chapter iii

.) that in some periods of greatest intellectual achievement the examination tests at the university were wholly inadequate: what follows is a list of great and prominent men who took no degree at all:--Bacon, Byron, Macaulay (fellow of Trinity), Gray (professor of history),[438] Morland the hydrostatician,[439] Woodward the founder of mineralogy,[440] Donne, Fulke Greville, Parr the classic, Sir William Temple, Cromwell, Pepys and Mildmay both of whom were conspicuous benefactors of the university, Dryden who received his degree by dispensation of the Primate, Stratford de Redcliffe who was created _M.A._ by royal mandamus, Palmerston who graduated “by right of birth.” There was no one so important as Macaulay in 1822 when his name was absent from the tripos list, no one so great as Darwin in the tripos lists of 1831 when he took an ordinary degree.

The Oxford roll of non-graduates is not less distinguished: Sir Thomas More, Sir Matthew Hale, Sir Christopher Hatton, Sir Philip Sidney, Wolsey, Massinger and Beaumont the dramatists, Shaftesbury, Gibbon, Shelley--while Halley the astronomer took his _M.A._ by royal mandamus, and Locke’s degree was irregular. Dublin university has not a dissimilar tale to tell; Burke failed to distinguish himself there, and Swift was given a degree _speciali gratia._

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