life-time, uniting, as such may do, to all the force of talent and character which is no more denied to Sovereigns than to subjects, whatever is inherently sacred and imposing in the high office. Doubtless the carrying this out will involve a change; but a change, be it observed, which requires no organic revolution. The Sovereign has only to be that which the Constitution already says that he is. True, a Parliamentary majority has been for some time the immediate source of power; but we have made sad havoc of this principle already. Fourteen years ago, a defeat on a vital point in the House of Lords was as fatal to a Ministry as one in the Commons; since then we have seen men in power for years in spite of a continued resistance from the vast majority of the former House. May not a like tacit change subvert the existing rule which demands a majority of the House of Commons, founded as that rule is, on no principle of the Constitution, pace Sir Robert Peel, who displaced his predecessors by asserting the contrary? It is true that the House of Commons holds the strings of the public purse, and so can refuse the supplies; but this is notoriously an extreme measure, on which few would wish to venture; and people always forget that moral impossibility and moral difficulty are every whit as strong as physical impossibility or physical difficulty. And besides, what is to influence the votes of the House of Commons-what the votes of those who elect to that House? Something or other most assuredly, nor need that something be degrading or corrupting. Obviously, in proportion as we remove such influences, as we have lately been professing to do, the sentiment of loyalty, of reverence towards, and love of, a great and wise and good Sovereign, will have, to say the least, as clear a stage and as fair a chance as any other.

This, therefore, may be one, at first most unlooked-for, result of the Reform Bill, that, by an approach towards relegating each separate power to its native region, we may have been restoring to each its due prerogatives and functions. And this consideration may do away the dread which the thought of a return to monarchical ideas will inspire in some minds, that Civil Freedom may be thereby endangered. We fear nothing of the sort. We are sure that in that restoration of the English Throne to its due place and preponderance, of which we cannot but think that we see symptoms, there will be involved a restoration of the same to all the orders which have lost such; and that, by the same auspicious event, the Poor and the Church, both of whom have suffered so deeply from the decaying and disappearing state of affairs, will be recognised and respected as they have not been for many generations. Be it remembered that the true idea of British Monarchy, that which the Plantagenets and Tudors to a great extent realized, and for which Strafford struggled unto the death, is as far as possible from that

of an Imperial despot or an Oriental Sultan; that, according to this idea, the King is to assert and exercise his power in and through the other elements of the Constitution-in and through the Laws-in and through Parliaments-and, hereafter, also, must he do so in and through that new and most mighty element, the Press-in and through that Public opinion which the Press so greatly stimulates, and which, like the air around him, is the invisible but beneficent preserver of the very humblest man to whom it has penetrated.

To return to Young England, and to those of whom we have already said we believe Young England to be but a sample; if we be right in imagining that they are thus looking to the Constitution in its essential elements, and not merely its accidental and transitory adjustments; if they be meaning to do their duty in the light of such convictions like men, if they really are purposing to fear God and honour the Sovereign, and not to "despise the cry of the poor," we cannot but hope well of them. Just in proportion as they sink to the level of a mere Parliamentary party will they become weak, weaker than all other parties in proportion as their creed is at present less tangible and more remote. Just in proportion as they cultivate a spirit of coxcombry and paradox will they become weak; because coxcombry and paradox are disgusting in all but the very young, and most disgusting when the subjects on which they are displayed are sacred ones. Just in proportion, too, as they show themselves mere men of fashion, tolerating the unchristian practices which have received the sanction of a world that is not subdued unto the Father's will, such as duelling and the like, will they become weak; for little as it really apprehends higher things, the world has a keen eye for inconsistency in those who profess a regard for them. But if, having felt that party has been the bane of England, they will resist the temptation to make themselves a party; if from a sense of the grandeur of those principles to which they have given in their adherence, they will feel bound to be sober and simple and earnest; if from a sense that those principles mean nothing unless they give their votary power to overcome the world, they will set their faces against that world's ungodly maxims and heathenish code,-if, eschewing everything that may mar their profession and vitiate their practice as Christian men, they will go on in firm Faith that God will bless their efforts in His cause, that Blessing will, we cannot doubt, accompany them; and their country will owe them a debt of gratitude equal to any she has incurred to Warrior, or Patriot, or Statesman, for many generations.

690

1. Two Exercises for the Degree of B.D., read in the Divinity School, Oxford, April 18 and 19, 1844. By RICHARD GELL MACMULLEN, M.A., Fellow of Corpus Christi College. Oxford: J. H. Parker. London: J. Burns. 1844. Pp. 64.

2. An Appeal to the Statutes. Oxford: Baxter. 1844.

3. Copies of the Correspondence in the case of the Regius Professor of Divinity and Mr. Macmullen. Oxford: J. H. Parker. London: J. Burns. 1844.

IN settling a question of injury, the only debateable point is, of course, as to the responsibility of the offending party. And it is an axiom in ethics, that this can be established only by proving ignorance or malice. No pleasant dilemma this; but we never heard of a tertium quid in morals. Now we propose-and it is with unaffected pain-to show how this distinction applies to the present state of the University of Oxford.

Anticipatory expressions of sorrow go for little; we get but slight sympathy, when we proclaim what self-inflicted miseries we are about to undergo; and a voluntary immolation meets with but few tears. True as this is to a proverb, we must beg our present professions to be construed as something more than a vague conventionalism: it is from no trick of the sophists' trade that we parade ordinary sentimentalities; if we say little or much, it must not be taken for an adequate expression of what we sincerely feel. But we do think that an answer is required to certain sarcasms, launched-with what feelings we will not inquire-against the course which a majority, unparalleled, as to numbers and rank, in the annals of the University, has felt itself, on a recent occasion, compelled to pursue. That the preachers of obedience should practise faction; that the upholders of authority should contemn and oppose constituted government; that the advocates of theoretical submission should inculcate it in every case but their own; this is the triumphant reductio ad absurdum which is to prove us at once inconsistent and malignant,-which is to fix upon us the contradictory attributes of ruffianism and hypocrisy, and which is to annihilate a whole school of divines, because some who are said to belong to it are to be proved as personally vindictive as they are discovered to be morally irresolute. The chimeras dire of romance, we are told, are now more than realized in our own persons. The familiar theological centaur, "half Jesuit, half Orangeman," at once subtle and noisy, stalks High-street some twenty score strong: Hildebrand and Tartuffe, the Inquisition and the Conventicle, contribute their irreconcileable attributes; and new compounds must be devised, as new affinities are discovered, for relegating, to a strange classification, the paradoxical incongruities which, like the Flora of the Orchidcæ, or the Fauna of Australia, create surprise rather than delight, by their grotesque combinations and impalpable varieties, defying at once type and definition, induction and comparison. Every image

of contradiction is exhausted-every rówоç of inconscquency is appealed to,-every common-place of contrast is worn threadbare. Quis tulerit Gracchos, &c.; the "steep and thorny way which we show," "the primrose path" which we tread, are rhetorically and pathetically opposed; and never was so complete a show-up of the reckless folly to say no worse-of our professions, as proved by our deeds. "He recks not his own read is fastened on our brows by the turbulent opposition displayed towards "the Governors" of the university by the Masters of Arts. So runs the objection to our recent conduct in convocation.

And we own that there is much in this. It is a startling thing to find ourselves, from whatever cause, opposed to legitimate authorities. No more threatening sign than to find confidence so far destroyed, as that we are compelled to look with suspicion where we would gladly tender love and affectionate submission; it is, indeed, an inauspicious omen for State or Church, or for any government to forfeit the respect of the governed. We frankly acknowledge the majesty, the divinity of Law. Authority does stand, to us, as in God's own place. Government, in whatever hands, and even however exercised, has awful sanctions: apart from its conduct, it possesses inherent sanctity. It were safer rather to endure the sneer of maintaining the divine right of a parish constable, than to derogate from the innate holiness of subordination and rule. And if this be so in the abstract, how much is such reverence for station increased, in the case of a University! Here, if anywhere, in the Church's chosen home, might we expect filial submission, on the one hand, on the other, fatherly love; here might we anticipate the absence of strife and anger and evil tempers; but where these are at work-and such confessedly is the case at Oxford-we are bound, for the Church's sake, to show that a state of things, as disastrous as humiliating, entails the very heaviest censure upon the party in fault; and also to point out where the fault lies.

We frankly admit, therefore, with whatever humiliation, that the University of Oxford presents, at the present moment, a spectacle to the Christian world, at which even a heathen would blush. School -Academy-the Seat of the Muses-the Walk-the Grove-the Porch-why, the very simplest notion which such names recall, even as connected with philosophy, apart from religion, is surely that of peace and order. And if to these, the merely literary characteristics of college life—we add all those inexpressibly sweet and endearing associations which have hallowed the University system, in its social and domestic phase: the common-hall-the common-prayers-the brotherhood-the "Society "-the "House"-the "Fellowship "-(holy names these!)-the mutual surrender of tastes and selfishnessesthe many bands, unfelt elsewhere, which serve to knit together by daily discipline, the many peculiar influences which must blend in one, varying ages, ranks, accomplishments, pursuits, and ministries ;these, as they are the result, so do they also form the type, of the

household of God. A family is the very image which best sets forth University life. It is something nearer and dearer, more of the inner man, than a State, or Society, or Convention. And if the conduct of a single household is set forth in Scripture, as the test of fitness for apostolic rule, surely it is not too much to expect that the government and order of a Christian University should be as the expansion of a holy family, should serve to all men as the very model of imitation,-in some, and that no fanciful sense, should visibly display the epitome of the Church, the realization of the communion of saints, the impersonation to all its members of that Divine law in which are found "men of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent, admiring HER as the mother of their peace and joy."*

We have pitched a high note; but the world does require much of such places as Oxford; and the Church requires much. And there must be great faults somewhere, into which it behoves us to inquire. Oxford strife is now all but a bye-word; it is not so much that Oxford reflects, or, it may be, concentrates, the odium theologicum of a divided Church; she has peculiar and private bitternesses of her own she has domestic and intestine seditions. On every possible question which can arise, on matters apparently the most indifferent, some fatality seems to attend her. Honey turned to poison in the acrid herbs of Sardinia; but corn and meal may lose their proper nature of food, if they ever come before an Oxford convocation. We dread the appointment of a Clerk of the Market. Even in the marshal and policemen, some "ism" may become suspected, and strife may arise. And it comes to this, that for all this rancour responsibility is not divided. We cannot, with quiet Sir Roger, say, that "much may be said on both sides:" it is not so. One of the two parties must be quite right, and the other quite wrong. We cannot consent to divide the scandal. Either petulance and arrogant insubordination, which would disgrace a school-boy of the fifth form, must be charged on the one party, or upon the other must be fastened the charge of ignorance of their high duty and responsibility, and a culpable confusion between right and wrong, which is itself criminal. We see no middle course: it is not a mere infirmity of temper; it is not a mistaken view of what is expedient and politic. Impatience of control, on the one hand, overweening claims to it on the other, are not enough of themselves, bad as such excuses would be in such a quarter, to account for our present troubles in the University. Such might be, as they have often been, the all but natural encroachments and heavings of the flux and reflux of rule and ruled. These jealousies, however we might regret, we might count upon; but agencies more subtle and dangerous than these are at work. It is a question of morals, not of local and temporary soreness and exasperation. There is great sin somewhere, to have produced a strife so unnatural as we are called upon to witness.

* Hooker.