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Cant Phrases In The University Of Cambridge Explained.
CANT PHRASES IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE EXPLAINED .
TO TIIE EDITOR OF THE FREEMASONS' MAGAZINE .
SIR , AMONG other valuable communications inserted in your last Na ruber , 1 was agreeably surprised to find one relative to the academical archaeology of Granta . Being myself a member of that university , my curiosity was excited by the superscription , " To the learned , the Graduates and Undergraduates of the University of Cambridge : " and I was hihlgratified by the perusal of the letter subjoined . Although
gy a vein of good-natured jocularity evidently pervades the whole composition , yet the academical honours , and the colloquial phrases , therein alluded to , do all certainly exist ; and are all , as certainly , very unintelligible , both to the students and fellows of the several colleges individually , and also to the public at large . But popery ana monkish impositions being nowit is to be hopedentirely
abo-, , lished in England , the correlative mummery should no longer ^ remain ; the age of superstition and of Abracadabra is past ! With a firm persuasion of this truth , I shall venture to offer some slight conjectures upon the intricate subject ; -well aware , however , that to the indefatigable industry , to the scrupulous accuracy , and to the immense
reading , of a Wall of Christ ' s , a Tyrwhitt of Jesus , or a Whiter of Clare , we must alone eventually look for full and satisfactory information . Mine will be , bnt an' inferior ministerial office in the temple -of literature ; I shall bind the ambiguous victims , and drag them to the altar . Let these hig h-priests come forward , and strike the blow . Before I proceed to notice the queries : of your ingenious correspondentit may not perhaps be improper to mention one very
re-, markable personage , Wine 1 , either through inadvertency or design , he has passed over in total silence . , 1 mean " The Wooden Spoon . " This luckless wig ht ( for what cause I know not ) is annually the universal butt and laughing-stock of the whole senate-house . He ia the last of those young men who take honours , in his year ,-and is called a junior optimeyetnotwithstanding his being . in fact superior to
; , them alij the very lowest of the if CTOAAOI , or gregarious undistinguished batchelors , think themselves entitled to shoot the pointless arrows of their clumsy wit against the wooden spoon ; and to reiterate the stale and perennial remark , that " wranglers are born with gold spoons in their mouths : senior opiums with silver ; junior optim- js with wooden ; and the oi woXAoi with leaden ones . "
Besides this mirth-devoted character , and in a degree still lower " than the .. wo ? j .. i , are always " a few , a chosen few , a band of brothers , " VOL . IV . " Bb
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Cant Phrases In The University Of Cambridge Explained.
CANT PHRASES IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE EXPLAINED .
TO TIIE EDITOR OF THE FREEMASONS' MAGAZINE .
SIR , AMONG other valuable communications inserted in your last Na ruber , 1 was agreeably surprised to find one relative to the academical archaeology of Granta . Being myself a member of that university , my curiosity was excited by the superscription , " To the learned , the Graduates and Undergraduates of the University of Cambridge : " and I was hihlgratified by the perusal of the letter subjoined . Although
gy a vein of good-natured jocularity evidently pervades the whole composition , yet the academical honours , and the colloquial phrases , therein alluded to , do all certainly exist ; and are all , as certainly , very unintelligible , both to the students and fellows of the several colleges individually , and also to the public at large . But popery ana monkish impositions being nowit is to be hopedentirely
abo-, , lished in England , the correlative mummery should no longer ^ remain ; the age of superstition and of Abracadabra is past ! With a firm persuasion of this truth , I shall venture to offer some slight conjectures upon the intricate subject ; -well aware , however , that to the indefatigable industry , to the scrupulous accuracy , and to the immense
reading , of a Wall of Christ ' s , a Tyrwhitt of Jesus , or a Whiter of Clare , we must alone eventually look for full and satisfactory information . Mine will be , bnt an' inferior ministerial office in the temple -of literature ; I shall bind the ambiguous victims , and drag them to the altar . Let these hig h-priests come forward , and strike the blow . Before I proceed to notice the queries : of your ingenious correspondentit may not perhaps be improper to mention one very
re-, markable personage , Wine 1 , either through inadvertency or design , he has passed over in total silence . , 1 mean " The Wooden Spoon . " This luckless wig ht ( for what cause I know not ) is annually the universal butt and laughing-stock of the whole senate-house . He ia the last of those young men who take honours , in his year ,-and is called a junior optimeyetnotwithstanding his being . in fact superior to
; , them alij the very lowest of the if CTOAAOI , or gregarious undistinguished batchelors , think themselves entitled to shoot the pointless arrows of their clumsy wit against the wooden spoon ; and to reiterate the stale and perennial remark , that " wranglers are born with gold spoons in their mouths : senior opiums with silver ; junior optim- js with wooden ; and the oi woXAoi with leaden ones . "
Besides this mirth-devoted character , and in a degree still lower " than the .. wo ? j .. i , are always " a few , a chosen few , a band of brothers , " VOL . IV . " Bb