At the meeting of the Estates at Prague in 1348 Charles made the following statement: 'One of our greatest endeavours is that Bohemia our kingdom, for which we feel greater affection than for any of our other lands, should, through our action, be adorned by a great number of learned men; thus will the faithful inhabitants of that kingdom, who incessantly thirst for the fruits of learning, be no longer obliged to beg for foreign alms, rather will they find a table prepared for them in their own kingdom; thus will the natural sagacity of their minds move them to become cultured by the possession of knowledge.' Charles concluded by informing the assembly that he had resolved to found the University of Prague. Faithful to his predilection for France, Charles modelled his regulations for the new University entirely on those of the University of Paris. The students were divided into 'nations' according to their nationality. In Prague we find the Bohemian, Polish, Bavarian and Saxon 'nations'; each of these separately elected members to the general council of the University. The new foundation seems to have been very successful from the first. Benes of Weitmil writes: 'The University' (studium) 'became so great that nothing equal to it existed in all Germany; and students came there from all parts--from England, France, Lombardy, Poland, and all the surrounding countries, sons of nobles and princes, and prelates of the Church from all parts of the world.' No special building seems at first to have been erected for the University. Many professors delivered their lectures at their own apartments, while of the five professors of the theological faculty one lectured in St. Vitus's Cathedral, the other four, all monks, in the monasteries to which they belonged. The lectures were at first always delivered in Latin, and it is, therefore, equally incorrect to maintain that the Prague University was at its beginning a genuinely German one as to say that it had, from the origin, a really Bohemian--national--character. In the last years of his life Charles caused several colleges to be built for the benefit of the students. The first of these colleges was founded when Charles bought the 'house of the Jew Lazarus in the old town,' which afforded a dwelling-place for twelve professors. Charles also gave a library to the newly-founded college. During the reign of his son this, the most important of these foundations, was transferred to the building known as the 'Carolinum,' which henceforth became the centre of the University. Everything connected with the University was to Charles of the greatest interest, and the Sovereign was often present at the 'disputations' which, according to the mediæval custom, took place there. Charles was also the founder of a confraternity or guild of artists, of which painters, sculptors, wood-carvers and goldsmiths were members, and which, as Palacky says, took the place of a modern academy of arts.