March 28, 1893.
Why should it not be suggested to Dundee, that instead of a division of forces, difference of place, etc., etc., they should build a college for themselves at St. Andrews, just as we hope Blairs will do, confined to Dundee people? I think that would meet the foundress's intention, and it might be called Dundee College. This would be transferring her benefaction to St. Andrews, instead of St. Andrews being bled into such veins as Dundee possesses.
I do not see why St. Andrews, holding a unique position, geographically and otherwise, should not also hold a unique position in being constituted, as Oxford and Cambridge are, of a congeries of free and affiliated colleges.
The above mention of "Blairs" has reference to another scheme which Bute hoped might, if carried out, fulfil the two-fold object of strengthening the position of St. Andrews, and of raising the educational standard—an object he had much at heart—of his co-religionists in Scotland. With this view he had proposed the transference to St. Andrews, and the affiliation to the university, of the College of Blairs, near Aberdeen, the training-school of the Scots Catholic clergy; and had promised substantial help both towards the acquirement of a site, and in the endowment of the new seminary. The success of such a scheme obviously depended to great extent, if not entirely, on the concurrence of the ecclesiastical authorities. They were divided on the matter, among those opposed to the plan being the then Metropolitan of Scotland, as well as the rector of the college; and finally the Holy See, much to Bute's disappointment, decided against the project. An alternative scheme, providing for the establishment in the university city of a house of studies in connection with the abbey of Fort Augustus, also proved impracticable. The Benedictines were only invited to make the foundation on the understanding that, and as long as, Bute's offer was not taken advantage of by the secular clergy, and they did not see their way to accept it under those conditions.
1894, Interest in the Jews
Simultaneously with the plan just referred to, Bute likewise cherished the hope of attracting to the university members of the Jewish body, in which he had always been warmly interested. He wrote as to this on June 8, 1894:
Mr. Mocatta has given me a tract, and talked to me at length of the religious desolation of the young Jews who are sent to Christian schools and colleges without any provision for their own religious instruction and practices. I am trying to persuade him and others that all they seek to gain would be gained, and all they deplore avoided, by starting a Jewish college at St. Andrews. I think the idea is dawning on them.
Three months later he wrote to the Chief Rabbi that he was much gratified at the prospect of young Hebrews matriculating at St. Andrews. "I do not pretend," he added, "to have any other motive in the matter than zeal for the good of the university; but I sincerely think that the benefits would be reciprocal."[[10]] Bute was not a little incensed at this time by what he called a "most unseemly" letter written to the newspapers by one of the professors, who said that he would much prefer that a group of Jewish students should have "a comfortable berth in Abraham's bosom" than that they should come to St. Andrews. A question subsequently arose as to the unsuitability of a certain Saturday—which was not only, of course, the Hebrew Sabbath, but chanced to be also their solemn Day of Atonement—for the entrance examination of Jewish candidates. The Principal suggested, as an alternative, holding an examination on the following Sunday—a proposal that drew from Bute a characteristic protest, in which he gives interesting proof of his sympathy with Hebrew religious ideals:
The Day of Atonement is, as the Chief Rabbi feelingly wrote me, the most solemn day in all their year.... Anything more defiantly contemptuous of their race and religion than the original selection of that particular day for the examination can hardly be conceived, nor any device better calculated to raise contempt for St. Andrews in the whole Jewish world. I fear it can hardly have been inadvertent.... The amended proposal, of holding the examination on the Sunday, seems to me hardly less objectionable. I had suggested Thursday, in order that the young men's minds might be as free as possible on their solemnity. On the Principal's plan, they would have to reach St. Andrews—a place utterly strange to them—on Friday evening and there pass the Day of Atonement alone, presumably in an inn. When night set in on Saturday, they would have been 26 hours without so much as a crumb or a drop of water—unwashed, barefooted, and probably dressed in grave-clothes—their minds having been fixed as far as possible on Sin, Death, and Eternity—and worn out by hours of recitation of Hebrew prayers. Would they be likely in this state to do themselves justice in an examination held a few hours later?