[British Critic, July 1838]
Most persons who fall in with Dr. Ingram’s “Memorials of Oxford,” will only consider it as a collection of beautiful prints in illustration of a beautiful city. In consequence they will be likely to place it on their drawing-room table, and to consider that, having done this, they have sufficiently recognized its claims upon their notice. And it is really a most interesting publication, viewed merely as a work of art; but those who have been led to cast their eyes upon its letter-press, will find there matter of a very different complexion from the dull running accompaniment, large in type and small in sense, which is commonly introduced into such artistic publications, by way of increasing their bulk without changing their character.
The President of Trinity, in truth, the learned writer of this letter-press, is evidently not a man to figure as a mere chevalier aux dames, or to serve up in proper style some elegant offering to the fashion of the hour. Never was a man less like the writers of the prose of an annual or an album. He is, to all appearance, one of a race of men, now almost extinct, who lived all their days in and for the University. A place like Oxford, it need scarcely be said, alters very much year by year in the outward characteristics of its society; and more so, in a time like this, when alterations and developments of a serious nature are taking place in the structure of society in general. The movements which have had so successful a course in the metropolis and great towns of England, cannot be altogether unknown and unheeded in the groves and halls of academic repose; newspapers, magazines, and reviews cannot possibly be made contraband; the fact cannot be concealed from Oxford residents that they are the objects of dislike to a considerable portion of the community, and of assault in certain august assemblies; and, in consequence, there has been, more or less, a revival in the members of the University of that energetic spirit, that resolve to take part and have a voice in the world’s matters, which is one of its distinguishing marks in history. They have long determined that Church and State shall neither do nor suffer, without their own doing and suffering too. The circumstances of the times seem to force such a course upon an ancient institution, which has never been a mere abode of the Muses, but has ever twined the myrtle round the sword; yet, at the same time, granting this, so much is clear, that the Muses suffer by it, and do not thank the times for its necessity.
They have to mourn over the gradual disappearance of classical taste, antiquarian research, and local knowledge. Oxford was a place of leisurely thought, of multifarious, though undigested erudition, of wayward irregular exertion, of enthusiastic College feeling, of chronic indulgence illuminated by the graceful or brilliant sallies of wit. It was a place impartially the Alma Mater both of genius and of abuses. No examinations or class-lists directed the mind either of tutor or of pupil to definite studies and honourable toil, or raised his eyes from his College garden to the University schools, and from the schools to the busy walks of life. Oxford was his home, and with the advantages of home, it had the disadvantages; it was a very dear place, but a very idle one; it was one Long Vacation. It was not a place of passage, not a lodging house for a term of years, not a means to an end,—as it is commonly now. Such a state of things, indeed, if its capabilities had been rightly understood, might have been productive of most beneficial results; the fault was, not that inducements for exertion were not sought for from without, but that there were no active principles spontaneously stirring within. One good effect, however, actually followed; very few Fellows of Colleges, we suspect, could now be found, who are well acquainted with the history or antiquities of their own Society, how it grew up into its present state, and by whose munificence it has been gradually enriched. On the other hand, talk with an old incumbent visiting the place for a few days, and, if a resident yourself, you will be surprised, if you have not cause to be ashamed, at his accurate knowledge of the minute circumstances of the domicile, where your outward man has lived perhaps for years, but whence your mind has been away. While you, rightly or wrongly, have been absorbed in ecclesiastical proceedings or scientific associations, he knows all about the College, from the curious show-books or the manuscripts of the library, and the number in full of old silver tankards in the buttery, down to the excellence of the pump-water, or the history of the common-room chairs. Such is the difference between the past age and the present;—between this busy anxious day and a time when Oxford was loved for its own sake, and was enjoyed with scarce a thought of what was outside of it.