the Caveau, which numbered among its members Hel- vetius, Duclos, Gentil-Bernard, Boucher, Rameau, Piron, and the two Crebillons, was dissolved, and was not re constituted till twenty years afterwards. Meanwhile, the Regent Orleans, who was an excellent comic actor, parti cularly in representations of low life, and who had been looking out for an author to write suitable parts for him, made Colle" his secretary. It was for the duke and his associates that Coll6 composed the greater part of his Tkedtre de Societe. Based on the stories of the younger Crebillon and La Fontaine, all the pieces in this collection, while remarkable for ease and gaiety, in point of delicacy are such as might be expected from their source and their avowed object. In 1763, however, Colle", whose jestings the duke had rewarded with a place under Govern ment, produced at the Theatre Francois Dupuis et Des- ronais, a sentimental comedy, which met with a decided success, and which was followed in 1771 by La Veuve, an attempt in the same direction, and a complete failure, In 1774 appeared La Par tie de Chasse de Henri Quatre (partly taken from Dodsley s King and the Miller of Mans field), Colle s last and best play. From 1758 to 1782, besides these and a multitude of songs, Colle was writing his Journal Historique, a curious collection of literary and personal strictures and animadversions on his boon com panions as well as on their enemies, on Piron as on Voltaire, on La Harpe as on Corneille. In 1783, having outlived the greater part of his old friends, and grieving for the loss of his wife, to whom he was greatly attached, Colle" died. He is best remembered by his lyrics, which form an important link in the chain of style through which the clianson, that peculiarly French form of the song, has passed. They are frank and jovial, though often licentious, and are remarkable for wit and amiability no less than for the artistic management of the refrain and for their popular attractions. The subjects are love and wine; occasion ally, however, as in the famous lyric (1756) on the capture of Port Mahon, for which the author received a pension of GOO livres, the note of patriotism is struck with no unskilful hand, while in many others Coll6 shows himself possessed of considerable epigrammatic force. See Grimm s Corre- f/wndance, and Taillefer s Tableau Historique de V Esprit et
da Caractere des Litteratures Fran^aises.COLLE, Rafaelle del, painter, was born at Colle, near Borgo San Sepolcro, in Tuscany, about 1490. A pupil of Raphael, whom he is held to have assisted in the Farnesina and the Vatican, Colle, after his master s death, was the assistant of his chief scholar, Giulio Romano, at Rome and afterwards at Mantua. In 1536, on the occasion of the entry of Charles V. into Florence, he took service in that city under Vasari, whose written w r orks are many degrees superior to his paintings. In his later years Colle resided at Borgo San Sepolcro, where he kept a school of design ; among his many pupils of note may be mentioned Gherardi and Vecchi. His works, which are yet to be found at Urbino, at Perugia, at Pesaro, and at Gubbio, are line examples of the Roman school of Raphael. The best are a painting of the Almighty supported by angels, a Resurrection, and an Assumption, all preserved iu churches at Borgo San Sepolcro.
COLLEGE (Collegium), in Roman law signified a number of persons associated together by the possession of common functions, a body of colleagues. Its later meaning applied to any union of persons, and Collegium was the equivalent of ἑταιρεία. In many respects, e.g., in the distinction between the responsibilities and rights of the society and those of individual members thereof, the collegium was what we should now call a corporation (see Corporation). Collegia might exist for purposes of trade like our guilds, or for religious purposes (e.g., the college of augurs, of pontifices, &c.), or for political purposes, e.g., tribunorum plebis collegia. By the Roman law a collegium must have at least three members. The name is now usually applied to educational corporations, the most important of which are the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge. In the numerous statutes relating to colleges the colleges of Winchester and Eton are usually associated with those of Oxford and Cambridge.
These colleges are in the eye of the law eleemosynary corporations. In some of the earlier statutes of Queen Elizabeth they are spoken of as having an ecclesiastical character, but the doctrine of the common law since the Reformation has been that they are purely lay corporations, notwithstanding that most or all of their members may be persons in priest's orders. This is said to have been settled by Patrick's case (see Raymond's Reports).
Colleges appear to have grown out of the voluntary association of students and teachers at the university. According to some accounts these must at one time have been numerous and flourishing beyond anything we are now acquainted with. We are told, for example, of 300 halls or societies at Oxford, and 30,000 students. Into the truth of these statements, or into the causes which led to the reduction in the number of scholars, we need not now enter. In early times there seems to have been a strong desire to confine the scholars to certain licensed houses, beyond the influence of the townspeople. Men of wealth and culture, and notably the political bishops and chancellors of England, obtained charters from the Crown for the incorporation of societies of scholars, and these in time became exclusively the places of abode for students attending the university. At the same time the corporations thus founded were not necessarily attached to the locality of the university. The early statutes of Merton College, for example, allow the residence of the college to be shifted as occasion required; and the foundations of Wolsey at Oxford and Ipswich seem to have been the same in intention. In later times the university and the colleges became coextensive; every member of the university had to attach himself to some college or hall, and every person admitted to a college or hall was obliged to matriculate himself in the university.
