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THE POLITICAL SPIRIT

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tian." Two years later the board assured Governor Hardy that the "general Principle of preparing youth for public service in Church and State, and making them useful members of Society, without concerning ourselves about their particular religious denomination is our Grand Idea." And in 1763, when Governor Franklin appeared at his first Princeton commencement, the board repeated that they had endeavored to conduct the College "in such a manner as to make it of the most general and extensive usefulness. Our idea is to send into the World good Scholars and successful Members of Society." The form of these addresses shows a growing change of attitude toward the Crown. One does not have to be reminded that the times were times of political unrest, and in Nassau Hall there was already stirring a spirit which foretold the exciting days to come. The address of the president and tutors to Governor Franklin on his visit to Princeton in March, 1763, informs him that the design and tendency of the College was "to promote the general Good of mankind, by forming our Pupils for the Service of their Country and assures him that they will "instil into their Minds, Principles of Loyalty to the best of Kings, a firm Attachment to the most excellent British Constitution and a Sacred Regard to the Cause of Religion and Liberty.' But it is significant, as Dr. DeWitt has pointed out,1 that in the trustees' address that September they omitted the customary protestation of loyalty; the Crown is not even mentioned. The address is so short that it verges on curtness; and it closes with a perfunctory expression of cordial wishes for the governor's public and domestic happiness, and for his peace, comfort, and

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"Princeton College Administrations in the Eighteenth Century," Presby. and Ref. Rev., July, 1897, p. 408.

usefulness in the administration of the provincewishes whose realization he was to need sadly in the coming thirteen years of his service. And the undergraduates did not lag behind the trustees in the new sentiment of the times. Of the commencement exercises in 1765, for example, the Pennsylvania Journal remarked "we cannot but do the young gentlemen the justice to observe that such a spirit of liberty and tender regard for their suffering country breathed in their several performances, as gave an inexpressible pleasure to a very crowded assembly." Among the exercises on the programme were an oration on "Liberty," pronounced by Mr. Jacob Rush; a dialogue also on "Liberty," and the valedictory had as its subject, "Patriotism." The graduating class agreed to appear on the commencement platform in clothes of American manufacture, and they persuaded their undergraduate fellows to follow their example.

The trustees in 1766 drew up an address to His Majesty for his "gracious condescension in repealing the Stamp Act" and, ever mindful of the chance to increase the equipment, added a petition for a grant of 60,000 acres of land in the Province of New York from lands recently added from the Province of New Hampshire. Mr. Richard Stockton, the Princeton lawyer and now a trustee, presented the address and petition at London. The address was graciously received by His Majesty; and the petition was comfortably pigeonholed in the Plantation Office, and has only recently been disinterred among the papers of the Privy Council Office. Its authors never heard of it again.

Except for this and a proposal to appoint a Dutch professor of divinity, a proposal no sooner made than laid on the table, the records of President Finley's ad

FINLEY'S ADMINISTRATION

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ministration are largely those of quiet growth in the student body, and of improvements to college property and equipment, such as planting shade trees,1 two of which are still thriving in the yard of the dean of the faculty's house; digging an additional college well; building a new kitchen; providing a fire engine, ladders, and buckets; charging a small sum quarterly for enlarging the library; requiring each entering student to give bond for punctual payment of his fees and charges, and similar minor but useful matters. Dr. Finley enjoyed reputation abroad; he had taught for many years his academy at Nottingham was one of the early famous schools-he was the first Princeton officer and the second American divine to receive an honorary degree from a British university, Glasgow conferring on him the degree of doctor of divinity. But he was probably already in the grip of mortal disease when he became president, and in July, 1766, he died at Philadelphia, whither he had gone for medical aid, and where he was buried. He and Mr. Dickinson are the two deceased presidents of the College not lying in the Princeton graveyard. His death closes the Colonial Period in the history of Princeton University.

These are the trees which it has so often been said were planted to commemorate the repeal of the Stamp Act. But unless one ascribe to the trustees the gift of prophecy the claim can have no justification. The trees were ordered the year before the Stamp Act was repealed.

III

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD

Presidency of Witherspoon. The Revolution. Campus Happenings. The Continental Congress at Princeton. The College Under Witherspoon. Princeton and the South. Witherspoon's Influence.

PRINCETON'S president during the Revolutionary period was unlike any of his predecessors. Not winsome like Burr, nor so intellectual as Edwards, nor so finished a speaker as Dickinson or Davies, and lacking even the teacher's experience that Finley possessed, he was nevertheless to be stronger and more effective man than any of these, a man to whom the headship of the College was to be only one of several opportunities for virile leadership. The colonial presidents belonged to a different age; they were of a different stripe. Under the guidance of any one of them, with the possible exception of Davies, the College would have emerged from the storm of the Revolution in very different fashion, if indeed it would have emerged at all. Even granting that the preparation of young men for public affairs as well as for the church had been their interpretation of the purpose of the College, Davies alone seems to have shown any genuine insight into the possible relations of the College to the future of the colonies or any clear prevision of its potential national destiny. To the colonial presidents their office was a more than solemn matter; it was almost melancholy. They were unable to rise above it, and with the exception of Edwards, who never completely donned the presidential harness, the

STATUS OF THE COLLEGE

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labors and responsibilities of the office sent each to an early grave. Dickinson died at the age of fifty-nine, after a presidency of less than a year; Burr at forty-one, after a presidency of ten years; Davies at thirty-eight after eighteen months, and Finley at fifty-one after five years as president. Dr. Witherspoon's administration was to differ from those of his predecessors in temper, in breadth of contact with current affairs, in effectiveness, and in length. Its history is inseparably bound up with the story of his own multifarious activities.

Any unbiased contemporary observer appraising the standing and prospects of the College in 1766 would have admitted that it was no longer the uncertain project of a handful of enthusiasts, but had grown into a permanent enterprise. Already it had on its roster of presidents a series of names which were guarantee of high purpose, and it was by common consent agreed to be the leading educational institution with which at least American Presbyterianism was concerned. Whether it had measured up to expectations during the twenty years of its existence depended on the point of view. If it had failures to regret, they were due largely to lack of the funds necessary to more ambitious achievement.

When Dr. Finley died the schism in the Presbyterian Church had been healed outwardly and the two rival synods of New York and Philadelphia were once more united, the former representing the "New Side," the latter the "Old Side," and together composing the Synod of New York and Philadelphia. The Old Side party had never had any share in the management of the College. The affluence and importance of its members seemed to justify representation and the death of President Finley afforded the opportunity they sought.

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