This however proved unfounded. It might have been a hazardous experiment to bestow conspicuous favour on a man against whom such discreditable charges were peading. Conciliation and procrastination were the ruling principles of Harley, and doubtless he wished Bentley, at least to make a shew of concession. But this was what the Doctor would not do. The only approach he ever made to pacification, was by detaching some few of his adversaries from the common cause. Divide et impera, a politic maxim, of which even the worldly expediency is very doubtful, when applied to large communities, is an effectual rule for maintaining supremacy in small factious republics, as the history of the Italian cities too often evinces, and Bentley made the most of it in Trinity College. But finding this method too slow for his impatience, he determined to starve the combinators to a surrender, and to shew the Fellows, that if they were not content to receive what he chose, in such proportion as he chose, and allow him to appropriate as much as he chose, they should have nothing at all. Having manoeuvred poor old Stubbe, the senior of his opponents, out of the Vice-mastership, and put a more manageable person in his place, he proceeded, at the winter audit, 1712-13, to interdict a dividend, unless his plan of distribution was accepted. Thus writes the aged Ex-Vice-master to the Earl of Oxford :-" Dr. Bentley, I hear, at the auditing of our college accounts, refused to vote a dividend of the remaining money, in order to starve the poor members into an acquiescence under his base and unworthy measures. Our College, my Lord, though it be dutiful and silent, is in a very wretched condition; and if your Lordship please to look upon it with compassion, you will be a second founder to us. My Lord, I cannot ask pardon for this without remembering my former offences of this nature; but I cannot doubt either of your Lordship's pardon, or of the success of my petition, when I consider that I speak for a nursery of learning to my Lord of Oxford." Whether Harley, who prided himself in the reputation of a Mecanas, was touched with compassion, or cajoled by flattery, to interest himself for the starving Fellows, or whether he only prescribed patience, a cruel prescription to the hungry, we know not. Certainly Bentley's expectations of submission from his opponents, and of protracted interposition from the minister, were disappointed. Miller would be put off no longer, and resolved to bring the matter before the Court of Queen's Bench. Stubbe* apprised the Treasurer that all nova hac dignitate, et gaudeo eo magis, quo magis id inimicis tuis doliturum esse novi." This shews that Bentley's litigations were heard of over the channel. * Stubbe must at one time have stood high in Bentley's good graces, for his nephew had, through the Master's influence, been pre-elected to a fellowship, contrary to cus endeavours to prevent the cause coming to a hearing would probably be vain, as the court would not allow the validity of the royal, or in good sooth, ministerial prohibition, while the discussion of a point of prerogative could do little good to a tottering administration: which argument, whether urged by the Ex-Vice-master or not, determined the ministry to take off the embargo, and Secretary St, John, now Lord Bolingbroke, wrote to Bishop Moore, "giving him the Queen's permission to proceed as far as by law he was empowered." Before the end of the Easter Term, 1713, the affair of Trinity College was first brought into court, by Mr. Page* obtaining a Rule for the Bishop to shew cause why a Mandamus should not issue to compel him to discharge his judicial functions. After a full year's delay, arising partly from forms of law, of which delay appears to be the only assignable object, and partly from the avocations of the Judges, and the disturbed state of the nation, in the Month of May, 1714, the trial of Bentley actually commenced. The large hall of Ely house was converted into a Court of Justice; tom, and without the claim of merit, being a worthless and profligate young man, whom Bentley himself afterwards declared "the worst man that ever entered a college." Whiston, who antedates the proceeding three years, alludes to this as Bentley's first deviation from rectitude, and asserts that the Master himself allowed that in this case he departed from the rule-Detur Digniore. It is also said that this Edmund Stubbe was to marry a niece of Bentley's, in which case, his uncle's fortune, not less than £10,000, was to have been settled on the young couple. We can scarce suppose, if this be true, that young Stubbe's vices were then notorious, though it sometimes will happen, that those who have the disposal of young ladies, are as blind to the faults of a wealthy suitor, as the young ladies themselves to the defects of a handsome lover. This is not the only occasion on which Bentley has been accused of match-making. He was said to have bestowed some small preferment on a young B. A. on condition that he should marry Mrs. Bentley's maid. This was probably an unfounded surmise; but the condition of the working clergy was then so depressed, and attendance on the higher classes so much esteemed, that the marriage of a small vicar with a lady's maid would not be accounted a misalliance, and happy was the poor curate, who could obtain for his daughter the enviable situation of Mrs. Honour. For some curious particulars on this head, consult "Echard on the Contempt of the Clergy and of Religion, 1670." Parson Adams is no exaggera tion. This Page was afterwards a Judge of "hanging" notoriety, whom Pope has "damn'd to everlasting fame." "Poison, or slander dread, from Delia's rage, IMITATIONS OF HORACE. "And dies if dulness gives her Page the word." DUNCIAD. In Johnson's Life of Savage, some specimens of this man's eloquence are preserved. Let us rejoice that the dynasty of the Pages is at an end. where written evidence was produced in support and refutation of the 54 articles against the Master of Trinity College. The counsel for the prosecution were Sir Peter King, (Is opposition to church dignitaries hereditary in his family?) Sir John Cheshyre, Mr. Serjeant Page, Dr. Paul, the civilian, and Edmund Miller, who probably pleaded with more sincerity on this occasion than advocates generally obtain credit for, and a mastery of the facts and bearings of the case, which few advocates have the means of acquiring. Bentley's* counsel were the Hon. Spencer Compton, (afterwards Speaker, and Earl of Wilmington,) Mr. Lutwych, and Dr. Andrews, the civilian. Bishop Moore had chosen as his Assessors, Lord Cowper, the Ex-Chancellor, and Dr. Newton, an eminent civilian. Though the principle grounds of complaint have been already related in the order of their occurrence, it may promote perspicuity if the important heads of the 54 articles be gone over, premising, that being in an interrogatory form, they read sometimes rather ludicrously. As e. g. conceive the following questions put by a learned Judge, or Reverend Bishop, to a Doctor of Divinity, a public guardian of the morals, manners, and orthodoxy of ingenuous youth? 32. "Why did you use scurrilous words and language to several of the Fellows, particularly by calling Mr. Eden an ass, and Mr. Rashleigh the college dog; by telling Mr. Cock he would die in his shoes, and calling many others fools and sots and other scurrilous names?" Or, 33, "Why did you profanely and blasphemously use and apply several expressions in the Scripture? As "he that honours me, him will I honour." " I set life or death before you, choose you whether," or to that effect." Or, 12. "When by false and base practices, as by threatening to bring letters from court, visitations and the like, and at other times by boasting of your great interest and acquaintance, and that you were the genius of the age. . why &c.?" Or, 10. "Why have you, for many years past, wasted the college bread, ale, beer, coals, wood, turf, sedge, charcoal, linen, pewter, corn, flour, brawn, and bran, viz. 40,000 penny loaves, 60,000 half-penny loaves, 14,000 gallons of ale, 20,000 gallons "In a loose paper, which I found in the treasury of Trinity College, there is the following account of the performances of four of these gentlemen. The writer seems to be some Fellow who was present at the trial: Spencer Compton. He hath been heard to say afterwards that he never was so ashamed of any cause in his life. "Sir J. Cheshyre. He used Dr. B. very much in his own way. Serj. Page. He hummed and haw'd, and stumbled, so his clients were very much ashamed of him. "Mr. Miller. Was very exact as to dates and quotations, but otherwise very dull and heavy.-Dr. Monk. of beer, 600 chaldron of coals, 60,000 billets of wood, 1000 hundreds of turf, 100 load of sedge, 500 bushel of charcoal, 100 ells of Holland, 400 ells of diaper and other linen, 5000 ounces of pewter, 200 bushels of corn, 400 bushels of flour, 300 bushels of bran, and other goods to the value of £3000 or other great sum, in expending the same, not only on yourself, but upon your wife, children, and boarders, and that in a very extravagant manner, by causing your servants to make whole meals upon the said college bread and beer only, (you not allowing them either flesh, cheese, or butter, with the same) and by many other ways?" We presume that these counts were not read aloud in Ely house in the presence of the accused, as the whole business was conducted by written affidavits, whereof no less than twenty-seven were sworn against the Master, nor does it appear that any one of the complainants relented, and declined to support his signature upon oath. The first and second articles refer to the Master's appropriation of certain sums, which of right belonged to his predecessor, and to the misapplication of the said sums. The third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh, to the expenditure in rebuilding and fitting-up the Lodgewhich is roundly stated at £1500-and to the unwarrantable means taken to inforce payment of the same. The seventh goes so far as to charge Bentley with obtaining money under pretence of paying workmen, and diverting it to other purposes. The ninth, absurdly enough, asks Dr. Bentley why he married; and why, having married, he brought his wife into college.-It is wonderful that some of his prosecutors should hazard a question which might have been retorted with such bitter effect upon themselves; and somewhat remarkable how unwillingly Queen Elizabeth permitted the marriage of the clergy. The tenth, thirtieth, thirty-first and forty-fourth, relate to waste of the college goods, and exorbitant demands upon its funds. The twelfth and thirteenth, to the staircase business (a discreditable job altogether). The fourteenth, to the allotment of college chambers-(seems frivolous at this distance of time, but might be very serious at the commencement of the last century). The fifteenth, to unlawful interference with the appointment of officers, in which the Master appears to have been culpable and inconsistent. The seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-first, twenty-sixth, and twenty-seventh, to punishments inflicted without due conviction, or the consent of the seniority. The twenty-second regards the expulsion of Miller. The twenty-third, fortieth, and fifty-second, allege certain irregularities and omissions in the chapel service (which, for any spiritual benefit derived from it, might as well be omitted altogether). As for the "founder's prayers," Bentley was quite right in letting them alone; for they are a mere apology for masses, and where the belief of purgatory does not obtain, have no meaning whatever. The forty-third and fortyfourth articles relate to the new scheme of dividends. The thirtyseventh and forty-seventh, to the bowling green, and another plot of ground, which Bentley had used according to his pleasure, asserting himself "to be Lord of the soil." The fifty-third complains of the observatory ;—one or two others, of the expense incurred in renovating the chapel, and purchasing an organ; and the rest relate either to mere repetitions of former offences or to matters of college regulation— such as the Friday's supper, the declamations in chapel, the permission to quit table before grace, and the like On a dispassionate review of these articles, it appears that they amount to a sort of accumulative treason against the state and liberties of Trinity College. By far the greater part of them are trifling,-yet, altogether, they prove, beyond contradiction, that Bentley's views extended to absolute sovereignty-that he deemed himself irresponsible -treated the college estate as if no individual but himself had a freehold therein and did not condescend to observe those formalities which, by a true college man, are regarded as essential to academic existence. At the commencement of the trial, public opinion was strong in his favour. Admitted on all hands to be the first scholar in his country, a gifted champion of christianity, connected by friendship or alliance with some of the highest characters of the nation, the man to whom Stillingfleet had committed the care of his son, whom Locke, and Evelyn, and Wren, and Newton had called friend, whom Samuel Clark addressed in terms of veneration, and whom the most erudite foreigners regarded as first among the first, he stood opposed to a knot of comparatively obscure men, to answer upon points in which the great world took little interest, before a judge devoted to literature, who had once been his companion. He had also the reputation of court favour; he had befriended the existing government in an anxious crisis; he had adorned his alma mater, not only by his own learning, * In June, 1812, a furious attack was made upon the Tory ministry, respecting the pending negotiations at Utrecht-the Whigs denouncing them as traitors, who were intriguing with the common enemy, to betray the allies, either in the hope of restoring the Stuarts, or from mere spite and envy at Marlborough's glory. The House of Lords was the scene of contest, and so high did whiggish expectation soar, that, according to Swift (Journal to Stella), the opposition desired their friends to bespeak places, to see the Lord Treasurer carried to the Tower. Though the Ministers obtained a Majority, yet it was especially desirable that every possible expression of |