When one hears of the destruction of the beautiful courts at Emmanuel and Sidney, one is tempted to wonder what good genius of building spared the second court of St John’s and Nevile’s Court at Trinity. Had Ralph Symons’ work been allowed to remain here, we should have had a building almost exactly parallel with the latter. Symons built courts, but he did not attempt imposing street-fronts, and the ranges he erected between 1584 and 1586 turned their backs ungraciously to the road. The entrance to the college was on the north side, where there is now a smaller court in the Gothic style of 1840. What is now known as the Brick Building, east of the entrance court and at right angles to the south side, belongs to 1633, but is substantially in harmony with Symons’ earlier work. It forms[245] a very charming fragment. The classical transformation of Emmanuel was begun during Dr Breton’s mastership. Sir Christopher Wren, who was just completing his chapel at Pembroke, was invited to design the east side of the court. It is interesting to observe how he followed his uncle’s design for the chapel of Peterhouse, copying the lateral galleries which connect the chapel with the main buildings. Wren built these between 1665 and 1677, and it is probable that, when he began working at Trinity in 1675, he left the completion of this beautiful composition to his pupil, Nicholas Hawksmoor. The characteristic of the whole is a very striking dignity. Internally, the chapel is less interesting, but the stained glass, representing noteworthy members of the college, such as Sancroft, William Law, and some of the Cambridge Platonists, is thoroughly suited to the fine, plain windows. The northern gallery is the picture-gallery of the Master’s Lodge as well as an approach to the chapel, and contains a number of fine portraits, including a Lely, two Gainsboroughs and two Romneys.

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In the last century the revival which Wren had innocently inaugurated swept away Symons’ building. In 1719 the south side of the court was rebuilt; the gigantic pilasters in the centre are a proof of how bad the Palladian work of that over-abused period could be. Sir James Burrough of Caius, who for half a century was the architectural dictator of Cambridge, designed new north and west buildings, obeying the unconquerable desire of the day for an eloquent fa?ade. Because the design is Burrough’s, this addition is tolerable and more or less appropriate to the chapel; but Burrough died before it was begun, and this, like the Clare chapel, is a posthumous and probably slanderous addition to his fame. At all events the work was entrusted to Essex, who carried it out before 1770. It is perhaps significant that Essex was chosen, a year or two later, to compare his work once more to Wren’s, this time at Trinity. The western cloister, which recalls the similar but earlier building at Pembroke, is heavy but not unsuccessful. Essex had his own way with the Hall, which is probably the least agreeable hall in Cambridge. It is cold and stiff, and the[247] plaster roof brings bad taste to a climax. In the Gothic court north of this is the Library, which corresponds to the refectory of the old Dominican house—the Hall is on the site of the chapel. It was, till the Restoration, the college chapel. Sancroft, to whose initiative Wren’s work is due, gave it a valuable collection of old books, chiefly Bibles, and its Oriental manuscripts were carefully described by Sir William Jones. The chief modern addition to Emmanuel is the large brick building at the east end of the college garden. This, although not remarkable in itself, is interesting as the pioneer of an attempt to revive the economical principle of the medieval hostel. It also forms a not unfitting termination to the pretty lawn, with its pond and tennis-courts.

“The pure house of Emmanuel” occupies the site of the house of Dominican Friars outside Barnwell Gate. At the dissolution the buildings were left untouched, and, when Sir Walter Mildmay, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Treasurer of the Household, came into possession of the land, he had his materials for a college all ready. Sir Walter was a strong Puritan, and was on that account[248] no great favourite with Queen Elizabeth. She met him one day and said, “Sir Walter, I hear that you have erected a Puritan foundation.” Sir Walter, however, disclaimed the insinuation, “No, Madam; far be it from me to countenance anything contrary to your established laws; but I have set an acorn, which, when it becomes an oak, God alone knows what will be the fruit thereof.” The acorn, nevertheless, grew into a very Puritan oak. The buildings seem to have been erected in a curious spirit; for, if not Sir Walter, at all events his executors, revelled in the fact that the secular buildings of the foundation stood upon the Friary church, and did all they could to obliterate the monastic plan of the buildings. But, beyond this unnecessary manifestation of spite, the college was admirably governed and its students were—and all through its history have been—serious and law-abiding. Sir Walter founded it as “a College of Theology, Science, Philosophy, and Literature, for the extension of the pure Gospel of Christ our only Mediator, to the honour and glory of Almighty God,” and appointed, as its first master, Dr Laurence Chaderton, who ruled the college for thirty-eight years, and had a great part in the Authorised Version of the Bible. Under Dr Chaderton, the foundation increased in learning and godliness, and Fuller said of it, “Sure I am, at this day it hath overshadowed all the Universities, more than a moiety of the present masters of colleges being bred therein.” Dr Branthwaite* of Caius, Dr Whichcot* of[249] King’s, Dr Samuel Ward* of Sidney, and the famous Ralph Cudworth* of Clare and Christ’s, all held fellowships at Emmanuel.

As time went on, the Puritanism of Emmanuel became more and more pronounced. The services in the chapel savoured of Congregationalism and were altogether opposed to the Laudian revival of church life and doctrine. Under the first Dr Sancroft, the college ritual was thus reported to the Archbishop, “They receive that Holy Sacrament, sitting upon forms about the Communion Table, and do pull the Loaf one from the other, after the minister hath begun. And so the Cup, one drinking as it were to another, like good fellows, without any particular application of the said words, more than............