reform of the universities—they being, as it were, hot-beds for raising parsons, and lords, and such-like. He regards this bill as a little step in the way in which we are to go,—not much, but something,—“the beginning of the end,” as our clever friend of the _Examiner_ has it. He thinks it is to “throw open” the good things to his children which the higher classes have hitherto been giving away quietly among each other. Such men look upon Oxford as aristocrat, and the Commission as the popular champion. Never was a more complete delusion. Who will be the fortunate claimants for these “open” scholarships, which are to be wrested, as Mr Woodgate ably and eloquently shows, from country grammar-schools to which the middle classes resort, from districts which some benevolent founder, risen himself to wealth from a humble origin, wished in his grateful affection to connect with his name for ever—in some cases from orphans—who are to inherit them? They are to be rewards of “merit;” we have so much unrewarded merit going about in this generation; and merit is nothing now without reward. It will be, in nine cases out of ten, boys from the head forms of Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Westminster— “Magnis centurionibus orti.” The sons of parents who can afford to spend one or two hundred per annum upon their education,—who have had advantages of every kind, which the poor curate’s or the country tradesman’s son can never hope for,—who should need no such incentives to study, as they need no such help in its pursuit. Are these the classes for which founders bequeathed their wealth? Hear the good William of Wykeham, one of the most magnificent of Oxford benefactors—whose too princely foundations are, as it would appear, never to be allowed to do the noble and pious work for which he intended them—“I will have,” says he, “not those already learned, skilled in letters, wealthy, accomplished in arts.” His gifts were wisdom to those who sought after wisdom, and help to those who needed help to seek it.