Page:The Works of Samuel Johnson ... A journey to the Hebrides. The vision of Theodore, the hermit of Teneriffe. The fountains. Prayers and meditations. Sermons.v. 10-11. Parliamentary debates.pdf/40

 speech, by the present chancellor, he has fallen from his former dignity of style. Lordship was very liberally annexed by our ancestors to any station or character of dignity. They said, the lord general, and lord ambassadour; so we still say, my lord, to the judge upon the circuit, and yet retain in our liturgy, the lords of the council.

In walking among the ruins of religious buildings, we came to two vaults, over which had formerly stood the house of the sub-prior. One of the vaults was inhabited by an old woman, who claimed the right of abode there, as the widow of a man whose ancestors had possessed the same gloomy mansion for no less than four generations. The right, however it began, was considered as established by legal prescription, and the old woman lives undisturbed. She thinks, however, that she has a claim to something more than sufferance; for, as her husband's name was Bruce, she is allied to royalty, and told Mr. Boswell, that when there were persons of quality in the place, she was distinguished by some notice; that, indeed, she is now neglected, but she spins a thread, has the company of a cat, and is troublesome to nobody.

Having now seen whatever this ancient city offered to our curiosity, we left it with good wishes, having reason to be highly pleased with the attention that was paid us. But whoever surveys the world must see many things that give him pain. The kindness of the professors did not contribute to abate the uneasy remembrance of an university declining, a college alienated, and a church profaned and hastening to the ground.

St. Andrews, indeed, has formerly suffered more atrocious ravages and more extensive destruction; but recent evils affect with greater force. We were reconciled to the sight of archiepiscopal ruins. The distance of a calamity from the present time seems to preclude the mind from contact or sympathy. Events long past are barely known; they are not considered. We read with as little emotion the violence of Knox and his followers; as the irruptions of Alaric and the Goths. Had the university