USHAW
234
USHAW
Corbishley, who survived him only a year, and Mon-
signor WiUiani Henry Brown, under whom new
lecture roonis have been erected to accommodate the
largely increased numbers of philosophy and divinity
students. Altogether the present blocks of buildings,
with their enclosed courts, cover a rectangle 8S0 feet
long by 420 feet broad; the outbuildings, grounds,
and campus cover over 100 acres, and the whole
estate, with its home and outlying farms, includes
between 1200 and 1300 acres.
Many objects of historical and artistic interest are preserved in the college. Lmgard bequeathed to it all his books and papers, which included an early MS. and the proof sheets of his " History of England " with about l.'jOO of his letters; Wiseman is represented by the MSS. of "Fabiola" and the "Hidden Gem", and of many sermons, lectures, and letters, while Eyre gathered for it a valuable collection of docu- ments dealing with the English Catholic history of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and in- tended for a continuation of Dodd's "Church His- tory". The library, in which these are stored, con- tains about 4.5,000 volumes, mainly of theological and historical interest. It is especially rich in early printed liturgical books and in seventeenth-century controversy. Examples of Wynken de Worde's "York Manual", Higden's "Polychronicon", the "Nuremburg Chronicle", the "Ulm Cosmographs", the "Complutensian Polyglot", are found on its shelves, and, perhaps more mteresting than all, about forty works that belonged to the pre-Reformation librarj' of Durham Abbey and which still retain the original monasticbindings. Themanuscripts include, in addition to the collection already mentioned, a large number of old English missals, psalters, and books of hours, as well as many documents connected with the history of the colleges at Douai, Lisbon, and Valladolid, and with the progress of Catholicism in the north of England. The museum, too, is rich in relics of persecution times, several missals and altar- stones and an old wooden crozier that belonged to Bishop Dicconson being among the most remarkable. The church treasury contains several splendid exam- ples of church plate, a chalice assigned to Benvcnuto Cellini taking the place of honour. It also preserves a chasuble that tradition connects with Westminster Abbey and another that belonged to Cuthbert Tun- stall, the last Catholic Bishop of Durham. The collection of relics is one of the largest extant in private hands, and includes a large rehc of the True Cross and a ring that was taken from the body of St. Cuthbert when the tomb at Durham was rifled during the Reformation.
Education. — In her system of education Ushaw has clung tenaciously, though progressively, to the traditions she inherited from the "Alma Mater Dua- censis" which she was founded to replace. No other college in England has found it possible permanently to retain, throughout the whole of its career, the essential characteristic of the Douai system — the co- education of clerical and lay students throughout their humanities. The classical element still pre- dominates in the course, and even the old class names, rhetoric, poetry, syntax, grammar, and figures, are still retained. For nearly fifty years after leaving France the Douai authors were read and the Douai time-table observed with scarcely an alteration. Then the second spring began to make its influence felt in education as in all other things Catholic. Catholic ciilleges were affiliated to London University in 1840, and Catholic scholarship was at last able to find a criterion to test its standing. U.shaw found she had no reason to shrink from the comparison. Her first two candidates for a degree in arts obtained a first class, and their example was so persistently fol- lowed that twenty years later the London examina- tions in arts were made the standard for the course.
Roughly speaking, during the thirty-three j-ears from
1863 to 1896, three-fourths of the candidates pre-
sented were successful, the exact numbers being 574
antl 717. But in the latter year several causes com-
bined to make another standard of comparison desir-
able, and, in accordance with a general mo^•ement
among the Catholic colleges, L^shaw substituted the
Oxford local and certificate papers for the London
examinations. About the same time, availing herself
of the privilege newly granted by the Holy See, Ushaw
utilized the university training which she found close
at hand. The college was affihated to Durham Uni-
versity in 1900, and during the next ten years 22 stu-
dents took the degree in arts, 16 obtaining classical
honours at the final examination, and 27 scholaiships
of the aggregate value of over £1000 ha\e been
secured. But once more the necessity of spentling
much time on uncongenial subjects has compelled a
change of front and the college has returned to the
London University course, which during the interval
has been entirely remodelled.
The history of the philosophical and theological courses, which occupy two and four years respectively, follows on very similar Unes. The Douai theses and the customs of "dictates" held for the first quarter of the nineteenth century. The value of the course was soon recognized. By a Brief dated Feb., 1813, Pius VII gave Ushaw and Old Hall the power of granting degrees in theology, though there is no rec- ord of the privileges ever having been exercised. The introduction of more modern methods began with Monsignor Ncwsham and to-day the various chairs are held by professors who have received their training at Ushaw and graduated at foreign universities. \\'ith very few exceptions professors have always been chosen from former alumni. Generally speaking, the more promising students are selected for special training at the end of theii' humanities, then, after studying philosophy, they teach the lower schools for three years, with the title of "minor" professors. They then proceed to their divinity, where a further selection is made for specialized study, which is gen- erally taken at some university on the Continent. Long ex-perience has shown the advantage of this system of training professors; another inheritance from the traditions of Douai.
Prominent Aluhni. — The roll of alumni (1912) includes close on to 5000 names. It embraces over 1000 priests, 30 bishops, 5 archbishops, and 4 car- dinals: Wiseman, De la Puente, Bourne, Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, and the Cardinal Sec- retary of State, Merry del Val, who was not only a student but also a "minor" professor at Ush.aw. Prominent names in almost every profession and almost every country can be found there. I^aw is represented in England by Mr. Justice Shee, the first Catholic post-Reformation judge; b\- Judge O'Connor, former deputy chairman of committees in the House of Commons; in India by Mr. Justice John Power ^\'allis, Judge of the High Court of Madras; in Canada by the Hon. James Foy, Attorney-general of Ontario; in the United States by Joseph Scott of Los Angeles, a prominent official of the Knights of Columbus. Statesmanship is represented by the present Under- Secretary for the Home Office, Wilham Patrick Byrne, C. B.; the services by General Montague Gerard, K. C. B., Major Miles O'Reilly, commander of the Irish Brigade at Castelfidardo, and Commodore Edward F. Charlton, Commodore of the l^astern Destroyer Flotilla; art by Charles Napier Ileniy, the Royal Academician: architecture by George and Ed- ward C.oldie and the youngest Pugin; literature by such names as Linganl the historian, Francis Thomp- son the poet, Wilfred \\:m\ the prcscnit editor of the "Dublin Review", and Joseph Gillow, the compiler of the well-known "Bibliographical Dictionary of the English Catholics".
