Beside

beginning and end are authentic, in which are narrated the contests of the Schoolmen and the efforts of Alfred to reconcile them. The intermediate part is very awkwardly interposed and (I think) was interpolated in order to pretend the yet greater antiquity of these institutions.* this testimony, (in itself assuredly unsatisfactory,) we have other proof that before the Norman Conquest, Oxford was a seat of learning: and we find in Oxford itself internal marks of some other origin than from Abbey or Cathedral Schools.

We have testimony, that the Anglo-Saxons partook in the scholastic movement of the eleventh century many of them indeed are named, as frequenting the celebrated school of the monastery of Bec in Normandy. The political intercourse of England with Normandy, and the extent of British commerce, made this inevitable: and though the only passage in which Oxford is named, (viz. by Ingulf, the Conqueror's Secretary,) is not beyond suspicion; it has never yet been attacked.

The oldest authentic accounts of Oxford lead us to believe, that its schools are earlier than the Norman Conquest. That scholastic streets, (School-street and Shydiard-street§) existed there in the year 1109, is clear from old documents quoted by Wood.||

* On this matter I have enlarged in Note (4) at the end. † See below on the Halls and Inns also on the position of the Oxford Chancellor.

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See Note (5) at the end. § Vicus Schediasticorum. || Wood does not use the quotation as a basis for the argument here advanced.

scholastic population must have filled them; and we can hardly allow less than from twenty to thirty years, for the gathering of such a population and erecting of the streets. Now this takes us back just to the horrors of the Norman Conquest and its immediate consequences. None can choose such a date as the conceivable origin of the system: we are forced to carry it higher. We then fall back on the Saxo-Danish period, and on the time when Ingulf is said to have studied in Oxford. Granting that this is the first notice of the system, it is unreasonable to infer that this was its beginning. Indeed even at a later period, it is seldom enough that the Chronicles are led to name the Academicians. Now considering what times preceded the Conquest, we may be sure that at most they would barely sustain existing schools. No reign nearer than Alfred's was likely to originate them.

Thus whatever we know at all,- by tradition, by documents (suspected or unsuspected,) or by the evidence of general probability,-converges to the same result, that the Oxford Schools are as an

cient as King Alfred.

§ 22. Physical position of Oxford.

Even the physical position* of Oxford might seem worthy of Alfred's wisdom. In the middle of

* See Note (7) at the end.

Southern England, situated on several islands in a broad plain, through which many streams flowed; it had easy communication with the Metropolis and with other parts; while by its marshes it was inaccessible to an invading enemy. Its own fortifications are recorded to have been of singular strength; while those of London Bridge hindered the seapirates from sailing up to attack the town. Once only did the Danes occupy it as enemies, viz. in 1009; and then perhaps only one quarter, or island. As, then, at the time of the Conquest it was an important place; and, soon after, we find its prosperity to depend on the University; this must probably have been the case also at an earlier period.*

23. Fluctuations in the progress of learning.

Of course I do not mean to say that the connexion was uninterrupted between the scholastic institutions of the ninth and of the eleventh century. We cannot imagine that the studies went on quietly during the Conquest, or even in the Dano-Saxon period. Many scholastic buildings may have fallen into ruin, or have become void: yet if traditions and lively recollections remained, they would exceedingly aid the after-revival of the University : indeed, a self-restoration might be expected whenever peace and quiet returned. Slowly and * See Note (7) at the end.

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diffidently this took place toward the end of the eleventh century. The zeal for learning in a Lanfranc or an Anselm, could not be wholly vain; and in the milder reign of Henry I. the effects began to appear. His marriage with good Queen Maude began the reconciliation of the two races and a new nationality; and thenceforth men of learning appear in England, equal to any of their Continental contemporaries: nor was it without reason* that the king, as patron of learning, received the name of Beauclerc. It is admitted that all through Stephen's stormy reign the age still advanced in intellect, till it reached its most flourishing state in the thirteenth century:† we know that from the beginning of the twelfth Oxford was in repute as a seat of learning; and there is every probability that she bore a large share in the national progress.

24. Oxford was depressed by being too much in advance of the age.

Whether Oxford was already to be called a University, whether she had any pre-eminence over the schools of Canterbury, Saint Alban's, Lincoln, Westminster, Winchester, Peterborough,—may indeed be questioned. Granting that she had none in the beginning of this twelfth century, it rather goes to prove my point. For (as will be stated) there is * See Note (8) at the end. + See Note (9) at the end.

ground to believe that Oxford was then less popular with the Church and the public, for the very reason that she was before the age in her estimate of positive Science. In fact, in the middle of the century Civil Law was taught by Vicarius at Oxford; and Medical Science not long after by others. Beside which, although we find no mention of any Abbey or Cathedral Schools which could be a nucleus for the University, yet it had Halls and Inns from the earliest time: wherein it shows a remarkable prematureness of developement, distinguishing it from all contemporaneous institutions.

25. DIVERGENCE of the Oxford System from that of Paris.

The points of contrast to the University of Paris, which, in the midst of similarities, Oxford presents; grow more strongly marked with time, and indicate a difference of origin and of organic tendencies. All this is at once accounted-for, if we believe the system to come down from Alfred. Although the relative antiquity of the Universities of Paris and of Oxford is not to be treated as an affair of honor, it is not immaterial to a right understanding of the history and the superior antiquity of Oxford, once established, sets at rest many erroneous opinions. Now that a considerable emigration of students took place from Paris to Oxford about 1229,