III.— MERTON COLLEGE.
By the Hon. George Charles Brodriek, D.C.L., "Warden.
OEVAL with the House of Commons " The House of the Scholars of Merton," the earliest of English Colleges, and the model of all the rest, dates its pedigree from the year 1264, having been founded by Walter de Merton, Chancellor to Henry III. Its original seat was Maiden, in Surrey, but provision was made in its first Statutes for a body of students at Oxford, and in 1274 \t was settled by the founder upon its present site, under a new code of Statutes, which remained in force within living memory. The noble choir of its Chapel, erected in the latter part of the 13th century, is the oldest collegiate building in Oxford, if we exclude fragments of monastic buildings afterwards converted to collegiate uses ; its Treasury, Sacristy, and Library, with the grand buildings of New College, are the chief, if not the only, genuine remains of 14th century architecture, other than monastic, among Oxford Colleges. No doubt, the idea to which Merton owed its origin was borrowed from monastic institutions, but the spirit of the Founder's statutes was essentially anti-monastic. The College was to be a society of secular, and not of regular, clergy ; and the Founder expressly ordained that if any of its Fellows should embrace religious vows, he should cease to be a member of it. The majority of them, it is true, were to employ themselves in the study of Arts, Philosophy, or Theology; but it was specially provided that four or five might become students of Canon and Civil Law within the College, while it was also contemplated that others should go forth into the great world. On the other hand students in "grammar," the very first step in learning, were distinctly recognized, and a "grammar master" was to be appointed, to whom even more advanced scholars might have recourse for instruction " without a blush."
For more than a century after its foundation, Merton College was by far the foremost place of education in Oxford, and the number of famous Schoolmen reputed to have been Mertonians shows, at least, the estimation in which it was held. Of these great names a few must be admitted to rest upon doubtful evidence. It is highly improbable that Roger Bacon was connected with Merton, and it cannot be clearly proved that Duns Scotus, William of Ockham, or Wyclif, were actually Fellows of the College. But it is quite certain that Walter Burley and Bradwardine were Fellows, and that not only theological and metaphysical studies, but mathematics, astronomy, physics and medicine, were ardently cultivated at Merton in the 14th and 15th centuries. Anthony Wood tells us that a chief reason why the medical lectureships founded by Linacre were assigned to Merton was the fact that "there were more physicians in that House than in any other in the University." An extra- ordinary number of Mertonians filled important offices in Church and State during the same period, and Merton took an honourable part in the Revival of Learning which preceded the Reformation. Under the stress of that great crisis, some of its Fellows temporized, like others, but in the main, the sympathies of the College were on the Catholic, or reactionary side, though it contributed Jewell to the Protestant cause. It was otherwise when Oxford became a central point of attack and defence in the Revolution of the 17th century. The illustrious Harvey, it is true, was elected Warden, under the influence of Charles I, after the battle of Edgehill, and Queen Henrietta Maria was lodged in the College for a winter, but the Puritan movement was strongly represented in the College. The Warden, Sir Nathaniel Brent, who had been displaced by Harvey for a few months only, was the President of the Parliamentary Visitation, and most of the Fellows and students made their submission. It is remarkable that Cromwell, following the example of Charles I, induced the College to elect as Warden his own physician, Goddard, one of the founders of the Royal Society.
Though Merton gradually lost its commanding supremacy after the foundation of New College, it was still the leading College until it was overshadowed by Christ Church, and produced a considerable
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