They, therefore, prepared what on the face of it appeared to be a very generous proposal. Briefly stated, in return for the election of a president of their choosing and the appointment of a genuine faculty of professors-something the College had not yet been able to afford, tutors being the only assistance the presidents had received-they would guarantee financial help for a term of years and the immediate collection of other funds. The plan was to be sprung on the board of trustees at the meeting in 1766, at which a successor to Finley would be elected. But it leaked out, and the trustees took prompt action. They valued their freedom more than the prospect of funds; after twenty years of possession they did not intend to let the College slip out of their grasp. Lurking behind the offer was the specter of synodical control, which was directly antagonistic to the spirit of the founders. And when the Philadelphia overture, backed by an impressive delegation of lay and clerical supporters, was brought to Princeton to be laid before the board, its advocates discovered that the trustees had already chosen a president, and that, while appreciating the generosity of the Old Side's financial offer, they felt it inadvisable to elect a faculty of professors until the money to pay their salaries was actually in the College treasury.

By what process the trustees had come to elect as their head John Witherspoon, minister of the gospel at Paisley in Scotland, has never been learned. The choice seems to indicate that they had decided it was time to inject new vitality into the presidency. They had watched four presidents die in less than nine years; it is recorded that they saw no satisfactory candidates in the American church; and it had not taken them long

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to find their man in the Scottish church. His name was known to most American divines as that of a leader of the conservative party in the Scottish General Assembly; he was the author of a few strongly evangelical sermons and of two or three strictly orthodox theological treatises; an essay of his, replying to Lord Kames and defending what was eventually to be the Scottish philosophy of realism, had reached those who subscribed to the Scots Magazine and who were admitted to the secret of his pseudonym; and he had shown in a piece of satire on his opponents in the Church of Scotland, which went through several editions, that he had a keen sense of humor. That the trustees of 1767 were attracted by this last quality it would be worse than foolish to assert; rather were they caught by the fact that Dr. Witherspoon was a graduate of Edinburgh in arts and theology, that St. Andrews had made him a doctor of divinity, that he was a man of undoubted piety, of strict orthodoxy, and of marked pastoral ability. Whether he had any special gifts as a teacher or as an academic. administrator seems to have been considered negligible; if he possessed them he had never had an opportunity for their display. But it was known that he had exercised unusual influence over the young people in his parishes; and his prominence in the councils of the Scottish church was guarantee of his mental equipment. In addition to his intellectual and moral qualifications, the activity of his career suggested that he was of tougher physical fiber than the average Princeton president had shown himself to be; and, with all due submission to the will of an inscrutable Providence, the frequency of breakdown and premature death in the headship of the College must have become discouraging to even the most patient members of the board.

The Philadelphians took their defeat in good part, most generous of all being Dr. Francis Allison, who had been slated for the presidency. It was almost unanimously conceded that, if Dr. Witherspoon proved to be made of the right stuff, he might heal all the troubles of American Presbyterianism; he would certainly be an invaluable accession to the forces of the colonial nonAnglican church; and his decision was awaited with hopefulness by the majority and with curiosity by all. To be sure, a petty and despicable attempt to influence his decision unfavorably was made by one disgruntled group, but Mr. Richard Stockton of the class of 1748, who was in England, and Benjamin Rush of 1760, then an emotional young Princetonian studying medicine at Edinburgh, were able to set his mind at rest, and he thought favorably of the offer. But Mrs. Witherspoon flatly refused to leave her native land, and her dutiful husband was compelled to decline the election.

At the October meeting of the board, in 1767, when this decision was received the Philadelphia party renewed their proposal in regard to the appointment of a faculty, and the trustees in conciliatory mood accordingly elected three professors-Dr. Hugh Williamson of Philadelphia, to the chair of mathematics and natural philosophy; the Reverend John Blair of Faggs Manor, a trustee, to the chair of divinity and moral philosophy, and to the chair of languages and logic young Mr. Jonathan Edwards, a tutor, and the son of the former president. The presidency itself, with the chair of rhetoric and metaphysics, they gave to young Samuel Blair of Boston, the former tutor and a nephew of the newly elected professor of divinity. The understanding was that these elections, saving the presidency, should not

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go into effect for a year, or until the board should be able to supply the salaries: £125 for the professor of languages and logic, £150 for the professor of mathematics and natural philosophy, £175 for the professor of divinity and moral philosophy, and £200 for the professor of rhetoric and metaphysics-all salaries being estimated in proclamation money. And to the trusteeship, left vacant by the appointment of Professor Blair, they elected an Old Side representative, the Reverend William Kirkpatrick of Amwell, New Jersey. Only one of these professorships-that of divinity—was actually occupied, and when Blair resigned the former plans were laid over, and Dr. Witherspoon was given a clean slate to fill.

Samuel Blair was twenty-six years old; he had been graduated from Princeton in 1760, had been a tutor under Finley for three years, and was the first alumnus elected to the presidency. Hearing that there were objections to him on account of his youth, he declined the election, and the more gracefully since it was rumored that Dr. Witherspoon might reconsider; for it turned out that Mrs. Witherspoon had changed her mind. Mr. Blair's declination and Dr. Witherspoon's hint that he would accept a second election were received together, and there was obviously only one thing for the board to do. As a result, in August, 1768, Dr. Witherspoon, with wife and family, landed at Philadelphia, and a few days later reached Princeton. The tutors and students escorted him from the East and West Jersey province line into the village, and Nassau Hall that night was illuminated with candles in every window.

The president found the College needing at each turn a leadership like the one he discovered he had the

power to supply. In 1767 the total financial resources of the institution amounted to £2,815 3s. 5d., of which only £950 was drawing interest; but with superb confidence the board in 1768 fixed the president's salary at £350 proclamation money, equivalent to £206 sterling. The College needed students and their tuition fees, and it needed money gifts, both of which could be obtained only by seeking; it needed enlargement of curriculum and faculty as well as widening of clientèle; it needed business methods in its financial administration. Most interesting to the stranger must have been the political atmosphere in which he found himself plunged. A process was going on whose character is illustrated by the fact that in 1761 one of the Princeton commencement pieces had been "The Military Glory of Great Britain," while in 1771 a similar commencement piece was to be "The Rising Glory of America." Between those dates lies the story of an awakening, the fullness of which Dr. Witherspoon was to witness and in part help to produce. He had led a party in the Scottish church which was fighting for popular rights against aristocratic power, against patronage, against ecclesiastical oppression; and he found here a college whose undergraduates and officers, in spite of professed loyalty to the British Crown, were growing steadily cooler toward it, and who were openly indorsing at every commencement the new political theories of the colonies. He himself when he reached America had no preconceived notions, save the conventional British ones, as to the relation of Crown to colony, and it is not within the province of these pages to trace his development into a full-fledged progressive American. But he soon perceived that he had fallen upon a bigger opportunity and was assuming graver responsibility than he had expected. For the