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was all that I could allot to it. A peep through Sir Isaac Newton's antique telescope, through which he surveyed the heavens, gave me more pleasure than any thing I saw in Trinity College. To handle, to explore,to peep through this homely telescope,handled and used by him who taught the mechanism of the universe,and who demonstrated its fundamental laws, was the richest feast I enjoyed at Cambridge. Next to Trinity College, I was most interested in the gorgeous displays of regal pride in King's Church, the richest edifice of its size in Great Britain. All I can say of it here is, that it is after the architectural style and splendor of what is called Woolsey's Hall, in Hampton Court Palace. I had the curiosity to ascend its long winding stairs, and even to place myself on its loftiest summit—a leaden seat on its comb-that I might survey the whole town of Cambridge and all the surrounding country. I sat there alone for almost half an hour, in contemplation not only of the University in its seventeen colleges, covering so great an area-not merely in surveying the city and its entire environs, but in casting a few thoughts over its connexions with the past and future history of England, and with the world that now is, and that which is to come.

How circumscribed is human vision, said I to myself, not only as respects the objects of the scenes around me, but as respects those which the mind itself surveys! How indistinct those in the remoter part of the few miles which I now survey, compared with those immediately around this splendid edifice! How little did the Roman Catholic founders of thirteen of these seventeen colleges, with all their church infallibility, imagine, when founding them and lavishing on them their gold and their silver, that these very colleges should be alienated from their church and converted into mighty engines to demolish her ancient infallibility and omnipotency!— Such, however, is the fact. The Papal schools and colleges, abbeys, priories, monasteries, convents, glebes, parsonages, &c. &c., have all been not only escheated from her dominion, but have become battering rams and engines of demolition against her grossest superstitions and most palpable abominations. Still these institutions are so combined with evils to man, are so much in league with the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eye, and the pride of life-so hostile to the letter and the spirit of Bible Christianity, that a man must be as spiritually blind as a bat at noon, if he do not see that the hierarchy which these institutions sustain is as worthy of repudiation and annihilation as that which has been, in its outward and political form, denounced and demolished by him that founded Trin

ity College,*-(how ridiculous and blasphemous the name!)—the first of the Protestant series of institutions added to, and allied with the Papal colleges baptized into mere Protestantism or reformed Popery.

May not the time come, continued I to myself, when these schools, and the languages, sciences, and arts which they teach, will be redeemed from their servility to a corrupt and corrupting hierarchy, which, like an incubus, oppresses the energies of a great and mighty nation, and holds it as much in abeyance to all that is animal and sensual in fallen humanity, as that hierarchy which, some three centuries since, it reprobated, condemned, and almost unanimously renounced!!

But to return from my musings to the University of Cambridge. From the archives of the University, we learned that the Professors derive their annual salaries from various sources, ancient stipends and modern stipends, paid out of the privy purse, or by government. We could not, however, accurately ascertain the aggregate amount of the salaries from all sources. Compared with American Professors, they are, however, liberally rewarded.

The matriculation fees of new students are paid on the second day of each term on the registering of their names. The fees are as diverse as the rank of the student. Noblemen pay £16, almost $80; a Fellow-Commoner, £ 12, more than $50; a Pensioner, £5 10s., or $26; and the very Sizer himself pays £1 5s., or $6. On these, however, there is a government tax and the fees of registry.

The tuition is paid quarterly, at the following rates:-A Nobleman pays £10; Fellow-Commoner, £5; Pensioner; £2 10; a Sizer, 15 shillings, or $50; $25, $12,50, and $3 per quarter.

To these are added room rent, attendance, coals, laundress' bills, assessed taxes, and college payments, amounting together to £25; Tuition and these accommodations amount to £35. The cost of boarding for 25 weeks, which is the average time of boarding in college during the three terms per annum, at 16 shillings per week, and the laundress' bill of £5 8s., make the annual expenses at Cambridge over £100, or $500 per annum. This is a fair average of all the seventeen colleges composing the University. Every member of the University pays also six shillings, $1,50, for the annual purchase of books for the public library.

Degrees are not confined to literary merit. "The University sometimes confers degrees without either examination or residence, * Henry VIII.

on such individuals of mature age as are illustrious-not, indeed, merely on account of birth, but for services rendered the state or to literature." Thus in America the degree of L.L.D. has been conferred on several distinguished statesmen, without any literary merit whatsoever. But so sworn to the English hierarchy is the University, that she confers no honors on any man, no matter how great his merit or learning, unless he be a bona fide member of the Church of England!

The University of Cambridge, by large and liberal prizes, does much to stimulate ambition and to elicit talent. Prizes on foundations of legacies for the purpose, for the encouragement of literature, free and open to competion for the whole University, amount to upwards of £1,500, or $7,260. Three-fourths of this sum are given for classics and English compositions--the remainder for mathematics. Besides this sum there are some $3,400 per annum given by each of the seventeen colleges. Two thirds of this sum is given for the encouragement of classic literature.

Connected with, and under the supervision of one of the colleges, is a grammar school, called from its founder, "the Perse Free Grammar School." The age of admission is 10 years. The term of continuance may be to the age of 18 years. The scholars all pay ten shillings entrance and twenty shillings per annum. Other scholars than "free scholars" are now admitted, and scholars educated here for three years are to be admitted (coeteris paribus) before all others to fellowships and scholarships in Caius College.

I have time and space only to note the public buildings, at which I merely glanced, not having time to visit them in detail. The public buildings are:-The University Library, the University Press, the Fitzwilliam Museum; the donation of Viscount Fitzwilliam, a splendid collection of Books, Paintings, Drawings, and Engravings; besides, for its erection and preservation, the gift of some half million of dollars; -the Mesman Museum, holding 248 Paintings and 33 Drawings and Prints; the Cambridge Observatory, in which are a Transit Instrument, of ten feet focal length by Dollond; a Mural Circle, eight feet diameter, and an Equa torial, of five feet in length; also, a magnificent Telescope, of nearly twelve inches aperture, and twenty feet in length, made in Paris, and presented by the Duke of Northumberland, &c. &c.; the Anatomical Museum, the Geological Museum, and the Mineralogical Museum. To these we may add the Botanic Garden, of some four acres; of each of which I cannot, of course, speak particularly. Such is a meagre outline of this grand national institution. But

of its great utility to the cause of humanity and religion, I cannot speak with much confidence, and shall therefore say nothing. One thing, the disproportion between the outlay and the revenue of good accruing, is most striking and obvious to the most superficial observer. It is all told when I state, that, on descending from the roof of King's Church, and on entering into that room in which worship was performed, all the remainder being unoccupied space, with golden roof and marble floor of some 200 feet long, I found but one hundred and twenty fixed seats, for one hundred and twenty persons only, each having its richly gilded psalter, prayer-book, and candlestick. An organ, a gilded pulpit, and a golden eagle with a Bible on its back, completed its furniture. Here were expended one million of dollars and more for the accommodation of but one hundred and twenty persons; and, from all I could learn, these seats are seldom filled with any kind of worshippers, professional or real. In literature and science we must not think that it is as in religion, a grand display-a gigantic institution, without a corresponding utility. Affectionately, your father,

A. CAMPBELL.

CHRISTMAS DAY.

As we are again, under the protecting providence of our heavenly Father, in the vicinity of this old and almost universal festival, commonly called Christmas, our readers will pardon us if we trouble them with a crumb or two of the old learning we have picked up from the table of "the Fathers," concerning its origin and observance; which, though it may seem hard and crusty, we nevertheless hope will be found digestable and wholesome. It is not unworthy of remark, how ready the human family is to receive unauthorized tradition and to fall into customs and observances, with religious punctiliousness, that have no higher than a human origin or sanction. This proclivity, indeed, is manifested no where so frequently, as in that department of life in which it ought, above every other, to be most scrupulously avoided-to wit, in the customs and institutions of the church. We might array quite a host of illustrations, but the subject of our article must suffice for the present.

Almost every person, in some form, observes this day; yet it does not appear to be generally considered why or wherefore. The term itself seems to be differently understood, at least differently written. We generally find it written Christ-mas, but sometimes simply SERIES III-VLO. V.

2*

Xmas. The sign of the cross is here put for Christ, by what acıthority we are not informed. We are inclined to think that it is a mistake arising from the confounding of another festival in honor of the erection of the cross, called Crouch or Cross-mas-day, and from which the Eastern Church reckoned their religious year. However this may be, Christmas is really intended as the Festival of Christ's Nativity. Its origin appears to have been no earlier than the 4th century. St. Augustine, who lived in the latter part of this century, mentions the anniversaries of the crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension of the Lord, with that of the descent of the Holy Spirit, as the only festivals, supposed in his day to have been introduced by apostolic usage, and therefore sanctioned by the decrees of general councils. He states the fact, however, that in his day Christmas was commonly observed as a festival; but as he denies that it was among the number sanctioned by couucils, "there can be no reasonable doubt that it had its rise after the Council of Nice," A. D. 325. Besides, the anti-Nicene Fathers make no mention of such a festival; but, on the contrary, not only speak of the importance of ascertaining the day of his nativity with indifference, but rather discourage such efforts as over-curious. Clemens Alexandrinus, who flourished about the beginning of the 3d century, and of course before the Council of Nice, after expressing his judgment concerning the years of certain Emperors, in which the Saviour was born, or baptized, or crucified, says: "There are some who over-curiously assign not only the year, but also the day of our Saviour's nativity, which they say was in the 28th year of Augustus, on the 25th day of Pachon, (20th of May.) Nay, some of them say that he was born in Parmuthi, the 20th or 21st day, (24th or 25th April.)" Within two centuries, then, of the birth of our Saviour, we discover that there was not only no festival commemorative of the event, but that not even the day on which it happened could be agreed upon.

After Christianity became the established religion, under Constantine, it appears that various new institutions were authoritatively introduced for the benefit of the church; and, among others, we are warranted in including that of Christmas. The oriental Christians for a long time assigned the 6th of January as the date of the advent; and as they supposed his manifestation to the eastern Magi and his nativity were on the same day, they,in reference to both these events, called the day Epiphany. His baptism was also supposed to have taken place on the same day of the year, and hence this feast was a favorite period for administering this ordinance. On the other hand, the western Christians made a distinction; and whilst they celebrated

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