Literary Landmarks of Oxford/St. John's
ST. JOHN'S
St. Johns's was founded, in the middle of the Sixteenth Century, for " Divinity, Philosophy, and the Arts; and to the Praise and Honor of God, the Virgin Mary and St. John the Baptist."
Archbishop Laud, when St. John's was in its youth, must have had some slight foresight of at least one great outgrowth of modern football; for, in his orders to the heads of the college, he required them to prevent the students from wearing their hair immensely thick and luxuriant. "See that none, youth or other," he commanded, "be suffered to go in boots or spurs, or to wear their hair indecently long, or with the lock in the present fashion, or with slashed doublets, or in any light or garish colors; and that noblemen's sons may conform, as others do, during the time of their abode, which will teach them to know the difference of places, and other betimes; and when they grow up to be men it will make them look back upon the place with honor to it, and reputation to you [its tutors and teachers]."
If slashed Jerseys do not appear at St. John's now, as they sometimes do in American colleges, garish colors certainly prevail; and not all hair is cut short.
Laud was President of St. John's for some years; and he was brought from Tower Hill to be buried in its Chapel.
Two early dramatists studied philosophy and the arts at St. John's. James Shirley, according to Wood, was transplanted from the Merchant Tailors' School to this College, about 1612. But in what condition he lived there, whether in that of a Servitor, a Batteler, or Commoner, Wood could not learn. It is known, however, that Bishop Laud had a very great affection for the youth, "especially for the pregnant parts that were then visible in him"; but the worthy Doctor would often tell him that on account of a broad or large mole on his, Shirley's, left cheek, which some esteemed a deformity, he was an unfit person to take the sacred function upon him, and should never have the consent of the President of St. John's so to do. Whereupon the candidate left Oxford, without a degree, for Cambridge, where he was permitted, despite his facial deformity, to become for a time a priest of the Church.
Battelers ranked below Commoners, and they are defined now as "Students in Oxford indebted to the college books, for provisions and drink to the Buttery."
All that Wood says of William Killigrew is that he became a Gentleman Commoner of St. John's in 1622, "where he remained about three years, when he went a travelling beyond the seas."
Professor Max Müller described a dinner given to Thackeray at St. John's, and the impression the novelist made upon the three or four men present.
He was then writing " Esmond," and " from his treasures of wit and sarcasm," said Max Miiller, "he poured out anecdote after anecdote, he used
plenty of vinegar and cayenne pepper, but there was always a flavor of kindness and good-nature, even in his most cutting remarks."
Thackeray did not send Esmond to Oxford. He matriculated his hero at Trinity, in the rival University town. "I go to Cambridge," says Harry, "and do but little good there."
Arthur Pendennis, created before Esmond, went, it will be remembered, to St. Boniface's College in "Oxbridge," where he attended classical and mathematical lectures with tolerable assiduity; and was annoyed by certain vulgar young men, who did not even wear straps to their trowsers, but who beat him completely in the lecture room! "Oxbridge," like "Camford," is a literary composite picture of the two great Seats of Learning.