FROM 1758 TO THE CLOSE OF THE CENTURY.
_Dedit ergo eis petitionem ipsorum,_
_Et misit tenuitatem in animam eorum._
PSALM cvi. 15.
Provost Andrews, a layman, but a Senior Fellow, and one of a
distinguished group of lay Fellows then in the College, succeeded
less than two years before George III. became king. His Provostship
is perhaps the most brilliant in the annals of the College. He was
a man of elegant tastes, of large acquaintance, of scholarship
quite adequate to his position, and he consequently did more
than any of his predecessors or successors to bring the Society
over which he presided into contact with the best and greatest
throughout Ireland. Even under the stricter and more academic
Baldwin, we learn from the Register that a large number of the
highest classes in Ireland had begun to frequent the College.[87]
We may assume that under Andrews this tendency increased. It was
only necessary to prove that the education of Dublin was equal
to that of the older Universities, to induce men of property in
Ireland to avoid the troubles and anxieties of sending their sons
by the roads and boats of those days to Oxford and Cambridge; and
thus we find that from the opening of the eighteenth century to
the second decade of the nineteenth the great body of the Irish
aristocracy was educated in Dublin. It would have been so, even
into recent days, if the Senior Fellows of the latter period had
thought earnestly about the dignity of the College.
The character of this Provost, according to his contemporaries
and the historians of the College, was very different from that
of Baldwin. He is indeed accused of good living, a great crime
in a College Don, when it includes brilliant society and rich
appointments; mere over-eating and drinking incur little censure.
But Andrews could speak Latin with fluency and elegance, and we
are glad to learn that in his day the Irish pronunciation did
not make him incomprehensible in Italy or France. He built and
occupied the noble Provost’s House,[88] which still remains one
of the mansions that give to Dublin its metropolitan aspect. He
entertained handsomely, both in the new Dining Hall and at his own
House. He must have been the promoter and founder of the School
of Music, which has produced a series of excellent Professors,
and created a distinct school of composition, starting from that
fortunate accident, a musical Peer--the Earl of Mornington, father
of the great Duke of Wellington. The principal Parliamentary grants
for building were during the extreme old age of Baldwin, so that
I suspect the influence of Andrews, who was then a Senior Fellow,
and a member of the Irish House, must have been the chief cause of
this sudden liberality; for after the completion of the Library in
1724, there is a pause in the Parliamentary grants till 1751, and
again they disappear after 1759, when Andrews became Provost, till
1787. But it is asserted in Duigenan’s pamphlet that the grants
of Baldwin’s time were not exhausted during the whole of Andrews’
Provostship. I take it, then, that Andrews had ample funds for the
fine buildings erected during his office.[89] Constant increase of
the College rents and constant bequests made it possible to rebuild
the Dining Hall in his time (1759-61), and no doubt much remained
to be done in making the new front, finished in 1759, habitable.
There was much hospitality, and good society was encouraged in the
College. The greatest ceremony during his time was the installation
of the Duke of Bedford as Chancellor, which is thus described by
the Registrar:--
Friday, Sept. 9 [1768].--This day his Grace John Duke of Bedford
was installed Chancellor of our University.
The Hall had been previously prepared by erecting a platform
at the upper end, and a gallery for the musicians at the lower
end. The platform was erected 2 feet 6 inches from the floor and
railed in. At the back in the middle, under a canopy of green
damask, and upon a semicircular step raised six inches above the
level of the platform, was placed a chair for the Chancellor, on
the right hand a chair for the Vice-Chancellor, and on the left
another for the Provost. From these chairs on each side along the
back and sides down to the rails were raised seats and forms, and
on the right side, advanced before those seats, were placed two
chairs of state for the Lord Lieutenant and his Lady. Over the
door of the Hall, and eight feet above the floor, was erected
the gallery for the musicians, and along the sides of the Hall,
between the platform and gallery, were seats raised and forms
placed, leaving a passage in the midst seven feet wide. On the
right side, next to the platform, part of the seats were enclosed
as a box for the reception of such ladies of quality whom the
Chancellor should invite. The platform with its steps, the
gallery and the seats, were covered with green broadcloth. The
passage through the midst of the Hall was covered with carpeting,
and the semicircular step under his Grace’s chair ornamented with
a rich carpet.
When the Lord Lieutenant and his Lady, the Nobility, the Lord
Mayor and Sheriffs of the city, the ladies of quality and
fashion, and all who walked not in the procession, had taken
their seats in the Hall, the procession moved solemnly from
the Regent House, the chamber over the gateway, to the Hall in
the following order, according to juniority:--Undergraduates,
Bachelors of Arts, candidates for Degrees, Masters of Arts,
Bachelors in Music, in Law, in Physic, in Divinity, Doctors
in Music, in Law, in Physic, in Divinity, Senior Fellows,
Noble Students, Vice-Provost, Beadle with his Mace, Proctors,
Chancellor between the Vice-Chancellor on his right and the
Provost on his left, Archbishops, Dukes, Earls, Viscounts,
Bishops, Barons, &c., &c.
Every gentleman who walked in the procession was habited in the
robes of his Order and Degree. The Undergraduates and Bachelors
of Arts stopped at the Hall-door, opened to right and left, and
after the Nobility entered the Hall according to seniority. The
candidates for Degrees, Masters in Arts, and Bachelors in Music,
Law, Physic, and Divinity, stopped at the steps of the platform.
The Doctors, &c., ascended the platform by four steps. During
this procession the musicians played a solemn March composed on
the occasion by the Earl of Mornington, Professor of Music.
The music having ceased, the Registrar read the Act of the
College constituting his Grace their Chancellor. Upon which the
Vice-Chancellor and the Provost, assisted by the Seniors, led his
Grace to the canopy and installed him. And the Vice-Chancellor
having taken his place on the right, when the Mace and the
University Rules were laid at his feet, the Provost, assisted
by the Seniors, delivered into his Grace’s hand a printed copy
of the College Statutes elegantly bound, promising for himself
and the University all due and statutable obedience. His Grace
then arising returned them thanks for the honour they had done
him in electing him their Chancellor, expressing that it was
more pleasing to him, as this mark of the confidence of a Body
so distinguished by their learning, virtue, and loyalty, gave
him reason to hope that his conduct during his administration
was not disagreeable to the people of Ireland in general,
whose prosperity and welfare, and particularly the honour and
privileges of the University, he would seek every occasion to
advance, &c.
The Provost having taken his place on the left, and the Seniors
having retired to their seats, after a short pause the Provost
rose and addressed the Chancellor and the University in a most
elegant Latin oration, in the close of which he addressed himself
particularly to the Professor of Music, who thereupon gave
the signal to the musicians, and gave copies of the Ode to the
Lord Lieutenant and the Chancellor. The Ode was written on the
occasion by Mr. Richard Archdale, an Undergraduate, and was set
to music by the Professor, the Earl of Mornington.
After the conferring of the Degrees by the Chancellor, the
Commencement was closed, and the musicians played the March, as
before, and the Procession, as before, attended his Grace to the
Provost’s House.
His Grace, with the Nobility, Fellows, Professors, &c., dined in
the Eating Hall. There were two chairs placed at the head of the
table; the Lord Lieutenant sat on the right hand.
Sunday, Sept. 11.--His Grace the Chancellor was sung into Chapel
by the Choir. He sat in the Provost’s stall, the Provost in the
Vice-Provost’s; the Vice-Provost, Nobility, and Professors,
were seated in the adjoining seats. Two Senior Fellows read
the Lessons, the Deans the Communion Service. The Professor of
Divinity preached from Proverbs, chap. xv., verse 14. There were
two Anthems. The _Te Deum_ and the _Jubilate_ were composed by
the Earl of Mornington.
On Tuesday, Sept. 13, the Chancellor, attended by the Provost,
Fellows, and Professors, visited the Elaboratory, Anatomy School,
Waxworks, &c. In the Natural Philosophy School his Grace was
addressed by Mr. Crosbie, a _Nobilis_, son of Lord Brandon, in
English verse.... As his Grace was quitting the Library, the
Professor of Oratory addressed him in an English farewell speech,
which his Grace was pleased to answer with great politeness.
The reader will remember that the Hall mentioned at the opening of
this extract was the old Hall, then entered under the dome which
appears in all the views of the College of that epoch. The date of
the first edition of the Statutes (August 22, 1768), when compared
with this account, also shows that they were first printed for the
purpose of this ceremony. The Chancellor’s copy of these Statutes
had probably been lost, or never perhaps handed over to the Royal
Personages who had recently been Chancellors; and indeed we wonder,
with a printing press now over twenty years established, that the
work had not yet been issued in print. The difficulty lay in the
Laudian Statute, which specially provided that three copies should
exist, and implied that no more should be circulated.[90] There is
possibly some entry in the Registry which would explain how the
Board evaded this obstacle. The printed copy bears opposite the
title-page, in print, _vera copia, Theaker Wilder, Reg^r_.
It is much to be regretted that the Ode, with Mornington’s music,
has disappeared.[91] It is stated by Dr. Stubbs that the Duke of
Bedford’s fine portrait by Gainsborough, now in the Provost’s
House, was presented upon this occasion. But there is an exactly
similar picture in the Dublin Mansion House, which must surely have
been presented by Bedford, or acquired by the city, while he was
Lord Lieutenant, seven years earlier. The portrait, therefore, in
the Provost’s House must be a replica, unless it was presented to
Provost Andrews much earlier than the date of the Installation.
Our Bursar, in his history, states with cold precision the large
amounts spent upon dinners to the Viceroys in these hospitable
days. It does not appear that the feast given to the Duke of
Bedford was by any means as costly as some of those given in later
years.[92] Such are the gossiping details preserved concerning this
Provost and his social doings in the College.
It might be easily inferred, were it not stated expressly in the
angry controversies with his successor, that the discipline of
the College was much relaxed, and many abuses tolerated by this
amiable man. The old Statutes regulating studies in the autumn
(out of term) had fallen into desuetude; the Chapel was shut up
in July, and all business ceased for six weeks. Residence was
not enforced at this time, or indeed at other times, in the case
of poor scholars, who went as tutors into country houses. Still
worse, the marriage of several Fellows, in spite of their solemn
oath of celibacy during their tenure, was connived at, and thus a
habit tolerated of trifling with solemn obligations, which not only
brought great scandal upon the College, but lowered the general
dignity and respectability of the Governing Body. Most of them were
in debt to the College, and with the expectation of never having
payment enforced. It also appears accidentally, from a document
printed by Taylor, that the Wide Street Commissioners, making a
report to the Irish Parliament in 1799 on the condition of the
College property extending from the north precinct to the river,
found that the houses and land had, by some great oversight, been
let on a long lease (60 years), at a small rent, to the Bishop of
Raphoe.[93]
We may assume that the great social successes of Andrews’
Provostship encouraged the Government, on his death, to promote
another layman, and lawyer, into the vacant post. It was doubtless
argued that, with the increase of wealth and splendour in the
College, it must be represented by a public man, a man of the
world, and a good speaker. But the new Provost, John Hely
Hutchinson, lacked other and not less necessary qualifications
which had made Andrews so successful. In the first place he had
never been a Fellow, and thus was not only ignorant of the routine
of College work, but also of the characters and susceptibilities of
the Fellows. It was but natural that such of them as were baulked
in their advancement by his appointment, and who thought themselves
more worthy to hold it, resented the promotion of a stranger by
political influence. Though Hutchinson managed to gain over certain
members of the Board, he found others irreconcilable, and he is
alleged to have dealt with them in unscrupulous fashion, both by
attempted bribery and by open oppression. The moral standard of his
profession, and indeed of the official classes throughout Ireland,
was very low. Every successful man seems to have feathered his nest
by obtaining or creating sinecures, nor was there any limit to the
rapacity which accumulated them in the same hands. It was well
that Hutchinson did not set himself to plunder the College for his
family; the few cases of inferior officers whom he thrust upon the
College, which his adversaries have exposed, are mere trifles.
But he was ambitious of political power for his sons; and he
certainly strove to make the College a pocket-borough. This
attempt brought about him a nest of hornets. The fact was, that
bribery or intimidation, which might be used with hardly any risk
in constituencies of ordinary electors, was sure to stumble upon
some young gentleman of high character and independence among the
Fellows or Scholars, and thus be exposed.
On the other hand, the abuses tolerated by Andrews gave the new
Provost a great power of intimidation, which he could have used
very effectually. Fellows with wives and large families, who had
broken their solemn engagement to celibacy, and resided outside
the College, contrary to the Statutes, who, moreover, owed to the
College large sums of money for the purchase of rooms, which they
could not pay, were practically in the Provost’s hands. It is much
to be regretted that when a layman, an outsider, and a public
man chanced to be set over the Society, he did not take in hand
thorough reforms on these all-important points--reforms which could
hardly be expected from an old member of the Corporation, promoted
after years of acquiescence or participation in the growing
laxities of discipline.
But the school in which Hutchinson was educated was even morally
worse than that of the culpable Fellows. There must be substantial
truth in the constant allegation, proved by two Parliamentary
inquiries, that the Provost’s assertions of discipline were not
just and uniform, but intended to promote his political power.
Both in 1776 and in 1790, when Hutchinson secured the return of
his elder and younger sons respectively by a very narrow majority,
there were petitions against them on the ground of intimidation
and bribery, and the evidence then given is the real ground of
the severe judgment which the local historians have pronounced
against the Provost. In the former petition his son was unseated;
in the latter--remarkable for having Lord Edward Fitzgerald and the
future Duke of Wellington among its members--the casting vote of
the chairman saved the sitting member. The evidence in both cases
is so very similar, that we cannot but wonder at the incaution of
the Provost, who was probably saved from a second disgrace only by
his personal influence with the Chairman of the Committee. In this
latter case, however, Hutchinson disowned altogether the person
who acted as go-between, and who made offers to the scholars. He
was private tutor to the Provost’s family, but was dismissed, and
excluded from the precincts of the College by order of the Visitors.
The case is therefore strong against the Provost, though we should
remember that in those days all Parliamentary elections in Ireland
were carried on by similar means, and that bribery was only
condemned by the law, not by the moral sense of the community.
This public evidence has, however, not weighed in the minds of
historians so strongly as the violent pamphlet called _Lachrymæ
Academicæ_, written against the Provost by his bitter personal
enemy, Dr. Patrick Duigenan, who as a Junior Fellow was at
perpetual variance with his chief, and at last resigned his
Fellowship to take a Chair of Law, which was increased in value
(with the Provost’s consent) to induce his resignation. This
exceedingly violent _ex parte_ statement seems to me chiefly
valuable for its allusions to the internal affairs of the College
not at issue in the dispute. The tone is scurrilous, and the
confident prediction that a few more years of the Provost’s
manipulation must ruin the College falsified by the facts. Instead
of securing all the posts in the College for partizans of his own,
the Provost met with more and more opposition, especially from the
Junior Fellows, as years elapsed. In 1775, a scholar whom he had
deprived insisted upon a Visitation, in which Primate Robinson,
the Vice-Chancellor, decided against the Provost. In 1791, another
Vice-Chancellor, Lord Clare, decided against him on the right of
negative, which he claimed under the Statutes in every election.
The sense of the Statute is plain enough. It ordains that the
majority of Provost and Board shall decide elections; but if such
majority could not be obtained after two scrutinies--that is to
say, if the Senior Fellows had divided their votes among three or
more candidates, so that none of them had more than three--then the
Provost’s vote, even if it stood alone, shall decide the election.
This very reasonable Statute was, however, so worded, that another
interpretation was possible, ordaining that even in an absolute
majority of votes the Provost’s must be one. Lord Clare decided
rightly that the disputed words _una cum Præposito, vel eo absente
Vice-Præposito_, merely meant that the Senior Fellows could not
elect without the presence of either of these officers.[94]
This Visitation concludes the long history of the quarrels of
the political Provost with his Fellows. He was then an old man,
and though he showed considerable vigour in arguing his case,
it is evident that the fire of his ambition was burning low,
and his combativeness decreasing with the decay of his physical
powers. It is a great pity that while a collection of scurrilous
tracts--_Pranceriana, Lachrymæ Academicæ_, and others--were
published and widely circulated, and are still quoted against
him, his own account of the history of the College, of his own
doings, and of the character of his opponents, has remained in MS.,
and even this MS. is not now in the Library, but in possession
of Mr. Charles Todd. It is therefore only known through the few
extracts which those writers have made who have had access to this
source. The impression produced by these extracts is strongly in
Hutchinson’s favour; he speaks with admiration of some of his
opponents, and with great calmness of his own political mistakes.
Until this important document is thoroughly examined, the case
for Provost Hutchinson cannot be considered complete, nor can we
determine all the motives of his policy. We can, however, infer
from the public acts of his government the following conclusions.
In the first place, he clearly desired to modernise the education
of the students, not only by modifying their course of study
(of which Dr. Duigenan says he was an incompetent judge), but
by making them practise accomplishments quite foreign to old
Collegiate discipline. The account of his improvements suggests
that he advanced in the direction which Andrews had set for the
College, but so rashly as to make his government a parody of that
of his predecessor. Having himself called out his man, and fought
a duel, he could not possibly interdict the use of arms among the
students; and we hear strange and probably exaggerated accounts of
the number of students killed or maimed in affairs of honour.[95]
Akin to the practice of arms was the practice of horsemanship,
which brought upon him some ridicule when he desired to have a
riding-school attached to the College. This idea was probably
suggested to him by country gentlemen, who thought that their sons
should receive a complete training for their after life in the
University. The same ideas prompted him to found Chairs of Modern
Languages, which have lasted to this day, and which proclaimed the
startling novelty that not dead languages only, but the living
languages of Europe are part of a liberal education. However late
and imperfect the teaching of modern languages at the University
may have been, we can here also infer that it was the solicitation
of parents of the higher classes which made Hutchinson propose
these changes, all of which tended to make the students men of the
world.
As regards his own office, he did many things to promote its
permanent dignity. He persuaded the Board to give him a grant for
enlarging the fine house which his predecessor had built, and
this addition is one of its chief features; it is the stately
Provost’s study, added at the north end of the main structure.
He took care so to lease the Provost’s estate as to preserve
its rental undiminished to his successors. The same principles
appear in his improvement of the College. With the aid of a grant
from the Erasmus Smith’s Board of £2,500, he built the noble
Examination Hall, intended for a Theatre or Hall of public Academic
performances, at the fortunate moment when our 18th century
builders had just reached the zenith of their art. No room in
Dublin is more perfect in its proportions, or more rich as well as
chaste in its ornamentation. He also persuaded the Senior Fellows,
who trembled for their renewal fines, to have the College estates
re-valued, and thus added a permanent £5,000 a-year to the property
of the Corporation. We are told that he could not carry out this
eminently honest and practical reform without guaranteeing each of
the persons who sat with him on the Board against loss of income.
Not one of them was willing to risk one shilling for the future
improvement of the College estate. He showed more questionable
taste when he transformed a number of old silver cups into a
service of dinner plates, which his enemies said he intended for
his own use, and probably for that of his heirs; for he carried
them to his suburban residence at Palmerstown [Park], and used them
in his entertainments. The service is, however, still safe, and
perhaps adds as much to the dignity of College entertainments as
would the cups that were melted down. But we grieve to think what
splendid old specimens of Caroline or Queen Anne plate have thus
been lost.
So far as Hutchinson was a politician--probably accepting the
Provostship with the determination to have the University for a
pocket-borough, and so to attain a position equal to that of the
County magnates--so far his life and conduct are open to severe
criticism. In every other respect his 20 years of rule were both
brilliant and profitable to the College. He continued the great
traditions of his two predecessors, and far surpassed the men who
succeeded him for the next 40 years. But whether the opposition of
the Fellows was really irreconcilable, or whether he was himself
wanting in tact or fairness, the painful result is beyond question,
that he lived all his life at war with his subjects.
When his health began to fail in 1793, a full year before his
death, intriguing for the succession to his place began in
official circles. The Bar, who absorb so many posts outside their
profession, began to speak of the Provostship as a political
office; and had they succeeded in appointing another lawyer, we
should presently have had it put forward as an axiom, that none
but a lawyer is fit to hold a post which requires any knowledge
of the law. We hear this absurd argument repeated every day with
fatal effect. On the other hand, the Senior Fellows, who had
considered this great post as their proper prize ever since the
necessity of importing scholars from England had passed away, were
equally zealous in counteracting these schemes. Four or five times
did they send deputations to London to interview Pitt, Dundas,
Portland, and perhaps with most effect Edmund Burke and the Marquis
of Abercorn, both of whom exerted themselves warmly against the
politicians and the lawyers in favour of an academical and clerical
appointment. Even Burke himself was spoken of for the office, and
then an English Bishop of Cloyne, Bennett, who was deterred by a
threatening visit from some of the Fellows.
Meanwhile, the moment for the celebration of the Bi-Centenary of
the Foundation had arrived. The Centenary had been held in 1694,
the 100th anniversary of the first taking of degrees. The more
correct date would have been 1692. But neither date was debated for
one moment by the creatures who were thinking of nothing but the
loss of a step in their promotion, or the chances of succeeding to
a lucrative post. All remembrance of the dignity of the College and
its historic position was obscured by these personal anxieties, to
which was added, in the minds of better men, a keen sense of the
inconvenience of having a stranger and a politician as the head
of a place of learning. Had any of the three great Provosts been
guiding the councils of the College, this disgraceful omission of
so honourable a commemoration would not have been tolerated.
But from this time onward, the College, having conquered in the
great struggle concerning Hutchinson’s successor, obtained the
practical nomination, and accordingly “the Senior Major of the
Regiment,” or the next senior, was regularly promoted. By a curious
coincidence, the influence of Primate Boulter’s policy, and the
exclusion of Irishmen from Bishoprics, had also passed away, and
so we find our Provosts passed on to the Episcopal Bench, leaving
no mark upon the College, and taking no interest in ought beyond
the decent management of the routine studies of the place. The
history from the appointment of Murray to that of Bartholomew
Lloyd, in 1837, is probably the least creditable in all the three
centuries. No fine buildings were erected during these years. Even
the belfry which was taken down was not rebuilt, and the great bell
relegated to a shed in a remote corner of the College, where it
lay for fifty years, till the munificence of a Chancellor educated
at Oxford retrieved the disgrace. When the old Chapel was removed,
so careless were these men of 1798 of the memories of the dead,
that the alabaster monument of the pious founder, Luke Challoner,
was thrust aside, not even into a shed, but into a corner, where
the recumbent figure was defaced by the weather beyond recognition
within thirty years. During the rule of the great Provosts there
had been frequent bequests from rich members of the Society, who
justly held that some practical expression of gratitude was due
to the College which had conferred upon them wealth and dignity.
That spirit died out with the century. From that day onward, many
men drew £50,000 in salaries from the College, and did not return
to it one farthing beyond their (often second-rate) official work.
Constant gifts of plate from rich students, as well as Fellows,
_for the use of the College_, had replaced the tax for _argent_, at
one time levied (as it still is in some Oxford Colleges) on all who
entered the College. These honourable gifts were no longer made,
though any but a criminally supine set of rulers could easily have
kept them up by example and advice. In fact, the existing plate was
concealed in the safes of the Board-room, and never issued except
for the Provost’s private use. During these disgraceful forty
years no public display brought the College into notice except the
lavish feast to George IV. (1821). At the same time, the number of
students was very great, the incomes of Seniors in renewal fines,
and of Juniors in Tutors’ fees, larger than they ever were before
or since; yet these were the years which justly earned for the
University of Dublin the now obsolete title of “Silent Sister.”
There was a day when Oxford, for like reasons, had obtained the
kindred name of “the Widow of Sound Learning.”
And yet the moment when Murray succeeded was one more than likely
to stimulate bright spirits to do brilliant work; it was the moment
when revolutionary ideas from the Continent were making their way
into Ireland; when hot-headed politicians were speaking of National
Independence, of Republicanism, of the Rights of Man; it was the
age that bore the great poets of the early nineteenth century.
One of them, Thomas Moore, whom his greatest contemporaries have
recognised and honoured as their peer, was actually a student
of Trinity College. He was the last of a considerable series of
playwrights and poets, which proves that English studies, at
all events, were not neglected in the College course. Congreve,
Swift, Goldsmith, Parnell, Sheridan, not to speak of Brady and
Tate, and Toplady, prove what Burke mentions in acknowledging the
honorary degree offered him by Hutchinson--“I am infinitely pleased
that that learned body ... condescends to favour the unaltered
subsistence of those principles of Liberty and Morality, along
with some faint remains of that taste of Composition, which are
infused, and have always been infused, into the minds of those
who have the happiness to be instructed by it.”[96] He might have
added another all-important training in expression, which used to
be a peculiarity of the Dublin Classical School, and which Chatham
devised as a means of making his son the prince of debaters. It
consisted in the practice of free _vivâ voce_ translation from
Greek and Latin into English, wherein the fluency of expression
was rated as of equal importance with grammatical accuracy. When
we competed for Scholarships in the earlier half of the century,
we were required to know a long course of authors in this way;
and surely to express the thoughts of another language in fluent
English is the best preparation for those who desire to express
their own thinking in apt and ready words. So far, then, the
narrowness of the Governors was not able to affect the students.
Those who went into the world became practical orators of the first
rank, while those who remained in the College sank into learned
insignificance.
Yet the time, as I have said, was full of excitement, political
and social. There were wars and rumours of wars, some men’s hearts
failing them for fear, others beating with the expectation of a
millennium of Liberty. It was impossible that the great agitation
of the country should not reach the ardent spirits whom the late
Provost had permitted or encouraged to mix in the world. They had,
moreover, started a debating club, the Historical Society, which,
after various modest beginnings and failures, became of recognised
importance towards the waning of the century. The very essence
of these debating societies is to transgress sober discipline;
for while it is the duty of Governors of a College to keep their
students’ attention upon abstract science, pure philosophy, and
classical languages, it is the one aim of debaters to avoid such
subjects, and choose those of present and burning interest.
Moreover, in those days the modern engines of the press and the
platform had not accustomed men to discount the mendacities, the
false passion, the gross exaggerations of political oratory.
Generous natures were more easily carried away than they now
are, when the poison and the antidote succeed one another in the
columns of the same newspaper. Wolfe Tone found even among the
Fellows two distinguished men, John Stack and Whitley Stokes--these
family-names have been for more than two centuries frequent in
the honour-rolls of the College--who adopted the views of the
United Irishmen, and admitted the principle of making Ireland
an independent nation. It is hard to avoid the observation that
Boulter’s policy of filling every post of importance with English
placemen must have been a powerful agent in turning the opinions
of the professional men in Ireland in this direction. Presently
the College was seized with military ardour; a yeomanry corps was
established, in which four companies were commanded by four lay
Fellows, for the purpose of aiding the Government in the impending
crisis. But along with the ardour for amateur soldiering so
universal among civilians, there crept in the feeling that, with
arms in their hands, men should secure not only peace and order in
the country, but some recognition of the claims of Ireland, so long
neglected and postponed to the most vulgar English interests. One
of the captains was, in fact, already an United Irishman, though
he seems to have been deterred from going as far as Wolfe Tone
would lead him, by Tone’s open assertion that the liberties of the
country must be attained even through arms and blood.
Presently it became necessary to revive the dormant Statute
forbidding students to attend any political meetings; and when some
of the scholars went so far as to avow publicly that they were
United Irishmen, in the sense then considered seditious, and one
member at least of the Board, who was also M.P. for the University,
openly declared himself opposed to taking extreme measures against
them, the time seemed come for a formal Visitation. In all this
difficult and dangerous passage of the history of the College
the Provost is hardly mentioned. The result of the great battle
between the Dons and the politicians upon Hutchinson’s death had
resulted, as has been said, in the appointment of the Vice-Provost,
Murray, a respectable, modest, benevolent old man,[97] wholly unfit
to guide the counsels of the Board, or to lead back the wilder
students into the paths of discretion or common sense. Moreover,
the ultra-Protestant party were in such panic at the state of
the country as to make them cruel in their punishments. The
Vice-Chancellor was Lord Clare, a very strong and uncompromising
member of the Protestant ascendency, who all through his life was
perfectly consistent in advocating the English supremacy, and in
crushing out all Irish aspirations, even with the halter and the
sword. He had been baulked in his policy of repression by the
admission of Roman Catholics to Degrees in Trinity College, carried
in 1793 by an Act of Parliament, but which would not have been put
into effect in that year but for the stout action of Dr. Miller,
who, as Senior Master Non-Regent, stopped all the conferring
of Degrees till the Vice-Chancellor consented to remit the old
oath against Popery. The facts, which are worth knowing in their
details, are thus stated by Dr. Stubbs:--
When the first Commencement day after the passing of the Act
of Parliament arrived, the Letters Patent altering the College
Statutes had not been prepared, and consequently, although
the declaration had been abolished by Act of Parliament, the
corresponding oath remained. Lord Clare was well known to be
opposed to the admission of Roman Catholics to Degrees, and
he presided as Vice-Chancellor of the University, and it was
expected that he would place every impediment in his power to
the relaxation which had been granted by the change in the
law. Mr. Miller, who was called upon to act as Senior Master
Non-Regent, declined to take his place until he had been formally
elected by the Senate, according to the letter of the University
Regulations. After some opposition to this proceeding on the part
of the Vice-Chancellor, this legal formality was carried out, and
Mr. Miller took his seat as one of the Caput.
The usual form at Commencements at that time was, that the
Proctor should first supplicate for the Degrees to be conferred,
and obtain the suffrages of the Senate, after which being done,
the oath and the declaration were read. On this occasion the
Vice-Chancellor called on the Proctor to commence by reading
the statutable oath. So far no objection was made; but when
that officer proceeded to recite the declaration as of old,
Miller immediately interfered, and reminded Lord Clare that this
declaration had been abrogated by Act of Parliament, and assured
him that if it were then insisted on he would, in his capacity as
a member of the Caput, prevent any Degrees from being conferred.
Lord Clare was unprepared for this proceeding, and threatened
to adjourn the _Comitia_. However, after referring to the Act,
which Mr. Miller had by him, and after a consultation with Mr.
Wolfe, the Attorney-General, who was present in the Hall for the
purpose of taking the Degree of Doctor of Laws, Lord Clare soon
saw that the clause in question, although conditional in the
preamble, was peremptory in its enactment, and that the Senior
Master Non-Regent was right in point of law. The declaration was
not read, and the Commencement proceeded. Letters Patent were
shortly afterwards passed making the necessary alteration in the
College Statutes, and from that time Roman Catholics have taken
lay Degrees without restriction.
It may therefore well be imagined that Lord Clare came in no very
good humour to visit the College, and that he probably desired
to show to the public that the Act of 1793 had been followed by
the consequences which the old ascendency party had foreseen, and
therefore urged against it. The second Visitor was Dr. Duigenan,
a man intimate with the College in former years, and a very good
judge of the characters of the Fellows, now that the old quarrels
and animosities with the late Provost and his party had been
superseded by far graver questions. I will let Dr. Stubbs narrate
the proceedings in his own words.
The Vice-Chancellor, on opening the proceedings, intimated
that the object of the Visitors was to inquire whether the
disaffection imputed to the College was founded in reality, or
was a mere rumour or surmise; and he announced his intention to
punish with severity any of the members of the College who should
be proved to be encouragers or abettors of treason or sedition.
The roll of the College was called, and to every member, as he
answered his name, an oath was tendered, and when sworn he was
examined as to his knowledge of unlawful societies existing in
College. Dr. Browne was asked as to his vote at the Board in
the case of Ardagh and Power, and he acknowledged that he had
considered expulsion too severe a measure, and therefore had,
with two other Senior Fellows, voted for the rustication of the
two Students for a year as a suitable punishment, and that he had
publicly stated his opinion after the meeting of the Governing
Body had terminated. For this open criticism of the decision of
the Board he was strongly rebuked by Lord Clare.
Whitley Stokes, when questioned by the Vice-Chancellor, denied
that he knew of the existence of societies of United Irishmen in
the College, or of any illegal or secret societies within the
walls. He admitted that he had been a member of the Society of
United Irishmen in 1791, before their revolutionary tendencies
had been developed; but he stated that from that period he had
altogether dissociated himself from them. He admitted that he
had professionally visited, as a physician, a man who was well
known for his treasonable proclivities, but who was very ill and
very poor, but always in company of a third person, lest his
action might be misrepresented. He had also subscribed to a fund
which was formed to relieve the necessities of two members of the
United Irishmen who were in prison. The most reliable evidence
was given on Dr. Stokes’ behalf that he had used his influence
among the Students, which was considerable, to induce some of
them to withdraw from treasonable associations, and to enroll
their names among the members of the College corps, and that
his efforts had been successful. In fact, Lord Clare was forced
to admit the concurring testimony of so many respectable and
independent witnesses in Dr. Stokes’ favour; at the same time he
stated that he was a well-meaning man who had been led into great
indiscretions.
The Students soon appeared to be reluctant to take the oath,
partly because they declined to implicate others, partly because
they were unwilling to make admissions which would criminate
themselves. At the end of the first day there were fifty who had
refused to be sworn. In consequence of this, Lord Clare intimated
on the following day that if any of the Students who had been
themselves implicated in the proceedings of these treasonable
societies would come forward and admit the fact, and would
promise that in future they would separate themselves from them,
the Visitors would pass over their previous complicity with
these associations. Among those who had first refused to take
the oath was Thomas Moore. However, when the Vice-Chancellor had
explained the matter to the Students, Moore complied, and denied
that he had any knowledge of treasonable practices or societies
in College. Many of the other Students who had at first declined
to be sworn, on the second and third days of the Visitation came
forward and confessed their errors. The result of the inquiry
of the Visitors was the establishment of the fact that there
were four committees of United Irishmen in the College, the
secretaries of which were Robert Emmett, Peter M‘Laughlin, the
younger Corbett, and Flynn. The sentence of the Visitors was to
the effect that Thomas Robinson, Scholar, who had lent his rooms
for the meetings of the United Irishmen, and who had in his sworn
evidence before the Visitors prevaricated in his answers, was
expelled from the College.
William Corbett, Dacre Hamilton, John Carroll, and David Shea,
Scholars; and Thomas Corbett, Peter M‘Laughlin, Arthur Newport,
John Browne, and George Keough, Students, were also expelled for
contumacy in refusing to be sworn, and because they had fallen
into the gravest suspicion, in the opinion of the Visitors, of
being acquainted with, and partakers in, a seditious conspiracy.
Robert Emmett, Thomas Flynn, John Penefather Lamphier, Michael
Farrall, Edward Barry, Thomas Bennett, Bernard Killen, and
Patrick Fitzgerald, were expelled for contumacy in refusing to
appear before the Visitors, and because there was the gravest
suspicion that they were acquainted with, and had been partakers
in, the conspiracy.
Martin John Ferrall was expelled because he admitted that he was
acquainted with, and had been engaged in, this conspiracy, and
because he had not informed the authorities of it, nor had been
willing to do so.
As to Dr. Whitley Stokes, the Visitors decided that because he
had confessed that he had some intercourse with the heads of
the conspiracy he should be precluded from acting as College
Tutor, and should for three years be disqualified from sitting
as a member of the Board, and from being co-opted to a Senior
Fellowship.
These sentences were confirmed on the 1st of May, 1798, by the
Duke of Gloucester, as Chancellor of the University.
This drastic treatment, whether just or not, seems to have
enabled the College to tide over the crisis of 1798, and to
emerge after the Union into that period when it reflects the
dulness and prosperity of the country. The last Provost of the
century, Kearney, is the type of his day. “This Provost,” says
Taylor, with unconscious naiveté, “was always remarkable for
his close attention to whatever might be considered for his
improvement.” His only notable act was to refuse, _with tears in
his eyes_, the resignation offered him, on the ground of religious
difficulties, by the pious John Walker, and to expel him publicly
next day. The same man connived at a number of his Fellows being
married, in formal violation of their oath. Over against these
unwholesome features, and the stagnation in the publishing of solid
intellectual work, must be set the undoubted fact that there were
men of sound learning and research among the Fellows. Mat. Young,
Barrett, Thos. Elrington, Rich. Graves, Geo. Miller, were all men
of respectable attainments in their day; and if the classical
school produced no compeer of the expelled John Walker, it was
at this apparently obscure period that the University of Dublin
exchanged its reputation as a school of theology, of eloquence,
and of style, for the reputation in Mathematics and Physics which
was its only distinction in this century up to the reformations of
Bartholomew Lloyd.
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FOOTNOTES:
[87] _Cf._ Stubbs, p. 161.
[88] Dunton speaks in 1699 of the Provost’s House as a fine
structure in process of construction. This, if he reports
correctly, must have been some residence intermediate between
the old “Provost’s lodgings,” on the south side of the original
quadrangle, and the present house. But there is no other allusion
to such a house.
[89] He obtained from the Trust of Erasmus Smith, of which he was
one of the administrators, large sums for the founding of new
Chairs--nearly £800 per annum, which was distributed in salaries of
£100 to £250.
[90] I conclude this from the last chapter (27) of the Statutes,
which ordains that _three_ authentic copies shall be deposited (1)
as safely as possible in the archives of the College, (2) with the
Lord Deputy of Ireland, (3) with the Chancellor of the University.
The copy held by Strafford when Lord Deputy is now in private hands
in Dublin. What has become of Laud’s copy we do not know; perhaps
it is at Lambeth. There is no provision for taking any other copy
from these; nay, rather, the opening sentence of the chapter
ordains that lost any should offend against them from ignorance,
they shall be read out publicly in the Chapel at the beginning of
each Term by the Deans, in the presence of the whole College.
[91] So have Mornington’s _Te Deum_ and _Jubilate_, composed for
the service on the following Sunday. The March, however, a trifling
composition, survives.
[92] _Cf._ the list in Stubbs’ _History_, p. 222.
[93] This was the lineal descendant of the Wm. Hawkins who in 1672
had got a 99 years’ lease of this land, then waste, for the purpose
of reclaiming it and building a quay. The Bishop had interest
enough with the Board in 1771 to stay the resumption, and even to
obtain a new lease of a valuable property from the College estate,
which his descendants still enjoy. In 1799 this lease had yet 33
years to run--hence a 60 years’ lease.
[94] Provost Baldwin had asserted this right of veto, and had
nominated against the majority, not without protest, but without
being challenged at a Visitation.
[95] “The effects [of the Provost’s duel] are already visible;
scarce a week passes without a duel between some of the students;
some of them have been slain, others maimed; the College Park is
publicly made the place for learning the exercise of the pistol;
shooting at marks by the gownsmen is everyday practice; the very
chambers of the College frequently resound with explosions of
pistols. The Provost has introduced a fencing-master into the
College, and assigned him the Convocation or Senate House [over
the gate] of the College as a school, to teach the gownsmen
the use of the sword, though this is strictly forbidden by the
Statutes.”--_Lachrymæ_, p. 109. Is the first part of this true?
Surely the names of students killed or maimed in duels would have
been paraded before us in the pamphlets of the time. The Provost’s
duel with Mr. Wm. Doyle, arising from anonymous attacks attributed
to the latter, is described at length in the Dublin papers of 17th
and 19th January, 1775.
[96] I quote from Dr. Stubbs, extract, _op. cit._ p. 264. It
appears from Duigenan’s _Lachrymæ_, p. 145, that in Hutchinson’s
time £200 a-year was voted by the Board of Erasmus Smith for Prizes
in Composition only.
[97] He was so popular in Dublin as to receive the honorary freedom
of the city.
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