Wykeham, early in life, before taking orders, was introduced into the Court of Edward III., and recommended himself to the King by his great skill in architecture. He was made surveyor of his works; and to him it is chiefly that the Royal Family of England are indebted for by far the noblest of their palaces—Windsor Castle. He grew into such favour with his sovereign, that he heaped preferments upon him, both civil and ecclesiastical, till at length he advanced him to the important See of Winchester. In the government of his Diocese he was a great reformer, and most zealously set himself to correct the ecclesiastical abuses which he discovered; and by the purity of his own life, as well as by the strict and vigilant discipline which he exercised, brought about a great improvement in the condition of the clergy. Through the royal bounty, wealth flowed in on him in great abundance; but he was only intent on finding channels for the useful distribution of it. His munificence was unbounded, so that it is doubtful whether any sovereign Prince ever expended so large a revenue on others, as he did in his public and private charities.[22] Among other works, which attest the largeness of his heart in this respect, may be mentioned his maintaining twenty-four poor persons in his own family—his building and restoring churches, and erecting residences for his clergy, at his own expense—and his rebuilding at an immense cost the nave of his own Cathedral Church at Winchester, which stands at this day a noble monument, not only of his princely munificence, but of his architectural taste; for there are few ecclesiastical buildings in England that equal it in dignity and grandeur. But the chief works which have rendered his name illustrious as a benefactor, are the building and endowing two noble Colleges, one at Winchester, and the other in Oxford; the former of which he designed as a nursery for the latter. These he enriched by very large and liberal endowments, and enriched them still more by the treasures of wise counsels and wholesome laws which he introduced into the statutes, which are so admirable—“drawn up with such judgment and reach of thought,” as Collier observes, “that they have been transcribed for the benefit of other houses; and served as it were as a pattern to the principal Colleges of Oxford and Cambridge;” (_Ecclesiastical History_, _Book_ VII, _p. 270_) so that it is no hazardous assertion to make, that no one person in modern or ancient times has done more—perhaps none so much—for the sound education of the clergy of England as William of Wykeham, some time Prebendary of St. Mary’s, Bridgnorth. At this very time, after the lapse of nearly five hundred years, Bridgnorth is receiving the benefit of his noble institutions; for the present Head Master[23] of Bridgnorth Grammar School is a Wykehamite, taught, and trained, and nurtured in Winchester and New College. His fitness for the important post he at present occupies, he owes, in part at