Page:The Works of Ben Jonson - Gifford - Volume 1.djvu/19

 he tells his "most learned and honoured friend," that he "is not one of those who can suffer the benefit conferred upon his youth to perish with his age;" and he adds that, in accepting the comedy, he will find no occasion to repent of having been his instructor. All this appears to argue greater maturity, and deeper studies than are usually allowed; and I should therefore incline to refer the period of his leaving Westminster to his sixteenth year.

From school Jonson seems to have gone, at once, to the University. The person who had hitherto befriended him, and whose name is unfortunately lost, gave a farther proof of kindness, on this occasion, and, if we may trust Aubrey, procured him an Exhibition, at Cambridge, where, according to Fuller, "he was statutably admitted into St. John's College." No note of his matriculation is to be found. By some accident there is an omission of names in the University Register, from June