Professors versus Tutors: Pusey and Vaughan at Oxford

After Newman’s decision to become a Roman Catholic in 1845, Oxford witnessed a fierce battle over the future of the university: would Oxford remain a Christian and Anglican institution, or would it become a purely national, and secular, endeavor? On the Anglican side, the most weighty protagonist was Newman’s former colleague, Edward Pusey. Among those arguing for a national and secular university was Henry Halford Vaughan. In the early 1850s, Pusey and Vaughan engaged in a written controversy, in which they respectively championed a tutorial and a professorial model of learning. However, the issues at stake were much broader than mere pedagogy, and went to the heart of the nature of the institution as a whole.