April 22, 1654.
University Library at Upsal. The French Resident visited Whitelocke, and, seeing him ready to go take the air, offered him his company, which Whitelocke could not refuse. They went together to the Library of this University, where there are many good books, for the most part brought out of Germany; but it is not extraordinary, nor exceeding the public libraries in England and elsewhere. One of Whitelocke’s gentlemen held it not exceeding his lord’s private library at his own house in England, as he affirmed to some of the scholars here, who were not pleased therewith, nor would easily believe that the English Ambassador’s library in his private house was to be compared to that of their University.
The keeper of this library is one Doctor Lovenius, there present, a learned and civil person, who hath published several books in print, touching the laws and government and antiquities of his country, in good Latin; and both himself and his works are worthy of esteem. He was attending upon Whitelocke all the time of his being in the library and in the public places of the University, and informed him of such things as he inquired touching the same; and, to gratify their civility, Whitelocke sent them twenty of his own books which he had in his house, all of them English authors, as the Primate of Armagh’s works, Sir Henry Spelman, Selden, and others; which was a present very acceptable, and kindly received by the University from him.
University of Upsal. They affirm this University to be very ancient; but there are no colleges or public houses for the maintenance of the scholars, or public revenue belonging to them; so that they do not live together in bodies or companies by themselves, but every one severally as he can agree or find for his convenience. But here are divers public rooms or schools where the professors and scholars use to meet and perform their exercises openly; and the rooms of their library are three, about twenty foot square apiece.
There are all sorts of professors for the arts and sciences, who are promised good salaries, but they complain that they are not well paid; and though some of them be very learned, yet they take not much pains; it may be according to the proverb, “mal payé mal servi”—he that is ill paid doth but ill service. Some counted the number of scholars to be about three hundred, which is not more than may be found in one college in England. They make great preparation by printing their theses and publishing them, and inviting the grandees to their disputations, where the Queen in person is sometimes present, though the exercise is only the art of well disputing, except in some of their professors and eminent persons.
Their University is a kind of corporation, like others, their want of supplies not affording them so much perfection, and their defect of government giving them liberty and temptation to disorder, to which they are much addicted; but in their sermons, whilst the English were among them, they would propose them as a pattern of civility and pious conversation. Their government is by a Chancellor, who at present is the Ricks-Chancellor; and it hath constantly been in the hands of some eminent and great person.
Cathedral of Upsal. Whitelocke and the Resident visited the Cathedral Church, which is fair and large, built with brick, and covered with copper. They affirm it to be one of the most ancient churches of Europe, and that the Gospel was here early planted, but earlier in the church of old Upsal, which is of a quadrangular form, and formerly dedicated to their heathen gods. Their cathedral, they say, was the seat of an arch-flamen; and in the places of arch-flamens and flamens, upon their conversion to Christianity (as in England, so here), bishops and archbishops were instituted; and now their cathedral, as other churches, is full of images, crucifixes, and such other furniture as the Lutheran churches tolerate, and is little different therein from the Popish churches.
The Resident and Whitelocke took also a view of the castle and city of Upsal. The castle is near the town, seated upon the point of a hill; it is built of brick, plastered over, strong and beautiful. If it had been finished, the design was to have had it four-square; but two sides of it only are built. It had been very large and noble if it had been perfected. As it is, it contains many rooms, and sufficient for the Court; some of them are great and stately, but up two stories, after the fashion of that country. If it had been finished, it would have equalled any other, if not the castle of Stockholm itself.
Environs of Upsal. The prospect from the castle is very beautiful; the country round about it pleasant and fruitful, and distinguished into meadows, pastures, and arable fields, and the river Sale passing through them, which loseth itself about half a league from thence into a great lake. The river is navigable with boats of about twenty or thirty tons, many leagues together, going through the lake also; it is not muddy, nor unfurnished with the fish of those parts, and is about half as broad as the Thames at Henley. It runs at the foot of the hill on which the castle stands, and the town is built upon it; and it waters most part of the streets, to their great commodity. It is for this reason called Upsal, because Ubbo—who, they say, was the son of Gomer, the son of Japhet, the son of Noah—this Ubbo built this town upon the river Sale, and therefore called it, after his own name, Ubbo Sale, by contraction of speech now called Upsal. All agree it to be one of the most ancient of their cities, the metropolitan see of their archbishop, and in old time the residence of their kings, and where they were invested with the regal dignity. The country about it seemed one of the most pleasant and fruitful of these parts. The town itself is not much beautified with stately buildings, not above nine or ten houses being built with brick; the rest of them, after the fashion of their country, built with great bodies of fir-trees, and covered with turf; the fairest of their brick houses was that where the English Ambassador lodged.
This city hath not much trade, and therefore not much wealth. The government of it is according to the municipal law of the country, and as other cities are; their head officer is a Burgomaster, who hath for his assistants a council, in the nature of the common councils in our corporations in England, consisting of the principal burgesses and inhabitants of the city, who have power, with the Burgomaster, as to making of ordinances, and in the government.