Arts in the Hebdomadal Board, and on the other have in their hands the discipline of the University.

And as Nations and their Proctors arose out of the metropolitan character of a University, to which students congregated from the farthest and most various places, so are Faculties and Deans of Faculties the consequence of its encyclopedic profession. According to the idea of the institutions of Charlemagne, each school had its own teacher, who was called Rector, or Master. In Paris, however, where the school was founded in St. Genevieve's, the Chancellor of that Church became the . Rector, and he kept his old title of Chancellor in his new office. Elsewhere the head of the University was called Provost. However, it was not every one who would be qualified to profess even the Seven Sciences, of which the old course of instruction consisted, though the teaching was only elementary, and to become the Rector, Chancellor, or Provost, of the University; but, when these sciences became only parts of a whole system of instruction, which demanded in addition a knowledge of philosophy, scholastic theology, civil and canon law, medicine, natural history, and the Semitic languages, no one person was equal to the undertaking. The Rector fell back from the position of a teacher to that of a governor; and the instruction was divided among a board of Doctors, each of whom represented a special province in Science. This is the origin of Deans of Faculties; and, inasmuch as they undertook among themselves one of those departments of academical duty, which the Chancellor or Rector had hitherto fulfilled, they naturally became his Council. In some places the Proctors of the Nations were added. Thus, in Vienna the Council consisted of the Four Deans of Faculties, and the Four Proctore

As Nations preceded Faculties, we may suppose that Degrees, which are naturally connected with the latter, either did not enter into the original provisions of a University, or had not the same meaning as afterwards. And this seems to have been the case. At first they were only testimonials that a resident was fit to take part in the public teaching of the place; and hence, in the Oxford forms still observed, the Vice-Chancellor admits the person taking a degree to the "lectio" of certain books. Degrees would not at that time be considered mere honours or testimonials, to be enjoyed by persons who at once left the University and mixed in the world. The University would only confer them for its own purposes; and to its own subjects, for the sake of its own subjects. It would claim nothing for them external to its own limits; and, if so, only used a power obviously connate with its own existence. But of course the recognition of a University by the State, not to say by other Universities, would change the import of degrees, and, since such recognition has commonly been granted from the first, degrees have seldom been only what they were in their original idea; but the formal words by which they are denoted, still preserve its memory. As students on taking degrees are admitted "legere et disputare," so are they called " Magistri," that is, of the schools; and "Doctors," that is, teachers, or in some places "Professors," as the letters S.T.P. show, used instead of D.D.

It will be observed that the respective distributions into Faculties and into Nations are cross-divisions. Another cross-division, on which I shall not now enter, is into Colleges and Halls.

I conclude by enumerating the characteristic distinctions, laid down by Bulæus, between the public or

grammar schools founded by Charlemagne, and the Universities into which eventually some of them grew, 'or, as he would say, which Charlemagne also founded.

First, he says, they differ from each other ratione disciplina. The Scholæ Minores only taught the Trivium (viz., Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric,) and the Quadrivium, (viz., Geometry, Astronomy, Arithmetic, and Music,) the seven liberal Arts; whereas the Scholæ Majores added Medicine, Law, and Theology.

Next, ratione loci; for the Minores were many and everywhere, but the Majores only in great cities, and few in number. I have already remarked on the physical and social qualifications necessary for a place which is to become the seat of a great school of learning: Bulæus observes, that the Muses were said to inhabit mountains, Parnassus or Helicon, spots high and healthy and secured against the perils of war, and that the Academy was a grove; though of course he does not forget that the place must be accessible too, and in the highway of the world. "That the city of Paris," he says, "is ample in size, largely frequented, healthy and pleasant in site, there can be no doubt." Frederic the Second spoke the general sentiment, when he gave as a reason for establishing a University at Naples, the convenience of the sea coast and the fertility of the soil. We are informed by Matamorus, in his account of the Spanish Universities,* that Salamanca was but the second site of its University, which was transferred thither from Palencia on account of the fertility of the neighbourhood, and the mildness of its climate. And Mr. Prescott speaks of Alcala being chosen by Cardinal Ximenes as the site for his celebrated foundations, because "the salubrity of the air, and the sober, tranquil complexion of the scenery, on the beautiful Hispan. Illustr. t. 2, p. 801.

borders of the Henares, seemed well suited to academic study and meditation."

The third difference between the greater and lesser schools lies ratione fundatorum. Popes, Emperors, and Kings, are the founders of Universities; lesser authorities in Church and State are the founders of Colleges and Schools.

Fourthly, ratione privilegiorum. The very notion of a University, I believe, is, that it is an institution of privilege. I think it is Bulæus who says, "Studia Generalia cannot exist without privileges, any more than the body without the soul. And in this all writers on Universities agree." He reduces those privileges to two heads, "Patrocinium" and "Præmium;" and these, it is obvious, may be either of a civil or an ecclesiastical nature. There were formerly five Universities endowed with singular privileges: those of Rome, of Paris, of Bologna, of Oxford, and of Salamanca; but Antony à Wood quotes an author who seems to substitute Padua for Rome in this list.

Lastly, the greater and lesser schools differ ratione regiminis. The head of a College is one; but a University is a "respublica litteraria."

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CHAPTER XIV.

SUPPLY AND DEMAND:

THE SCHOOLMEN.

T is most interesting to observe how the foundations of the present intellectual greatness of Europe were laid, and most wonderful to think that they were ever laid at all. Let us consider how wide and how high is the platform of our knowledge at this day, and what openings in every direction are in progress,-openings of such promise, that, unless some convulsion of society takes place, even what we have attained, will in future times be nothing better than a poor beginning; and then on the other hand, let us recollect that, seven centuries ago, putting aside revealed truths, Europe had little more than that poor knowledge, partial and uncertain, and at best only practical, which is conveyed to us by the senses. Even our first principles now are beyond the most daring conjectures then; and what has been said so touchingly of Christian ideas as compared with pagan, is true in its way and degree of the progress of secular knowledge also in the seven centuries I have named.

"What sages would have died to learn,
[Is] taught by cottage dames."

Nor is this the only point in which the revelations of science may be compared to the supernatural revelations