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Section VIII. 



"Trinity," "The Colleges," and the Universities. 



Although the University of Dublin and Trinity College were 

 established by Charter of Elizabeth in 1591, and ;the founda- 

 tion stone of the College building was laid in the same year 

 by Thomas Smith, Apothecary, we do not see any evidence 

 of the study of medicine within its walls for many years after 

 the foundation. 



For the initiation of a medical faculty the College is indebted 

 to John Steame, born at Ardbraccan, Co. Meath, in 1624. 

 He spent part of his student days at Trinity College, and left 

 the country at the time of the Rebellion (1641). He next 

 went to Sidney College, Cambridge, and thence to Wadham 

 College, Oxford. On his return to Dublin he proceeded to 

 carry out his plan to establish a Fraternity of Physicians. 



In 1662 he was elected Professor of Medicine in the Uni- 

 versity of Dublin, when he had succeeded in establishing 

 Trinity Hall for " the advancement of the study of Physick 

 in Ireland. ' ' Shortly afterwards Stearne established the College 

 of Physicians, in 1668, by obtaining a Charter and the settle- 

 ment of Trinity Hall and the lands belonging thereto on the 

 newly incorporated College. 



This was the beginning of the College of Physicians, which 

 has since maintained its connection with the University of 

 Dublin. 



Trinity Hall was restored to the University in 1880, and 

 the articles drawn up include an agreement that the President 

 of the College of Physicians shall be a Protestant of the Church 

 of Ireland. The attempts of King James in 1686 to appoint 

 Arthur Green, " one of the king's converts," who was a 

 graduate of Physics of the University, to the Lectureship in 

 Irish, and to appoint Bernard Doyle of Drogheda as Fellow, 

 met with no success. Dr. Crosby, although elected to the 

 Presidency of the College about this time, the appointment 

 would not be sanctioned by Trinity because he was a Roman 

 Catholic. 



