The whole question had been referred to a Royal Commission by the Government of Lord Salisbury.  The results were seen in the charter for a Gresham University, embodying the former alternative, and in the introduction into Parliament of a Bill to carry this scheme into effect.  But this action had only been promoted by some of the bodies interested, and was strongly opposed by other bodies, as well as by many teachers who were interested in university reform.

Thus at the end of February, Huxley was invited, as a Governor of University College, to sign a protest against the provisions of the Charter for a Teaching University then before Parliament, especially in so far as it was proposed to establish a second examining body in London.  The signatories also begged the Government to grant further inquiry before legislating on the subject

The protest, which received over 100 signatures of weight, contributed something towards the rejection of the Bill in the House of Commons.  It became possible to hope that there might be established in London a University which should be something more than a mere collection of teachers, having as their only bond of union the preparation of students for a common examination.  It was proposed to form an association to assist in the promotion of a teaching university for the metropolis; but the first draft of a scheme to reconcile the complication of interests and ideals involved led Huxley to express himself as follows:—­]

Hodeslea, Eastbourne, March 27, 1892.

Dear Professor Weldon [Then at University College, London; now Linacre
Professor of Physiology at Oxford.],

I am sorry to have kept you waiting so long for an answer to your letter of the 17th:  but your proposal required a good deal of consideration, and I have had a variety of distractions.

So long as I am a member of the Senate of the University of London, I do not think I can with propriety join any Association which proposes to meddle with it.  Moreover, though I have a good deal of sympathy with the ends of the Association, I have my doubts about many propositions set forth in your draft.

I took part in the discussions preliminary to Lord Justice Fry’s scheme, and I was so convinced that that scheme would be wrecked amidst the complication of interests and ideals that claimed consideration, that I gave up attending to it.  In fact, living so much out of the world now, and being sadly deaf, I am really unfit to intervene in business of this kind.

Worse still, I am conscious that my own ideal is, for the present at any rate, hopelessly impracticable.  I should cut away medicine, law, and theology as technical specialities in charge of corporations which might be left to settle (in the case of medicine, in accordance with the State) the terms on which they grant degrees.

The university or universities should be learning and teaching bodies devoted to art (literary and other), history, philosophy, and science, where any one who wanted to learn all that is known about these matters should find people who could teach him and put him in the way of learning for himself.