The plague pursued Charles to
Oxford. In those days, and long afterwards, it was a common
complaint that the citizens built rows of poor cottages within the
walls, and that these cottages were crowded by dirty and indigent
people. Plague was bred almost yearly at Oxford, and Charles really
seems to have improved the sanitary arrangements of the city.
Laud, the President of St. John's, became, by some intrigue,
Chancellor of the University. He made Oxford many presents of Greek,
Chinese, Hebrew, Latin, and Arabic MSS. There may have been--let us
hope there were--quiet bookworms who enjoyed these gifts, while the
town and University were bubbling over with religious feuds. People
grumbled that "Popish darts were whet afresh on a Dutch grindstone."
A series of anti-Romish and anti-Royal sermons and pamphlets,
followed as a rule by a series of recantations, kept men's minds in a
ferment. The good that Laud did by his gifts--and he was a
munificent patron of learning--he destroyed by his dogmatism.
Scholars could not decipher Greek texts while they were torturing
biblical ones into arguments for and against the opinions of the
Chancellor. What is the true story about the gorgeous vestments
which were found in a box in the house of the President of St.
John's, and which are now preserved in the library of that college?
Did they belong to the last of the old Catholic presidents of what
was Chichele's College of St.
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