nity; that a science like this should
have ever been deemed unnecessary to be studied in an university, is
matter of astonishment and concern. Surely, if it were not before an
object of academical knowlege, it was high time to make it one; and to
those who can doubt the propriety of it's reception among us (if any
such there be) we may return an answer in their own way; that ethics
are confessedly a branch of academical learning, and Aristotle
_himself has said_, speaking of the laws of his own country, that
jurisprudence or the knowlege of those laws is the principal and
most[e] perfect branch of ethics.

[Footnote c: Lord chancellor Clarendon, in his dialogue of education,
among his tracts, p. 325. appears to have been very solicitous, that
it might be made "a part of the ornament of our learned academies to
teach the qualities of riding, dancing, and fencing, at those hours
when more serious exercises should be intermitted."]

[Footnote d: By accepting in full convocation the remainder of lord
Clarendon's history from his noble descendants, on condition to apply
the profits arising from it's publication to the establishment of a
_manage_ in the university.]

[Footnote e: [Greek: Teleia malista arete, hoti tes teleias aretes
chresis esti.] _Ethic. ad Nicomach._ _l._ 5. _c._ 3.]

FROM a thorough conviction of this truth, our munificent benefactor Mr
VINER, having employed above half a century in amassing materials for
new modelling and rendering more commodious the rude study of the laws
of the land, consigned both the plan and execution of these his
public-spirited designs to the wisdom of his parent university.
Resolving to dedicate his learned labours "to the benefit of posterity
and the perpetual service of his country[f]," he was sensible he could
not perform his resolutions in a better and more effectual manner,
than by extending to the youth of this place those assistances, of
which he so well remembered and so heartily regretted the want. And
the sense, which the university has entertained of this ample and most
useful benefaction, must appear beyond a doubt from their gratitude in
receiving it with all possible marks of esteem[g]; from their alacrity
and unexampled dispatch in carrying it into execution[h]; and, above
all, from the laws and constitutions by which they have effectually
guarded it from the neglect and abuse to which such institutions are
liable[i]. We have seen an universal emulation, who be