DOCTOR OF DIVINITY.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 11110, 6 May 1911, Page 4

DOCTOR OF DIVINITY.

TO BE CONFERRED ON THE REV. , - T. U. Si'ltOTT. A cablegram lias- boon received noti-. fying that the degree of Doctor of; Divinity (D.D.) jure dignitati3 (by right of his oflico) will bo conferred by the University of Dublin on the Rev. T. H. Sprott, M.A., the Anglican Bishopoleul of ■Wellington. Mr. Spjotfc had a distinguished career at Trinity College, Dublin, where ho won the Hebrew prize in 1877; took the B.A. degree ills 1878: the Divinity Testimomum (firstclass) and Church Formularies prize, 1870; and the M.A. degree in 1882. The degree will bo conferred at the summer commencements on July 6. In tlio case of Mr. Sprott the honour is something more, than a formal recognition of his election to the bishopric of Wellington, lor no man in the Anglican Church of New Zealand lias done better work in the restatement of the Christian faith in the light of modern thought, and his book on "Inspiration and the Old Testament," published last .year by the Cambridge University iress, has been highly spoken of as a very able presentation in a popular form of the- results of recent Biblical scholarship. _ Originally there were only two steps 1" U'livcrsity graduation, those of bachelor and master, and tho title of doctor was given to certain masters as an alternative or as a merely honorary appellation. The process by which the doctorate became established as a third degree, distinct and superior to that of master, cannot bo clearly traced. At Bologna it seems to have been conferred in the Faculty of Law as early as tho twelfth century, and Paris is said to have conferred tho degreo in tho Faculty of Divinity some time after 1150, tho earliest recipients being Peter Lombard and Gilbert do la Portrce. In England the degree was introduced in the reign of John or of Henry 111. Both in England and on the Continent it was confined for a considerable period to the Faculties of Law and Divinity. It was not until tho fourteenth century that it began to bo conferred in medicine, and the doctorates of philosophy, science, and music are] of comparatively recent date.