Let us have patience, my Lord. I have not scrupled to confess to you,
that much is, at present, amiss in those seminaries, and wants to
be set right. But so, God knows, there is every where else. As our
factions and parties both in religion and government die away, the
Universities will become more reasonable; and as the general manners
refine, they too will, of course, take a better air and polish. In a
word, they may not lead the public taste or judgment; but, as I said,
they will be sure to follow it.
And the happy period is not, perhaps, far off. For, now I have taken
upon me to divine so much of the future condition of our Universities,
let me paint to you more particularly what I conceive of their growing
improvements; and, in a kind of prophetic strain, such as old age, they
say, pretends to, and may be indulged in, delineate to you a faint
prospect of those brighter days, which I see rising upon us.
“The TIME will come, my Lord, and I even assure myself it is at
no great distance, when the Universities of _England_ shall be as
respectable, for the learning they teach, the principles they instil,
and the morals they inculcate, as they are now contemptible, in your
Lordship’s eye at least, on these several accounts.
“I see the day, when a scholastic theology shall give place to a
rational divinity, conducted on the principles of sound criticism and
well interpreted scripture: when their sums and systems shall fly
before enlightened reason and sober speculation: when a fanciful,
precarious, and hypothetic philosophy, shall desert their schools; and
be replaced by real science, supporting itself on the sure grounds of
experiment and cautious observation: when their physics shall be fact;
their metaphysics, common sense; and their ethics, human nature.
“Do I flatter myself with fond imaginations, my Lord? Or is not the
time at hand, when St. PAUL shall lecture our divines, and not CALVIN;
our BACONS and BOYLES expel ARISTOTLE; Mr. NEWTON fill the chair of
DES CARTES; and even your friend (if your Lordship can forgive the
arrogance of placing himself by the side of such men) take the lead of
BURGERSDICIUS?
“Still, my Lord, my prophetic eye penetrates further. Amidst these
improvements in real science, the languages shall be learnt for use,
and not pedantry: Your Lordship’s admired ancients shall be respected,
and not idolized: the forms of classic composition be emulated: and a
set of men arise, even beneath the shade of our academic cloysters,
that shall polish the taste, as well as advance the knowledge, of their
country.
“Yet, I am but half way in the portraiture of my vision. The appointed
lecturers of our youth, whom your Lordship loves to qualify with the
name of _bearded boys_, shall adopt the manners of men; shall instruct
with knowledge, and persuade with reason; shall be the first to
explode slavish doctrines and narrow principles; shall draw respect
to themselves, rather from the authority of their characters, than
of their places; and, which is the first and last part of a good
education, set the noble and ingenuous youth intrusted to their care,
the brightest examples of diligence, sobriety, and virtue.
“Perhaps in those days, a freer commerce shall be opened with the
world: the students of our colleges be ambitious of appearing in good
company: and a general civility prevail, where your Lordship sees
nothing, at present, but barbarism and rudeness.
“Nay, who knows but, in this different state of things, the arts
themselves may gain admission into these seminaries; and even the
exercises be taught there, which our noble youth are now sent to
acquire on the Continent?
“Such, I persuade myself, if the presage of old experience may pass
for any thing, is the happier scene which a little time shall disclose
to your view, in our _English_ Universities. What its duration may be,
I cannot discover. Much will depend on the general manners, and the
public encouragement. In the mean time, if any cloud rest upon it, it
will not, I assure myself, arise immediately from within, but from the
little, or, which is worse, the ill-directed favour, which the Great
shall vouchsafe to shew to places, so qualified, and so deserving their
protection.
“Yet, after all I have seen, or perhaps dreamt, as your Lordship
may rather object to me, of the future flourishing estate of our
Universities, and of their extreme fitness in all respects to answer
the ends of their institution, I cannot be mistaken in one prediction,
“that the mode of early Travel will still continue; perhaps its fury
will increase; and our youth of quality be still sent abroad for their
education, when every reason shall cease which your Lordship has now
alleged in favour of that practice.”