pious and withal businesslike and sensible spirit of the foundress:-- "To all the sons of our Holy Mother Church, who shall look into these pages, Elizabeth de Burgh, Lady de Clare, wishes health and remembrance of this transaction. Experience, which is the mistress of all things, clearly teaches that in every rank of life, as well temporal as ecclesiastical, a knowledge of literature is of no small advantage; which though it is searched into by many persons in many different ways, yet in a University, a place that is distinguished for the flourishing of general study, it is more completely acquired; and after it has been obtained, she sends forth her scholars who have tasted its sweets, apt and suitable men in the Church of God and in the State, men who will rise to various ranks according to the measure of their deserts. Desiring therefore, since this consideration has come over us, to extend as far as God has allowed us, for the furtherance of Divine worship, and for the advance and good of the State, this kind of knowledge which in consequence of a great number of men having been taken away by the fangs of pestilence, is now beginning lamentably to fail; we have turned the attention of our mind to the University of Cambridge, in the Diocese of Ely; where there is a body of students, and to a Hall therein, hitherto commonly called University Hall, which already exists of our foundation, and which we would have to bear the name of the House of Clare and no other, for ever, and have caused it to be enlarged in its resources out of the wealth given us by God and in the number of students; in order that the Pearl of Great Price, Knowledge, found and acquired by them by means of study and learning in the said University, may not lie hid beneath a bushel, but be published abroad; and by being published give light to those who walk in the dark paths of ignorance. And in order that the Scholars residing in our aforesaid House of Clare, under the protection of a more steadfast peace and with the advantage of concord, may choose to engage with more free will in study, we have carefully made certain statutes and ordinances to last for ever."[35] [Illustration: Clare College and Bridge.] The distinguishing characteristic of these statutes is the great liberality they show in the requirements with respect to the professedly clerical element. This, as the preamble, in fact, suggests, was the result of a desire to fill up the terrible gap caused in the ranks of the clergy by the outbreak of the Black Death, which first made its appearance in England in the year 1348, and caused the destruction of two and a half millions of the population in a single year.[36]