Churches throughout the year were to be discharged by four salaried
Chaplains, yet, during Lent, a Fellow of the College was to assist the
Chaplain of All Saints in hearing confessions and in other ministerial
functions; another, similarly, to assist the Chaplain of St.
Michael’s; another, to assist the Chaplain at Combe; and the Rector,
or a Fellow appointed by him, to assist the Chaplain at Twyford. On
all greater festival days, the Rector or his representative (in an
amice, if he had one, and if not, in surplice, and the hood of his
degree), accompanied by all the Fellows (except one who was to attend
as representative of the College at St. Michael’s), was to go to
service at All Saints.[170] St. Mildred’s Church was to be commemorated
on her day (13th July) by a celebration in the College chapel; and the
benefaction of John Bucktot by a Fellow going to Ashendon to say mass
on St. Matthias day, and that of William Finderne by a similar service
in Childrey parish church.[171] Sermons in English were to be preached
at All Saints on Easter Day and on All Saints Day,[172] by the Rector,
and on the dedication day of that Church, by one of the Fellows; and at
St. Michael’s on Michaelmas Day, by one of the Fellows.[173]
(_b_) As regards temporalities. On the 6th of May a “Rector chori” was
to be appointed for All Saints and a “Rector chori” for St. Michael’s;
their duties were to occupy the Rector’s stall in the chancel, and to
collect all alms, fees, etc., for the bursar of the College. These
duties at Twyford belonged to the Rector of the College, and at Combe
were supervised by him.
(4) As regards the ordinary academical curriculum, the founder’s
requirements were by no means exacting.
(_a_) The College disputations were to be weekly during Term, in Logic
and Philosophy on Wednesdays, for those members who had taken B.A. and
not yet proceeded to M.A. (there being no undergraduates, according to
the founder’s scheme); and in Theology on Fridays, for all members of
M.A. standing. Both sets of disputations were to cease during Lent,
when the Fellows were engaged in their ministerial duties.
(_b_) Fellows, elected as B.A., were to proceed to M.A. as soon as
possible; Fellows were to take B.D. (or B. Can. L. in case of the
Canonist Fellow) within nine years from M.A.; and, unless the College
approved of an excuse, to proceed to D.D. (or D. Can. L.) within six
years later. The last of these provisions, however, was practically a
dead letter, for the College never forced any Fellow to the expensive
dignity of the Doctorate.
(5) Study, however, as distinct from formal academical exercises,
was inculcated as a virtue both by persuasions and punishments. The
Subrector was charged to rebuke Fellows not merely for offences against
morality and decorum, but for being neglectful of books; and unless the
Fellows so admonished submitted and mended their ways, they were to be
expelled.
The founder and later benefactors, as has been from time to time noted,
made gifts of “books” (_i. e._ MSS.) for the use of the Fellows;
and John Forest built a library for their reception. According to
Rotheram’s statutes, two classes of books were to be recognized--
(_a_) Those which were to be chained in the library, and which the
reader had therefore to consult there. According to the Catalogue of
1474, this library then contained 135 MSS., arranged on seven desks.
(_b_) Those which were to be considered as “in the common choice” of
the Rector and Fellows. On each 6th November a list of these was to be
made out; the Rector was to choose one, and after him the Fellows one
each, according to their seniority,[174] and so on till the books were
all taken out; thereafter, the Fellows were to take the books to their
own rooms, depositing a bond for their safe custody and return. In 1476
there were 35 books in this “lending library,” different from the 135
above-mentioned. A record is also found of the books (18 in number)
thus borrowed by the Fellows in 1595 and (17 in number) in 1596; among
them are two copies of Augustine _De civitate Dei_, and one of Servius
_In Virgilium_.
(6) The Fellows had to take their share in the ordinary routine of
College business, especially in the two chief meetings on 6th May and
6th November, called “chapters” (_capitula_), and to serve when called
upon in the College offices. These were three in number, all held for
one year only.
(_a_) The Subrector was charged with the general management of the
College during the Rector’s absence, the supervision of the conduct
of the Fellows and commoners, the presiding over disputations, and
the writing of all letters on College business. The emblem of his
office was a whip, which, with his alternative title (Subrector _sive_
Corrector[175]), is eloquent as to his original duty of correcting
faults of conduct by corporal punishment. This scourge of four tails,
made of plaited cord after the old fashion, is still extant and
perfect, is solemnly laid down by the Subrector at the conclusion of
his term of office, and restored to him next day on his re-election.
It has been coveted for the Pitt-Rivers anthropological museum, as a
genuine example of the “flagellum” of mediæval discipline.
(_b_) The Bursar (_thesaurarius_) was charged with the duties of paying
bills, collecting rents, and keeping accounts; of seeing that commons
were duly and sufficiently supplied; and of governing the College
servants (over whom he had the power, with the consent of the Rector,
of appointment and dismissal).
(_c_) The Key-keeper (_claviger_) was to keep one of the three keys
with which the Treasury was locked, and one of the three keys of the
chest in the Treasury which contained the College money, the other keys
of these sets being in the charge of the Rector and Subrector. This
“chest of three keys” corresponds to the balance to the credit of the
College at its bankers and its investments in the public stocks; in it
were placed any surplus money or donations to meet sudden calls for
payment or to wait investment; and the idea of appointing a key-keeper
was that the chest might never be approached by any person at random
or singly, but always by responsible officers, protected against
themselves by the presence of others.
(7) The Fellows were strictly required to reside in Oxford and within
College. During the Long Vacation they might be absent from College for
six weeks; at other times not for more than two days, without special
leave: the Rector and Subrector had, however, general directions given
them in the statutes not to be niggardly in granting leave in cases
where the presence of the applicant was required by no College duties.
On several occasions of the visitation of the city by the plague, this
requirement of residence was relaxed; and the Fellows were permitted
to have all their allowances if they lived in common at some place
near Oxford. Thus, in the pestilence of 1535, commons were allowed to
the Rector, Subrector, and five Fellows in residence at Launton, for a
fortnight in some cases, for a month in others; and in that of 1538,
commons were allowed to the Rector, Subrector, and twelve Fellows in
residence at Gosford (near Kidlington), during a period of no less than
fifteen weeks.
During Elizabeth’s reign, leaves of absence become frequent and
continuous, and are practically equivalent to non-residence. The
Fellows in this reign, and later, developed a bad habit of asking for
leave when their turn for disputing, or other duties, came round; and
several Visitors’ Injunctions are directed against granting leaves
unless a substitute has been provided to perform all duties.
From this statement of the duties of the Fellows, we pass on to discuss
their emoluments. These can best be understood if we group them
together under separate heads.
(_a._) Commons (_communiæ_), the weekly allowance for food at the
common table in the hall of the College, and at the regular time of
meals. Rotheram provided that in each week there should be allowed for
each Fellow in residence (counting the Rector as a Fellow), the sum
of sixteen-pence; fixing the allowance at that amount, and not more,
because, as he says, “clerks” should avoid luxury.
Several festivals of the Church’s year were to be honoured by an
addition to the ordinary table-allowance. In the weeks in which the
following Holy-days occurred, the allowance for commons for each Fellow
was to be increased by the sum named:--Epiphany (6th Jan.), 4_d._;
Purification of Mary (Feb. 2nd), 2_d._; _Carnis privium_ (Septuagesima
Sunday), 2_d._; Annunciation of Mary (25th Mar.), 2_d._; Easter,
8_d._; Ascension, 4_d._; Whitsun day, 8_d._; Corpus Christi, 4_d._;
St. Mildred (13th July), 2_d._; Assumption of Mary (15th Aug.), 2_d._;
Nativity of Mary (8th Sept.), 2_d._; Michaelmas (29th Sept.), 2_d._;
dedication of St. Michael’s Church (in Oct.), 2_d._; All Saints’ Day
(1st Nov.), 4_d._; dedication of All Saints’ Church (in Nov.), 4_d._;
Conception of Mary (8th Dec.), 2_d._; Christmas, 8_d._
An incidental, and therefore very striking, indication of the plagues
which then infected the country is the care the statutes take to
provide for cases of leprosy or other noisome disease. The Fellow so
afflicted is to live away from the College, and to receive yearly forty
shillings in lieu of all allowances.
(_b._) Salary (_salarium_), payments in money. Rotheram made no grants
for these, except to the Rector and the College officers; but he gave
liberty to other benefactors to make them. The first distinct mention
of such grants is in 1537, when Edmund Darby directs that 3_s._ 4_d._
shall be paid annually to each Fellow, and 6_s._ 8_d._ to the Rector.
The dividends of the College rents, after payment of all charges, known
as “provision,” date no doubt from a very early period, but their
history cannot now be traced.
(_c._) Livery (_vestura_), allowance for clothing. For this also
Rotheram made no provision, except to permit it if given by later
benefactors. Edmund Audley, Bishop of Sarum, in giving his benefaction
in 1518, directed that forty shillings per annum should be allowed _pro
robis_ to the Rector, and to each of the four senior Fellows.
(_d._) The Fellows in common were entitled to the services of the
common servants; for which see below.
(_e._) The Fellows were entitled to have rooms (_cameræ_) rent-free.
These were to be chosen, according to seniority, on the May chapter.
About 1600 we find that along with his room, the Fellow received also
the attic (“loft,” or “cock-loft”) over it, into which he might put a
tenant from whom he might receive rent. How far this custom had come
down from antiquity we have no means of saying.
(_f._) Obits (_obitus_), allowances for being present at Mass on the
anniversary-day of a benefactor. A considerable benefactor invariably
made a bargain with the College, that his name should be kept in
remembrance, and his soul’s health prayed for in a special Mass, yearly
on the anniversary of his death, or, if that should clash with some
very solemn season of the Church’s year, on the nearest convenient day.
To insure the presence of the Rector and Fellows, he generally ordered
that each Fellow present at the Commemoration Service should receive a
stipulated sum, which was called by the same name as the day itself, an
“obit.”
The following are the dates of the obits in Lincoln College, and
the amount paid to each Fellow; the Rector as celebrant, receiving
in each case double the amount which a Fellow received:--Jan. 10th,
Edward Darby, 1_s._; Jan. 16th, Bishop Beckington, 6_d._; Feb. 23rd,
Archdeacon Southam, 1_s._; March 21st, John Crosby, 8_d._; March 26th,
Dean Forest, 1_s._; April 11th, Cardinal Beaufort, 8_d._; May 29th,
Rotheram, the second founder, 1_s._; Aug. 23rd, Bishop Audley, 1_s._;
Oct. 10th, Bishop William Smith, 1_s._; Oct. 29th, William Dagvill,
1_s._; Nov. 16th, William Bate, 6_d._--all of them early benefactors.
The obit of the first founder, Fleming, was fixed for Jan. 25th; but no
allowances made for it, gratitude alone being strong enough to ensure
the attendance of all the Fellows.
At the Reformation, the celebration of Mass and, consequently, the
observance of these anniversary services in the form directed by
the statutes, became illegal, and the chapel services ceased. The
allowances still continued to be paid to each Fellow who was present in
College on the particular day, the test of “presence” being now dining
in hall at the ordinary hour of dinner.
(_g._) Pittances (_pietantia_). Besides the sum given to the Rector and
each Fellow on a benefactor’s anniversary day, it is sometimes directed
that a sum shall be paid to them in common for “a pittance,” _i. e._
as I suppose, to provide a better dinner on that day. Thus Cardinal
Beaufort gave a pittance of 3_s._ 4_d._; Rotheram, one of 2_s._; Edward
Darby, one of 3_s._ 4_d._
(III) The Chaplains were four in number. Two were to serve the churches
of All Saints and St. Michael in Oxford, one of whom must be of the
diocese of York, the other of the diocese of Lincoln. They were to be
appointed by the Rector, and to be removed by him when he chose; and
each to receive from the College a stipend of £5 per annum. A third
Chaplain was to serve the church of Twyford under the same conditions,
except that his stipend was to be paid by the Rector; a fourth was to
serve the church of Combe Longa.
It was clearly no part of the founder’s intention that the chaplaincies
should be served by the Fellows: and we find, down to the Civil War
and the Commonwealth, instances of Chaplains who were not Fellows.
But after the Restoration, when £5 per annum no longer represented a
reasonable year’s income, there was a growing feeling that it was for
the honour of the College that the duties of Chaplain of All Saints,
St. Michael’s, and Combe should be undertaken by Fellows. And so long
as there were Fellows in orders enough for the duties, this was done.
In the last half century, recognizing the changed circumstances of the
times, the College has provided a more adequate endowment for each of
its four chaplaincies.
(IV) The Servants. Rotheram’s statutes provided that the Rector and
each Fellow should have free of charge his share of the services of the
“common” servants (_i. e._ of the College servants). These were (1) the
manciple, whose duty it was to buy in provisions and distribute them in
College; (2) the cook; (3) the barber;[176] (4) the laundress. From an
account-book of 1591, it appears that the salary of the manciple and of
the cook was £1 6_s._ 8_d._ per annum; of the barber, 10_s._; and of
the laundress £2.
There was also the bible-clerk (_bibliotista_, contracted _bita_),
who was to be the Rector’s servant when he was in residence. At
dinner in hall he was to read, from the Bible, or some expositor, or
some other instructive book, a portion appointed by the Rector or
Subrector; and at dinner and supper he was to wait at the Fellows’
table. For these services he was to receive food and drink; a room;
and washing and shaving (the latter referring to the tonsure probably,
and not suggesting that he was old enough to grow a beard). Different
benefactors made additions to his emoluments; and at last, until
divided by the 1855 statutes into two “Rector’s Scholarships,” the
Bible-clerkship was the best paid office in College, being worth three
times the Subrectorship, twice the Bursarship, or once and a half a
Tutorship.
(V) The Commoners, or Sojourners (_commensales seu sojornantes_).
Almost from the first there had been graduates resident in College,
attracted by its quiet and by its social life, but not on the
foundation, and therefore receiving no allowances from the College.
Rotheram’s statutes provided for their discipline, directing that
they must take part in the disputations of the Fellows, and so on.
Undergraduates are by implication excluded; and this presumption is
increased to a certainty by the fact that no provision is made in the
statutes for tuition.
In its beginnings, therefore, Lincoln College differs from our modern
conceptions of a College alike in its aims and in its constitution. In
all external features, and partially also in its domestic arrangements,
it resembles a monastic house; but it differs from a convent in two
important, though not obvious, points; first, that its inmates are
not bound by a rule, and are free to depart from the College into
the wider service of the Church; secondly, that the duty of prayer
for benefactors and the Christian dead is co-ordinate with two other
duties, the duty of serving certain churches, and the duty of studying
for study’s sake and for the truth. We have next to inquire how the
College changed its original character, and was made, like other Oxford
Colleges, a place of residence for undergraduates, with a body of
Fellows engaged in tuition. This was one of the indirect results of the
Reformation.
Under Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Elizabeth, the old freedom of
the University was taken away, lest, if the immunities of the place
continued, Oxford should become an asylum for disaffected persons.[177]
No undergraduate was to be allowed in the University, unless he had
the protection of a graduate tutor; and residence was to be restricted
to residence within the walls of a College or Hall. There was thus
an external pressure forcing undergraduates to enter Colleges. There
was also a readiness from within the College to receive them. The
proceedings of the Reformers had been a violent shock to the adherents
of the old faith in Lincoln College; and now that the routine of chapel
services, masses, anniversaries, obits, could no longer be pursued,
these adherents devoted themselves to training up young students in
opposition to the new movement. And when, under John Underhill (Rector
1577-1590), the College was purged of the old leaven, the pressure
of poverty (which then began to be felt in the University) made the
Fellows glad to have undergraduates resident in College to keep up the
establishment and pay tuition fees.
Unfortunately, there are no statistics of the stages of this change:
the intervals between the years in which statements of the numbers
in College occur being too great. In 1552 there were in College, the
Rector, eleven Fellows, one B.A. Commoner, and thirteen persons not
graduates, of whom some were certainly servitors, and some probably
servants. In 1575 the Rector and the greater part of the Fellows
have undergraduate pupils assigned to them in grammar and logic. In
1588 there were in College, the Rector and twelve Fellows, sixteen
undergraduate Commoners, and nine servitors. In 1746, there were
the Rector and twelve Fellows, eight Gentlemen-commoners, eighteen
Commoners, and eight Servitors.
What provision was made for their instruction?
From about 1592 the College appointed annually these instructors
for its undergraduates: (_a_) two “Moderators,” to preside over the
disputations in “Philosophy” and in “Logic” (occasionally when the
College was full, an additional “Moderator” was appointed in Logic);
(_b_) a Catechist, or theological instructor. Also, from 1615, a
lecturer in Greek, annually appointed, was added. Of these the
catechetical lecture disappears after 1642; the others continued to
be annually filled up till 1856, but for many years these had been
merely nominal appointments, the work of tuition devolving on regularly
appointed Tutors, as in other Colleges. But at what date these last had
been introduced into Lincoln College, is nowhere stated. In some few
years, exceptional appointments are made; as, for example, in 1624 a
Fellow is appointed to teach Hebrew; in 1708, £6 per annum is paid to
Philip Levi, the Hebrew master.
Among these lecturers two may be noted. In 1607, and again in 1609 and
1610, Robert Sanderson was Logic lecturer; and began that vigorous
course of Logic, which was published in 1615, and long dominated the
Schools of Oxford: indeed, its indirect influence survived into the
present half century, if, as Rector Tatham wrote to Dean Cyril Jackson,
“Aldrich’s logic is cribbed from Sanderson’s.” In 1615 Sanderson was
Catechist, and perhaps at that time turned his attention to those
questions of casuistry, in which he was to gain enduring fame. John
Wesley was appointed to give the Logic and Greek lectures in 1727,
1728, 1730; and the Philosophy and Greek lectures in 1731, 1732, and
1733.
What provision was made for the maintenance of undergraduates in the
College?
In 1568, Mrs. Joan Traps, widow of Robert Traps, goldsmith of London,
bequeathed to the College lands at Whitstable in Kent for the
maintenance of four poor scholars. One scholar was to be nominated
from Sandwich School by the Mayor and Jurats of that town, but not
to be admitted unless the College thought him fit; in defect of such
nomination, Lincoln College was to fill this place up (as it did
the other three) from any grammar school in England. Each of these
four scholars was to receive fifty-three shillings and fourpence
half-yearly. Mrs. Traps was also, in her husband’s name, a benefactor
to Caius College, Cambridge, in which College their portraits hang.
Descendants of R. Traps’ brother are still found in Lancashire,
Catholics; and one of them has told me his belief that the Traps had
bought Church lands at the dissolution of the monasteries, intending
to return them to the Church when the nation was again settled on its
old lines; but this hope failing, devoted them to education,[178] as
so many other conscientious purchasers of Church lands did. If this
be so, it is fitting that the first recorded Traps’ Scholar, William
Harte (elected 25th May, 1571), should have been one of those sufferers
for the old faith, whose cruel and barbarous murders are so dark a
stain on the “spacious times” of Elizabeth. Mrs. Joyce Frankland,
daughter of the Traps, augmented the stipend of these “scholars.” She
was afterwards a considerable benefactress to Brasenose College, and a
most munificent donor to Caius College, Cambridge. Is she also to be
numbered among those “offended benefactors” who have been mentioned
above? Or had Lincoln College in her time been “reformed”? These four
Traps’ scholars,[179] commonly called the “Scholars of the House”
(being distinguished, as I suppose, by that name from the servitors
maintained privately by any Fellow), were for a century the only
undergraduates in Lincoln College in receipt of any endowment.
In 1640, Thomas Hayne left £6 per annum in trust to the corporation
of Leicester for the maintenance of two scholars in Lincoln College
to be elected by the Mayor, Recorder, and Aldermen of that city. The
corporation received this benefaction, but never sent any scholar to
the College. Numerous educational benefactions throughout England were
lost, like this, in the anarchy of the Civil War.
In 1655, a Chancery suit was begun against Anthony Foxcrofte, who had
destroyed a codicil of Charles Greenwood, Rector of Thornhill and
Wakefield, by which two Fellowships (or perhaps Scholarships) were
bestowed on Lincoln College. What the issue of the suit was, I cannot
say; nothing, certainly, came to the College.
About 1670, Edmund Parboe left a rent-charge of £10 per annum issuing
out of the Pelican Inn in Sandwich, of which £4 was to be paid to the
master of the grammar-school there, £1 to the Mayor and Juratts for
wine “when they keep their ordinary there,” £5 to Lincoln College for
the increase of the scholarship from Sandwich school; if no scholar is
in College, it is to be funded till one is sent, and the arrears paid
to him. From that date the corporation of Sandwich never nominated a
scholar. I suspect the Mayor and Juratts treated the £5, like the £1,
as a _pour boire_.
May the College still hope that the towns of Leicester and Sandwich, or
some one for them, will remember the long arrears of these endowments,
thus diverted from education? Even at simple interest, they would be
now a great benefaction; and at compound interest, how great!
Later Scholarships and Exhibitions were founded by Rectors Marshall
(four, in 1688), Crewe (twelve, 1717), Hutchins (several, 1781),
Radford (several, 1851); also by Mrs. Tatham, widow of Rector Tatham
(one, 1847). In 1857, Henry Usher Matthews, formerly Commoner of the
College, founded a Scholarship in Lincoln College, and an Exhibition
in Shrewsbury School to be held in Lincoln College: but the Public
Schools Commissioners unjustly took the latter from the College. Since
that date no Scholarship benefaction has come to the College; but
Scholarships and Exhibitions have been created from time to time, under
the provisions of the Statutes of 1855, out of suspended Fellowships.
The consideration of this change in the aims of the College has led us
beyond the point to which we had come in its annals; it is therefore
necessary to go back, and pass rapidly in review its post-Reformation
history.