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that it is desirable that the benefit of all institutions should be extended to as large a number of persons as are capable of enjoying them; and, as a consequence from this, that the admission of Dissenters to the universities is a thing to be desired, if it be compatible with the purposes of those institutions, and conducive to their own well-being, and therefore through them to the well-being of the state.
If, then, the object be thus in itself desirable, it will be asked, "What are the difficulties which prevent the step from being taken at once?" To this I answer, that the difficulties are of two kinds: the one relating to the effect of such admission upon the course of education now carried on in this university; the other, to the consequences of the privileges which would be bestowed by our degrees upon persons who neither were ever intended to exercise them, nor are capable of doing so with advantage.
In the parliamentary discussions the latter of these classes of objection has been most insisted on. The former is, in my judgment, incomparably the most important, and that which I believe to be most strongly felt in this place. I would wish it to be understood that except when special reference is made to the sister university, my observations are to be understood solely to relate to Oxford; and the case of the two bodies so far differs, that it is necessary to keep this distinction in view.
