Oxford (England) -- History; University of Oxford -- History
The Coronation of William and Mary was observed by a special Act
ceremony, in which one of the pieces recited was "Magdalena Ridens,"
Magdalen smiling in triumph at the flight of her oppressor. October 25,
1688, was the day on which James had restored the ejected fellows. Ever
since the college has observed that day, and yearly the members pledge
each other in a loving-cup, _Jus suum cuique_.
CHAPTER X
JACOBITE OXFORD--AND AFTER
Among the demies elected at Magdalen the year after the expelled fellows
returned was Joseph Addison, whose name is traditionally connected with
the northern part of the Magdalen walks, where the kingfisher "flashes
adown the river, a flame of blue," and Henry Sacheverell, his friend and
chamber-fellow. The former outlined the pacific policy of the
Hanoverians in the Freeholder; for the latter, when he hung out his
"bloody flag and banner of defiance" against the existing order, as for
Atterbury, Oxford was loud with the cheers of "honest" men. For during
the first half of the eighteenth century Oxford was violently Jacobite.
John Locke, who had been suspected of complicity in Shaftesbury's design
against the succession, and had been removed (1684) from his student's
place at Christ Church in accordance with the directions of a royal
mandate, had warned William that the good effects of the revolution
would be lost if no care was taken to regulate the Universities. But the
Hanoverians avoided oppressive measures. The Tory Wine Club, under the
cabalistic name of High Borlace, to which no member of a Whig college
like Wadham, Christ Church, Exeter or Merton might belong, was allowed
to meet annually at the King's Head Tavern on 18th August to toast the
King across the water and drink confusion to the rival Constitution
Club. But the triumph of the Whigs at the accession of George I. and the
disappointment of "honest" men, led to a great riot on the first
anniversary of the birthday of the new sovereign.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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