The Sun.
London, England, 1854-03-18 00:00:00

RITSSIA. AND TURKEY.

Lord J. RUSSELL, by corninand of her"Majosty,
brught up copier of treaties between Russia and Turkey,
which were ordered to lie upon the table.

THE BALLOT.

Mr. H 6 BERKELEY gave notice that, after Easter,
he should renew his motion on the subject of the ballot.

RUSSIAN PRODUCE

—-- - -
Mr. T. DUNCOYIBE asked Lord John Russell,
in the event of war taking place, whether the pur-
chase of Russian produce would become illegal and
liable to seizure pn its transit overland, via Konigsberg
to England ; or would Russian produce purchased by
the subjects of any neutral state, and repurchased of
them by English merchants be illegal or liable to seizure
on its transit from such neutral state to the port of
London ?

Lord J. RUSSELL was not prepared to give any
answer to the second question, but with regard to the
first, he did not think such goods would be liable to
seizure.

OXFORD UNIVERSITY.
Lord J. RUSSELL rose to ask leave to bring in a bill
to make further provision for the good government and
extension of the University of Oxford and of the colleges
therein. The noble lord said—Sir, in rising to lay under
the consideration of the house a most grave and important
subject, I feel peculiar need for your indulgence. I feel
peculiar need for your indulgence, in the first place, be-
cause I have not had the honour of studying at the Uni-
versity of Oxford, with regard to which I now propose to
bring in a bill ; and, in a second place, because I am la-
bouring under thadefect of bodily indisposition. I fear I
may not, therefore, be able to convey amply and fully to
this house the views her Majesty's Government entertain.
with regard to this very important matter. On the other
hand, I have had the advantage of having under conside-
ration a vary elaborate and copious report from the com-
missioners appointed by her Majesty to inquire into the
state and condition of the University of Oxford, and {
have likewise had the advantage of the report which has
been made by the committee of the heads of houses, and
the able evidence submitted to them upon the questions
which have been raised. I have had likewise the assist•
ance of my right hon friend the member for Oxford Uni-
versity (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) in the prepara-
tion of the bill which I am about to ask the house to give
me leave to introduce. (Hear, hear.) I therefore, Sir,
proceed at once to the question, whether or not it is
desirable to propose to Parliament great changes with
respect to that university. I will no', at the present
moment enter upon the objections which have been made
against any interference by Parliament with the con-
otitutioa of that university, bat, after having stated the
views that we take, I will endeavour to meet those argu•

,THE, SUN, LONDON,

meats which were used to prevent the interference of Par-
liament. Sir the commissioners have pointed out at great
length the defects which they conceive to exist in the Uni;
versity of Oxford, 'and the remedies which they think it
desirably to apply. But it is not the commissioners
who have stated that Oxford does not at present fulfil .
the purposes for which it is designed as a national univer-
sity. (Hear, hear.) I find a statement to the same effect
in the very valuable paper laid before the heads of houses
by Dr. Pusey. He has said—
" There is much need of every exertion to extend the old
universities. They have means for sound education, and a
traditional feeling which no new institution can possess ;
means (as our fellowships) which are now often compara-
tively wasted, because no adequate employment is found for
them within the university. But now, instead of extethiing
our influence, we have been gradually losing the preliminary
education, not only in some degree, of other learned profes-
sions (as the bar and the higher medical profession), but even
of the very clergy. The population of England increases day
and' night ; increase of the clergy is not only needed, but de-
manded."

There cannot be stronger testimony that some reforms are
needed than that so able an opponent of the commissioners
as Dr. Pusey should be found saying, that not only is the
education furnished at Oxford not adequate, in extent at
least, to the education required for the bar and other
professions, but that it is not sufficient even for the clergy,
whose education the University of Oxford might be sup-
posed to be fully competent to conduct. (Hear, hear.)-
In considering this subject, I propose to take in order the
different subjects which I stated iu ray speech last year on
the subject of national education, and which subjects were
then pointed out in a letter to the Chancellor of the Uni-
versity of Oxford by my noble friend the Secretary of
State for the Home Department. The first relates to the
alteration of the constitution of the University, with a view
to the public welfare and to the extension of the useful in-
fluences of the universities. The commissioners have
stated that there are general complaints of the governing
body of the University. They have stated that the heads
of houses are elected for other, reasons and other purposes,
because, for example, they are supposed to be of concilia-
tory manners as heads of houses, or that they will exercise
a wise superintendence over the revenues of the college,
or that they have connections of a personal or political
character with those who have the appointment in their
gift ; and that they are not specially qualified to undertake
the superintendence of the studies of the University. That
this is the case is admitted by several of those gentlemen
wno have given their opinion on the appointment of heads
of houses. Without now stating to the house what it is
proposed to do on this subject, I proceed with the next
question, on which there is a great deal of evidenee in the
report of the commissioners—l mean the extension of the
University. We are to consider that this is a national in-
stitution—that it is one that ought to supply education for
as many young men as can be expected to require at. that
place--aslibsrai- system of education; - Sir, in look-
ing at the history of the universfsYN will be found
that in ancient times tha onivertif,tainoti the col-
leges WOs the principal and ruling povver—(hear, hear)—
that the congregation of the leading resident teachers,
Summoned by a bell,. formed the congregation or ruling
body of that university—and that at one time there were
no less than 30J halls to which scholars resorted to obtain
the benefit of the education given by the university. But
in process of time the whole of this system was subverted,
and the commissioners state that for 150 years, and, it ap-
pears, for a considerably longer time, the colleges have sup-
p.auted the university, the halls have become altogether
extinct, and that no education has been received by stu
dents except throagn the medium of th.. tutors of the dif-
ferent colleges. I rind that this is stated not only by those
who are in favour of reform, but by those who are against
it. There is thus now existing quite a different system
from that which was originally established, and the con-
- sequence of that difference is that the education given has
become more restricted in its extent, that young men are
obliged to enter a college, and, believing that they are
obliged to receive the education given in that college,
only look to that education, whether they desire to obtain
degrees, or honours, or fellowships, and the more substan-
tial rewards of the university. Now, there is in the
evidence of Dr. Pusey a great deal of very acute dissua-
sion upon the question which he puts as .an alternative, of
education in colleges, or education by professors of the
university. I own it appears to me in the first place, that
these are not antagonistic questions. (Hear, hear.) It ap-
pears to me that there is nothing more wholesome and
more advantageous than the existence of colleges, the heads
and fellows of which exercise a certain amount of dis-
cipline over the young men who may be sent to the
university, who may afford them the benefit of their so-
ciety, and who bath by their authority and their manners
can put some check upon their excesses and extravagance
and moderate the passions of young men. I consider it a
great advantage that this country possesses in the Univers-
ity of Oxford, that there should be colleges, and that edu-
cation should be given within those colleges. (Hear.)
But, sir, if the education given is to be entirely confined
to those colleges, it is obvious that the tendency will be
that those who teach, and the tutors of those colleges, will
confine themselves to certain branches of learning ; and 2 not
only to certain branches of learning, but that in those
branches of learning which they teach they will confine
themselves to certain branches and certain particular classes
of studies with which they are thoroughly acquainted, and
which they find greater facilities in teaching than a more
°slighted and comprehensive scheme of education. On the
other hand; the professorial system, merely considered alone,
has a tendency—as has been suited by one of those who
have given evidence to the commissioners—to a loose and
somewhat superficial, and what is called a "hand to
mouth" system of teaching ; and the student, although
he msy hear the lectures of the professor, will not have
the advantage of being thoroughly examined viva voce by
a person in whose room he is sitting, and from whom he is
receiving immediate instruction. (Hear, hear.) But, on
the other hand, it is to be expected that the teaching of i
the college tutor should have a tendency to confine
young men to certain branches of study, and that
they should not be able to obtain from the col-

lege tutors that large and comprehensive view— of
different sciences which would be obtained from
persons in the station of professors, and who, being gene-
rally men of eminence, and having devoted their minds to
particular branches of study, are able to point out the
various branches of learning that belong to that particular
class of study. Dr. Pusey has drawn a comparison between
the tutorial system of the English universities and the
professorial system of the German universities, and he has
said that the choice is between the tutorial system of Ox-
ford and that scheme of German rationalism which has
been taught by the professors of some of the German uni-
versities. But the logic and the proof of this assertion
are entirely wanting. (Hear.) The system of German
rationalism does not belong to the professorial system, and
if, instead of going to Germany, Dr. Pusey had gone to
Scotland, he would have found that the professors in the
universities there were such men as Dr. Chalmers and
others,"whoselectures are as far removed as possible from

the views of those German divines whose rationalistic doc-
trines are the dread of Dr. Pusey. It appears to me that
we have an opportunity, and that opportunity we ought
not to lose, of combining the advantage of the collegiate
with that of professorial teaching. (Hear, hear.) And I
should as little listen to a person who said that, because
the tutorial system is excellent and colleges are of the
greatest value, we ought not to have professors to give
young men the benefit of their teaching, as I should
listen to a lecture by an agricultural teacher who should
say that it is very important to prepare the ground
and till it, to plough and harrow it, to break it up and
fertilise it with manure, but that with respect to
sowing the seed it was a matter of little importance, to
which his hearers might pay little attention. For this
seems to me the argument that is used. The argument is,
that we ought not only to endeavour to strengthen the mind,
but that we ought to throw in all the power we possess to
strengthen and discipline the mind, but not to give it in-
formation. If these were young men who only stayed at
the university until they were 16, I could well understand
that language. But as these young men usually stay un-
til they are one or two and twenty, it seems to me advis-
able that at the beginning of their college tuition they
should have information with regard to tithe° great
branches of learning and science which of late years, and
not only of late years, but for the last century, have formed.
the riches of our modern time, and that the science of New-
ton and the literature of modern days, of England, and
Italy, and France, ought not to he unknown to those
who receive a liberal education. (Cheers.) It appears to
me that there are two classes of p arsons for whom this
education is desirable. The one class is those who are will-
ing to adopt some profession, or who, at all events, expect
to derive great advantage from the learning so acquired in
the pursuits of life. Now, I do not think you give these
young men sufficient education unless you point out the
road by which such eminence can be obtaintd. I observe
that, with regard to the course of studies proposed in the
year 1850, a great advance was made in this respect ; but I
think if that scheme of studies of 1850 is examined it will be
found that even it has not sufficient scope—that it does not
afford sufficient means to young men to obtain that know-
ledge of science, and of the learning of modern times,
which they ought to acquire. I find that at Cambridge
every person who endeavours to obtain honours is obliged
to have some acquaintance with the Principia of Newton.
I do not find, however, that any such obligation exists at
Oxford ; yet it appears to me, whether considered with a
view to forming the mind, whether with a view to
strengthening the intellect for other species of reasoning,
whether with a view to watching the progress of discovery
as continued by one eminent man after another, or who-
ther, as opening the most sublime views of divine Provi-
dence and divine intelligence, that following geometrical
propositions from the commencement of Euclid to the
third book of the Principia would be as good and as use-
ful a study as young men could possibly pursue. It would
appear, however, as if the modern date of Newton's dis-
coveries constituted, in some way, an objection to the use
of his Principles in the University of Oxford. I observe
that Dr. Pusey takes great credit for the instruction which
is given in Butler's Analogy. No doubt Butler's Analogy
is as fit to be put into the hands of men whose minds are
to be exercised and who are to be taught the process of
reasoning, as any book that can well be pointed out ; but
I find that it is only for a few years past that that work
has been used at the university. I may read to the house
a statement of the number of pupils who have attended
the lectures of the various professors of the university.
Those numbers have varied, from time to time, daring
the last two years, having sometimes been, in the case
of the Regius Professor of Divinity, 13, 3,6, 26, 16, 14.
The attendance at the lectures' of the Regius Professor of.
Medicine was, in former times, rarely more than 10, and
'often not above four or five. At the lectures of Savile's
Professor of Geometry the average attendance was not
above three, the numbers having varied from 18 to
none. (A laugh.) The average number attending Savile's
Profeostrp Philosophy, between
btwyewaseel aboutt4oand 50 ;
three;
anl
White's,Camden'sProfessor
of m
Professor of Ancient History—for the popular lectures
about 4:10, for the others, 10. The lectures of the Regius
Professor of Modern History having been a great attrac-
tion on their establishment, the attendance for the first
year was 160 on the average, and for the second year 57.
The attendance at the lectures of the Earl of Lichfield's
Clinical Professor was, on the average of the last three
years, 5, and at those of Lord Almoner's Reader in Arabic,
3,4, or 1. The attendance at the lectures of Aldrich's
Professor of Chymistry averaged, from the years 1822 to
183. x, 31. per annum • from 1831 to 1838, 16 per annum ;
and from 1838 to the present time, 12 per annum. The
average attendance upon Lee's Pi aelertoi of Anatomy
varied from 12 to 20, upon the Reader in Experimental
Philosophy it was 30, upon the Reader in Mineralogy and
Geology it was 107 on the average for four years, and upon
Boden s Professor of Sanscrit it was 10. It will be seen,
therefore, with regard to the lectures of these professors,
that they do not in fact form a part of the education of
the university. In some of the publications against the
reports of the commissioners stress is laid upon the circum-
stance that professorships exist at present; but as the
attendance upon the lectures of the professors does not
form any part of the road to the honours and emolu-
ments of the university, the consequence is, as might
naturally be 'expected, that the studies of the colleges
are preferred and that young men who devote an hour,
to Greek plays, another hour to Tht!cydides, and ano-
ther to Aristotle's .Etletio, are sot &spoiled afterwards