on is now revealed for the first time, 

 though it is not quite apparent whether all has yet been 

 disclosed, for in the course of their inquiries on this topic 

 the Commissioners have not unnaturally been met with 

 considerable reluctance, and in some cases apparently 

 even with evasion. The synoptical tables for the Oxford 

 Colleges give the amount thus annually devoted as just 

 9,000/, which may. be thought a fully sufficient charge for 

 this item, being more than is set apart for College 

 officers, for the management of estates, or for invest- 

 ment. This figure, however, it cannot be too widely 

 known, is a totally delusive one, and probably does not 

 represent one quarter of the amount which is really 

 squandered in this way. This conclusion would be at 

 once suspected by anyone who has an inkling of the 

 facts, when he reads that Queen's is credited in this table 

 with nothing at all, and Magdalen with only 17/. \os. A 

 more particular examination of the full returns made by 

 the individual Colleges amply confirms these suspicions 

 by proving, though in a roundabout way, that Queen's 

 really pays away to incumbents 3,000/. a year, and Mag- 

 dalen no less than 9,000/. To this it may be added that 

 Christ Church, which in the tables is only credited with 

 2,000/., does as a matter of fact spend just four times that 

 amount ; and that since 1835, and chiefly within the last 

 few years, has given away 28,000/. for cognate eccle- 

 siastical purposes. In connection with this subject, it 

 may be mentioned that Magdalen possesses a certain 

 benefaction called the Sheppard Fund, subject to no 

 specific conditions, except that the proceeds are to be 

 appropriated " to such uses as are likely to promote piety 

 and learning in Magdalen or any other College." Out of 

 a net 2,000/. a year received from this fund, 300/. is spent 

 on management, &c., the ambiguous item of subscriptions 

 runs away with 470/., while 720/. is swallowed up in eccle- 

 siastical objects, leaving a bare 540/. for Magdalen Col- 

 lege and other schools. The accounts of the Hulme 

 Trust connected with Brasenose teach the same lesson, 

 for in that case no less than 4,000/. per annum out of a 



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