Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1996. Vol. 1. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 24)

George Cushing: Eger - British connections

The university, a very fine building, was erected entirely at his expense. It is said to have cost him, including its furniture, 200.000 pounds. The world must not be so uncharitable as to suppose that he has gained this immense sum by the monopoly of wine; nor entertain so high an opinion of his virtues as to think that Heaven, in answer to his prayers, supplied him by miracles with it. No: he is an Esterházy, and his family estate is about ten thousand a year; and the see of Erlau was always considered as one of the richest in the kingdom ... But to return to the university ... it is a princely building, and has all the requisites for a university. The professors are well accommodated, the lecturing rooms are very good, and the chapel, library, and the hall for the public disputations and for conferring academic honours very elegant. The painted ceilings of the two last are, in my opinion, very fine. That of the library represents the Council of Trent, where the bishop has shown his uncharitable bigotry by bringing • down from heaven lightning to strike the heretical writings. On that of the hall, the Sciences are allegorically represented. They have both an admirable effect, and are far beyond many I have seen of great fame: I think they are superior to any I saw in Italy. The painter was a native of Hungary, and had studied in Vienna: he is since dead. The university is provided with an observatory, and the instruments are from London. A quadrant alone cost fifteen hundred guineas. How common it is for men to be scrupulously exact in the performance of religious trifles and yet to be negligent in the discharge of important moral obligations! Will it be believed that the man who had nearly been prosecuted by the crown for severities shown to his peasants, should have had scruples about the propriety of buying these instruments in England because we are heretics? Yes, I was told that he went so far as to send to Rome to know what he ought to do ... A museum of natural curiosities was begun to be formed, and many Hungarian birds neatly stuffed were collected; but the negligence of the overseers ... has now nearly reduced the whole into ruins. The Emperor Joseph, who could not like such a man, never seconded the views of the bishop, and this establishment is at present little more than a college for the clergy. I walked through the episcopal palace; it was poorly furnished and destitute of every mark of social comfort; and chilling gloom and 54