Here They
Determine Matters In A Summary Way, As Is Practised In Those We
Call Pye Powder Courts In Other Places, Or As A Court Of
Conscience; And They Have A Final Authority Without Appeal.
I come now to the town and university of Cambridge; I say the town
and university, for though they
Are blended together in the
situation, and the colleges, halls, and houses for literature are
promiscuously scattered up and down among the other parts, and some
even among the meanest of the other buildings, as Magdalene College
over the bridge is in particular; yet they are all incorporated
together by the name of the university, and are governed apart and
distinct from the town which they are so intermixed with.
As their authority is distinct from the town, so are their
privileges, customs, and government; they choose representatives,
or members of Parliament for themselves, and the town does the like
for themselves, also apart.
The town is governed by a mayor and aldermen; the university by a
chancellor, and vice-chancellor, etc. Though their dwellings are
mixed, and seem a little confused, their authority is not so; in
some cases the vice-chancellor may concern himself in the town, as
in searching houses for the scholars at improper hours, removing
scandalous women, and the like.
But as the colleges are many, and the gentlemen entertained in them
are a very great number, the trade of the town very much depends
upon them, and the tradesmen may justly be said to get their bread
by the colleges; and this is the surest hold the university may be
said to have of the townsmen, and by which they secure the
dependence of the town upon them, and consequently their
submission.
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