Paley’s Sketch of His Early Academical Life
In the year 1795, during one of his visits to Cambridge, Dr. Paley, in the course of a conversation on the subject, gave the following account of the early part of his own academical life; and it is here given on the authority and in the very words of a gentleman who was present at the time, as a striking instance of the peculiar frankness with which he was in the habit of relating adventures of his youth. “I spent the two first years of my under-graduateship (said he) happily, but unprofitably. I was constantly in society where we were not immoral, but idle and rather expensive. At the commencement of my third year, however, after having left the usual party at rather a late hour in the evening, I was awakened at five in the morning by one of my companions, who stood at my bedside and said, ‘Paley, I have been thinking what a d—d fool you are. I could do nothing, probably, were I to try, and can afford the life I lead: you can do every thing, and cannot afford it. I have had no sleep during the whole night on account of these reflections, and am now come solemnly to inform you, that, if you persist in your indolence, I must renounce your society.’ I was so struck (continued Paley) with the visit and the visiter, that I lay in bed great part of the day and formed my plan: I ordered my bed-maker to prepare my fire every evening, in order that it might be lighted by myself; I rose at five, read during the whole of the day, except such hours as chapel and hall required, allotting each portion of time its peculiar branch of study; and, just before the closing of gates (nine o’clock) I went to a neighbouring coffee-house, where I constantly regaled upon a mutton-chop and a dose of milk punch: and thus on taking my bachelor’s degree, I became senior wrangler.” He, too, filled the trustworthy and dignified office of Tutor of his College, and deserved, though he did not die in possession of, a bishopric.
THE LOUNGER. BY AN OXONIAN
I rise about nine, get to breakfast by ten,
Blow a tune on my flute, or perhaps make a pen;
Read a play till eleven, or cock my laced hat;
Then step to my neighbours, till dinner, to chat.
Dinner over, to Tom’s, or to James’s I go,
The news of the town so impatient to know,
While Law, Locke and Newton, and all the rum race,
That talk of their nodes, their ellipses, and space,
The seat of the soul, and new systems on high,
In holes, as abstruse as their mysteries, lie.
From the coffee-house then I to Tennis away,
And at five I post back to my College to pray:
I sup before eight, and secure from all duns,
Undauntedly march to the Mitre or Tuns;
Where in punch or good claret my sorrows I drown,
And toss off a bowl “To the best in the town:”
At one in the morning I call what’s to pay,
Then home to my College I stagger away;
Thus I tope all the night, as I trifle all day.