A history of the University of Oxford

by George C. Brodrick

Reception of Fairfax and Cromwell

While they were thus engaged, Fairfax and Cromwell visited Oxford together in state on May 17, 1649. They were lodged and entertained at All Souls’, in the absence of the new Warden, now on duty in Parliament, by Zanchy, the sub-warden, and one of the proctors, who happened to be a colonel in the Parliamentary army. Both the generals received a D.C.L. degree, and Cromwell, addressing the University authorities on behalf of himself and Fairfax, professed his respect for the interests of learning, and assured them of his desire to promote these interests for the sake of the commonwealth. They dined at Magdalen, played bowls on the college green, had supper in the Bodleian Library, and attended University sermons at St. Mary’s. There is no reason to doubt the sincerity of the assurances given by Cromwell, who became Chancellor on the death of Pembroke, in January 1650. In this capacity, he not only presented the University with a collection of manuscripts, but resisted the reduction of academical endowments proposed by the Barebones Parliament, and supported by Milton; while Fairfax, himself a man of scholarlike tastes, had already proved his regard for the University when the city was in his power.

Second Board of Visitors

The first stage of the Visitation terminated in April 1652, when the London Committee was dissolved, and the Visitors ceased to act. Their work had been constantly interrupted by differences with the London Committee, whom they recognised as their official superiors, but who had of course little acquaintance with University affairs. These bodies were equally resolved to Presbyterianise the University, to make its education more emphatically religious, to strengthen moral discipline, and to enforce such rules as those against excess in dress, and even that which enjoined the colloquial use of Latin. They differed chiefly in their mode of action, the Visitors desiring to adopt a more conciliatory attitude, and to show more respect for academical independence than the London Committee was prepared to sanction. Several changes had taken place among the former, and the retirement of Reynolds had weakened the moderate party on a board which, however, remained distinctively Presbyterian. During the fourteen months between April 1652 and June 1653 the history of the University, like the Visitors’ Register, presents almost a blank. On September 9, 1652, Owen, who had succeeded Reynolds as Dean of Christchurch, was nominated vice-chancellor by Cromwell. On October 16 he was placed at the head of a commission to execute all the Chancellor’s official powers. With him were associated Goddard, the Warden of Merton; Wilkins, the Warden of Wadham; Goodwin, the President of Magdalen; and Peter French, prebendary of Christchurch; and the government of the University seems to have been practically transferred from the Visitors into their hands. Of these men, Goddard had been head physician to Cromwell’s army in Ireland, and afterwards in Scotland; Owen and Goodwin had been his chaplains, and thoroughly enjoyed his confidence; Wilkins was one of the most eminent scientific authorities of his time; French was Cromwell’s brother-in-law and had been on the Board of Visitors. All of these, except Wilkins, were appointed, with five others, to serve on a new and temporary Board of Visitors, for the creation of which the University itself had petitioned, in order to carry on the new academical settlement, with the expression of a hope that they might be fewer in number than before, and all resident. The proceedings of this Board, in which the Independents were more strongly represented, deserve but little notice. The process of weeding out the University and colleges having been completed, and strict rules laid down, little remained except to interpret these rules, to organise the new system, and to guard against the revival of abuses. The Visitors, however, agreed to meet every Monday and Tuesday, and succeeded in doing much useful work. In September 1654, the Board was reconstituted by Cromwell, who had been solemnly congratulated by the University on his assumption of the Protectorate in the previous December.

Third Board of Visitors, and conclusion of the Visitation

As Owen had been the ruling spirit on the second Board of Visitors, so this last was mainly dominated by the influence of Goodwin, and contained several additional members, some Presbyterians. It lasted no less than four years, but the records of its proceedings are but scanty, and chiefly relate to corrections of abuses, such as corrupt resignations of fellowships and irregular elections. In short, the Parliamentary Visitors, having placed the government of the University and colleges in hands which they regarded as trustworthy, were mainly occupied in discharging the functions which properly belonged to the Chancellor and the ordinary Visitors of the several colleges. In an appeal from Jesus College, they deliberately set aside the jurisdiction of the Earl of Pembroke as hereditary Visitor of that society. On the other hand, after Cromwell’s resignation of the chancellorship on July 3, 1657, they went so far as to lay before him their decision on an important case at All Souls’, and received from him an assurance ‘of all due encouragement and countenance from his Highnesse and the Councell.’ Even while they were claiming a paramount authority, the University was insensibly recovering its independence. As vice-chancellor and Dean of Christchurch, Owen was still a great power in the University, and supported a body of Delegates who proposed a sort of provisional constitution for the University under which independent representatives of Convocation would have been associated with the Visitors. In another instance, Owen sought to override a vote of Convocation against reforms which he proposed by the direct action of the Visitors and even of the Protector’s Council, but was foiled in the first attempt, and dissuaded from making the second. In fact, the University had begun to legislate again for itself, and was becoming somewhat impatient of being nursed and schooled by a meddlesome select committee of its own members. As Convocation alleged, ‘Visitors residing upon the place do rather nourish and ferment than appease differences,’ and there was a natural resentment against Heads of colleges acting as judges on their own causes. Having done its real work, the Visitation was perishing of inanition. After Richard Cromwell had been elected Chancellor in July 1657, he appointed Dr. Conant, Rector of Exeter, vice-chancellor, and from this moment Conant, whose importance had long been growing, became the real governor of the University. With a firmness and zeal for reform fully equal to Owen’s, he combined a more conciliatory and statesmanlike character, and while he resisted, as the champion of academical privileges, Cromwell’s scheme for a new University at Durham, he stoutly upheld the autonomy of colleges against the project for superseding all episcopal Visitors. Nevertheless, for six months after his nomination to the vice-chancellorship the Parliamentary Visitors continued to meet, and to make occasional orders, the last of which is dated April 8, 1658, when their register breaks off abruptly. It is not known how their commission was terminated, or whether it was terminated at all. By this time, however, it was beginning to be manifest that, after all, the old order in Church and State was regretted by a majority of the people, and that England was almost tired of Puritan despotism. Parliament itself had virtually established an amended monarchy with a new House of Lords, and the army alone had prevented Cromwell from assuming the title of King. No one was better aware than he of the reaction in popular sentiment, calling for a revival of the institutions so hastily demolished, and his prescient mind foreboded, if it did not actually foresee, the coming restoration of the Stuarts. In this last year of his life there was no force in the central government to push on further interference with Oxford. Moreover the University was now in good order, and possessed the confidence of the nation.

State of the University on the recovery of its independence

It is clear, indeed, from scattered notices of passing events, that its inner life had been less disturbed by the presence of the Visitors than we might infer from the space which they naturally fill in University history, and that since the close of the Civil War Oxford studies and habits had been gradually resuming their ordinary course. It is some proof of this that even during the Puritan interregnum no order was issued to put down the disorderly and indecorous buffoonery of the Terræ Filii, those self-constituted and privileged satirists whose sallies upon University dignitaries continued to scandalise graver censors of academical morals for several generations. When John Evelyn visited Oxford in 1654, and witnessed the celebration of the Act in St. Mary’s Church, he found ‘the ancient ceremonies and institutions as yet not wholly abolished,’ enjoyed the usual round of festivities, and admired the mechanical inventions contrived by Dr. Wilkins with the aid of young Christopher Wren. In the following year a coffee-house was opened opposite All Souls’ College, and largely frequented by Royalists and others ‘who esteemed themselves either virtuosi or wits,’ and in many a private house the services of the Church were regularly performed by clergymen in surplices, to congregations of gownsmen, with the full knowledge, if not the actual connivance, of Cromwell and the Visitors. The academical population was already larger than it had been in the reign of James I., and the University contained quite as many scholars and divines of established reputation. Throughout all the disorders and confusion incident to revolutionary times, it had never ceased to be respected as a home of religion and learning, and Clarendon himself bears unconscious witness to the character of the Visitation in the well-known passage which concludes his strictures upon it. For, after denouncing it as a reign of barbarism, he proceeds to say that, in spite of all, the University ‘yielded a harvest of extraordinary good and sound knowledge in all parts of learning, and many who were wickedly introduced applied themselves to the study of good learning and the practice of virtue, and had inclination to that duty and obedience they had never been taught, so that when it pleased God to bring King Charles the Second back to his throne, he found that University abounding in excellent learning, and devoted to duty and obedience little inferior to what it was before its desolation.’

CHAPTER XIII.
THE PERIOD BETWEEN THE RESTORATION AND THE REVOLUTION.

The Restoration and new Visitation of the University