USA > Maine > Cumberland County > Brunswick > General catalogue of Bowdoin College and the Medical School of Maine, 1794-1894 > Part 5
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Under date of November 28, 1816, he writes : "God has been pleased, as I trust, to visit several of the students, with his saving health. We do hope that at least six of the number have been transformed by the renewing of the mind. This is a great thing- a very great thing. It is what we have been long praying and longing for. A third of the students, or very nearly that portion, it is now hoped, are pious. It is but a little while since we had none of this description." A year later he writes : "As to the College, God has shown us new favors. Not only have a con- siderable number of serious students entered, but there have recently been, as we hope, three or four individuals converted to the Lord. This is a great thing, an unexpected mercy that God should have returned to us so soon. Those students who were thought to have experienced religion last year, have, by divine grace, done well. They appear to be good, sound, judicious, and zealous Christians. This is a glorious thing. Religion seems to have obtained strong footing in Bowdoin College."
At his death, 12 November, 1819, President Appleton was only forty-seven years of age. The pressure of his college duties, and especially his unremitted application to study, had unquestion- ably hastened his decease. His keen sense of personal responsi- bility laid on him a heavy load of anxiety. His natural tastes and his intellectual ambition led him to attempt and to accomplish, what now would be impossible, the mastery of all the subjects pursued in the college curriculum. Habits of study that for long periods only allowed four hours a day for sleep and demanded a
1 From a letter quoted in Smyth's Three Discourses on the Religious History of Bowdoin College.
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spare diet that the need of physical exercise might be lessened, could not but injuriously affect his constitution. None the less manifest, however, were the results of his self-devotion. Under his direction the institution, with its little corps of five teachers and fifty pupils, won an enviable reputation for "good morals and sound scholarship." Among the one hundred and thirty grad- uates who enjoyed his instruction were two presidents of colleges, five judges of the higher state courts, one governor, and five congressmen. Of the three or four who gave themselves chiefly to literary work, at least one, Jacob Abbott, has exerted a wide- spread influence by his writings.
The separation of Maine from the mother state brought anxiety to many friends of the college. A few years before, the private affairs of the college treasurer had become hopelessly involved, and a temporary attachment was placed upon the property of his brother-in-law and surety, General William King, for the purpose of securing the college against possible loss. The agent in this matter was a prominent federalist and political opponent of the future governor. The latter's indignation was great and unfort- tunately fell, in part, on the college, which he regarded as a federalist institution. His influence was given to obtaining a charter for Waterville College, now Colby University, and to inserting in the constitution of the new state a provision that no literary institution should receive state aid unless the legislature were able "to alter, limit or restrain any of the powers vested in any such literary institution." To protect the college from this dreaded antagonism of the dominant political party, a provision was inserted in the act of separation that Maine should assume the payment of the annual grant of $3,000, until its expiration four years later, and that the president, trustees, and overseers of Bowdoin College should continue to enjoy all their rights, powers, and privileges. In the midst of the doubts and mis- givings that the prospective withdrawal of state aid aroused, there is heroism as well as faith in the oft-quoted sentiment of the dying president, uttered as he looked out from his chamber window toward the college halls : "God has taken care of the college and God will take care of it."
CHAPTER V.
PRESIDENT ALLEN'S ADMINISTRATION.
Rev. William Allen -State and College-Increase of students- Benevolent society - Winthrop Hall-Maine Hall burned-Professor Newman - Professor Packard-Professor Upham-Professor Smyth- Professor Longfellow - The old faculty -The curriculum by depart- ments-Student life-Attempted removal of the president-Second fire in Maine Hall-President Allen's resignation.
In December, 1819, Rev. William Allen was unanimously chosen president. He had marked qualifications for the position. A graduate of Harvard in 1802, he served there as regent several years, then studied theology and succeeded his father in the pas- torate of the church at Pittsfield, Mass. Recently he had been at the head of the short-lived Dartmouth University. His literary reputation, early won by his biographical dictionary, his family . connections, his collegiate experience, and his political views, which were in sympathy with those of the party then dominant in the state, united in making him an acceptable candidate.
In his inaugural address, President Allen set forth the advan- tages flowing from a cultivation of the arts and sciences, and the importance to a free commonwealth of collegiate institutions. While in striking accord with his predecessors he maintained that knowledge without virtue is valueless, he dwelt with emphasis upon the service which the college renders the state, and the essential unity of their interests. That his views on this subject were not merely theoretical was soon apparent.
The first, and, in some respects, the most important measure of his administration, was the establishment of the Medical School of Maine, of which an account will be found in the chapter relat- ing to that institution. Closely connected, if not, indeed, necessi- tated by this, was the surrender to the state of the right to modify the charter of the college. By the Act of Separation, the legisla- ture of Maine had no control over the college. By the constitu-
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tion of the state, no donation could be made to a literary institu- tion that was, so to speak, independent of the law-making power. Shall the college surrender its independence for the sake of the pittance it may receive, was the question as put by those distrust- ful of the future. Shall the college fail to allow the Common- wealth to render it the assistance alike needed and deserved, asked President Allen. The latter view prevailed. The Boards voted that the right to alter their powers should be vested in the legis- lature, and, at the same time, petitioned for a continuance of the annual grant from the bank tax, "and for such other donations as the legislature, in their wisdom, may be disposed to make." The legislature of 1820 forthwith extended the annuity of three thousand dollars for a period of seven years from February 14, 1824, the date at which it would otherwise have expired.
The following year the legislature exercised its newly acquired rights, and increased the number of trustees to twenty-five, and of overseers to sixty, giving the governor the power to appoint these new members. The appointments were men of the highest social and intellectual standing : but with few, if any exceptions, they and his excellency thought alike ou political matters. The subsequent appeals to the legislature in 1825, for aid in building a chapel, and in 1831, for a continuance of the annuity, did not receive a favorable response.
The commencement of 1821, to which the governor came with his staff and an escort of cavalry, and which was largely attended by prominent and influential men from all parts of the state, revived memories of the famous first commencement. Popular favor seemed lavished on the college. It was also marked by the entrance of the largest class the college had yet known, and one destined to be its most famous. The noticeable increase in the number of students at this period resulted from several causes, among which the growing reputation of the college and its im- proved facilities for instruction were prominent. The extension of the field for professional, as distinct from commercial employ- ment, and the higher estimate placed upon education throughout the new state, also had their influence. Though the tuition had been raised to twenty-four dollars, the room rent to ten, and
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Sallust, Ancient and Modern Geography, and Walsh's Arithmetic added to the entrance requirements, the proportion of students dependent upon their own exertions, or from families of limited means, became materially greater than ever before. For the assistance of this class the Benevolent Society was organized in the previous administration, and incorporated in 1826. This organization, by annual assessments on its members, and by the solicitation of gifts from the public, raised a considerable sum of money which it loaned, without interest, to needy students in small amounts. It also provided books and furniture, as far as its means would allow, with only a nominal charge for their use. Its prosperity and efficiency, however, seemed to have languished not long after it became legally a body corporate, and no record is preserved of its activity subsequent to 1830.
The increase in students made it necessary to provide addi- tional accommodations. In September, 1821, the Boards author- ized the erection of a new hall at a cost of ten thousand dollars. This building was erected the following year, and, after being long known as New College and as North College, received, in 1848, its present designation of Winthrop Hall in honor of Governor John Winthrop of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Work had not begun on this edifice when, March 4, 1822, Maine Hall caught fire and the entire interior was consumed. The fire is supposed to have started in the garret and, when dis- covered at three o'clock in the afternoon, was beyond control. The loss of private property was considerable, being estimated at the time at $1,500. The loss to the college was far more serious, as there was no insurance. This calamity, however, be- came a source of benefit through the liberality of the contributions to repair the loss. These were systematically sought throughout Maine and Massachusetts by friends and alumni, and prominent men in Washington were also solicited. Among the contributors were President Monroe, John Quincy Adams, and John C. Cal- houn. As a result, nearly ten thousand dollars was raised, while the restoration of the building, since the walls proved to be prac- tically uninjured, cost but sixty-five hundred dollars.
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Of greater importance than new buildings were the accessions
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to the Faculty that signalized President Allen's administration. The first was Samuel Phillips Newman, who had graduated with honor at Harvard in 1816 and had since been engaged in teaching and in theological studies under President Appleton. He served as tutor for two years prior to his inauguration in 1820 as profes- sor of the ancient languages. It was, however, in the professor- ship of rhetorie and oratory, established in 1824, and to which he was transferred, that his most valned services were rendered. His treatise on rhetoric, published soon after, was an admirable text-book, as shown by the number of schools and colleges in which it was adopted and the sixty editions through which it passed. His department was made to include the rising science of political economy, and the substance of his lectures on that subject was issued in 1835 as an elementary treatise. As a man even more than as a teacher, was his influence felt. Possessed of much business ability, faithful, prompt, and firm in the discharge of duty, his services, especially during the two years of President Allen's absence, when he was acting president, were invaluable to the institution. Of him a pupil' writes : "His genial, unaffected manners, his genuine sincerity, and faithful discharge of duty secured the respect, confidence, and affection of the students, while his catholic sentiments and Christian charity endeared him alike to orthodox and heterodox." His regretted resignation in 1839 was followed hardly two years later by his death at the age of forty-five.
Alpheus Spring Packard, a graduate of 1816, who had given the three intervening years to teaching, was appointed tutor in 1819, and professor of ancient languages and classical literature in 1824. For forty-one years Professor Packard conducted the work in Latin and Greek, a part of the time without the assistance of a tutor, while for three of these years, 1842-5, he also had over- sight of the department of rhetoric and oratory. In his inaugural address on the method in which the classics should be taught, he said : "Like faithful guides we are to show the pupil the most direct path to knowledge and become companions of his way, pointing out to him as he advances, whatever may animate and
1 Hon. Peter Thacher of Boston, Mass.
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allure, and leading him to the most favorable points, whence he may view all that is grand and beautiful." This simple yet com- prehensive ideal he faithfully strove to carry out. His habit was not to dwell upon minute philological and grammatical details, but to unfold and illustrate the thought of the author. His reci- tations were enriched by occasional lectures carefully prepared to stimulate the student's appreciation of the literary style of the author read and the historical relations of the text. He felt keenly the importance of a correct yet free translation of the original, paragraph by paragraph, a method to which William Pitt, as he was wont to remind his pupils, owed much of his remarkable fluency and facility in debate. This characteristic of his teaching, the more noticeable by reason of its departure from the traditional method,1 sometimes incited his students to render- ings more idiomatic than he desired, as, for instance, when John P. Hale translated dimidium facti, qui cœpit, habet-" well lathered is half shaved." His genuine interest in educational matters led to several essays and addresses which were published in the North American Review and in the Collections of the American Insti- tute of Instruction, and he edited for the Harpers in 1839 a school edition of Xenophon's Memorabilia of Socrates, which passed through three editions.
In February, 1825, Thomas Cogswell Upham was formally inaugurated Professor of Metaphysics and Moral Philosophy and Lecturer on Biblical Literature. Professor Upham was graduated at Dartmouth in 1818, pursued a theological course at Andover, and, at its close, was chosen Professor Stuart's assistant in Hebrew. The reputation he had won as a scholar, in part by his translation and abridgment of Jahn's Archeology, led to his being called from a brief pastorate in Rochester, N. H., to the newly established professorship at Bowdoin. He entered upon his field of labor at an important period. Locke and Reid had, hitherto, reigned supreme, but now the philosophical discourses of Coleridge were being read, Cousin's teachings in France were awakening popular interest and, above all, the influence of Kant was becoming more
1 This traditional method, as described on p. xxxiii., was in vogue in some New England colleges as late as 1830.
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BOWDOIN COLLEGE IN 1822.
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and more widely felt in America. He was expected to oppose the tide of German metaphysics, which his denomination regarded as likely to unsettle and lead astray. The young professor accepted in the main the Scottish philosophy. The views of this school he incorporated in 1827 in a volume styled " A Compilation of Intel- lectual Philosophy.", This, in 1831, he elaborated into a more original and systematic work in two volumes. It met with a favorable reception in both this country and England. The late Prof. Henry B. Smith wrote in 1837 :1 " We know of no work on mental philosophy which has so much completeness and inclu- siveness. It is eminently practical without being commonplace, and is east in a form well fitted for purposes of instruction. To deeper and more fundamental investigations it is a safe and suffi- cient introduction, and by its impartiality will guard against that exclusiveness of spirit which may make a partisan, but never made a philosopher." The work passed through several editions, and was widely used as a college text-book. One of his pupils, Rev. Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, translated it into Armenian and employed it at Robert College, Constantinople. Three years later, he pub- lished his " Treatise on the Will," which must be regarded as his most original work, and which formed the third volume of subse- quent editions of the Mental Philosophy.
Though an able and faithful instructor, Professor Upham undoubtedly contributed more to the reputation and influence of the college by his writings than by his recitations. In addition to the philosophical works just mentioned, his religious and mis- cellaneous contributions to literature had a wide circulation. On the subject of the higher Christian life, there appeared in 1844, " Principles of the Interior Life," and this was followed in subse- quent years by " Religious Maxims," "The Life of Faith," "Trea- tise on Divine Union," "Life and Religious Opinions of Madame Guyon." An early and earnest advocate of peace, his essay on the congress of nations and his manual of peace were stereotyped and circulated by the American Peace Society. In 1852 he visited Europe and the Holy Land, and the resulting series of letters,
1 Literary and Theological Review, v. 4, p. 628.
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reprinted in book form for a circle of friends, met with such favor that the work passed through two editions. A volume of minor poems, collected under the title, " American Cottage Life," was a favorite gift book a generation ago, and several of the pieces it con- tained are never omitted from any extended religious anthology. Of a remarkably retiring disposition, he at the same time possessed a knowledge of human nature and a persistency that enabled him to secure for the college, by personal solicitation, over seventy thousand dollars, largely from a denomination that had distrusted its management. Failing health led him to retire from the duties of his professorship in 1867. His active mind, however, con- tinued its work, his last book, "Absolute Religion," appearing after his death. This occurred in New York City, 2 April, 1872.
After Professor Cleaveland began to devote himself to the natural sciences, most of the instruction in mathematics fell to the tutors. It consisted mainly in the pupils studying the prescribed lesson in Webber's Mathematics and subsequently repeating it. What is now called original work was quite unknown. Occasion- ally, however, a practical exercise in surveying was given. In geometry each student had a blank book in which he drew the figures and which he used in demonstrating. In algebra prob- lems were worked out on a slate and the result explained at the teacher's side. In a crowded recitation room it sometimes hap- pened that correct answers followed incorrect processes. "How did you get that result?" a tutor once asked a Bowdoin Sopho- more, who afterwards became president of the United States. " From Stowe's slate," was the frank reply.
In 1824 Tutor William Smyth, a graduate of two years standing and fresh from a year of theological study at Andover, introduced with his Sophomores in algebra the use of the blackboard. This novel experiment, as it then seemed, was a great success. The enthusiasm that the young teacher awakened is indicated by the fact that a class which had completed the subject, petitioned for a review of it under the new method. The following year Mr. Smyth, abandoning his first love, Greek, in which he had won some distinction, accepted the professorship of mathematics, and began his long occupancy of that chair, terminated only by his
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death in 1868. With characteristic zeal and earnestness he gave himself to an extended study of the French system of mathematics. His active mind and unusual power of concentration enabled him to read Laplace's Mécanique Céleste, at the close of days of vexatious drudgery. His manuscripts with their carefully elab- orated formula show that he not only read but mastered.
Under circumstances that would have deterred one of less indomitable will, he prepared his well-known series of mathemat- ical text-books. The first was a small work on plane trigonome- try, issued for the use of his own classes in 1825. His algebra appeared in 1830, received warm commendation from Dr. Bow- ditch, and was adopted as a text-book at Harvard and at other institutions. After passing through several editions it took the form of two separate books, the Elementary Algebra and the College Text-book of Algebra. In 1834 elementary algebra was made one of the requirements for admission. Two years later he published an enlarged edition of the trigonometry with the applications of the science to surveying and navigation. His treatise on analytic geometry was issued in the same year, and in 1854 his Elements of the Differential and Integral Calculus. The last mentioned work evinced no little originality. It received emphatic approval in high quarters, notably from the late Professor Bache. In addition to his mathematical instruction Professor Smyth gave lectures on natural philosophy, and towards the close of his life on astronomy. With all his college work he found time to labor earnestly for the general interest of the community and in social reforms. The public schools of the town were graded and suitable buildings erected largely through his exertions ; the church and the parish found him a never-tiring worker. He early joined the anti-slavery movement, met hardship and even outrage in the advocacy of his views, and his house was a well-known station on the under-ground railway.
The professorship of modern languages was the last of the four new chairs established under President Allen. Instruction in French had been given as early as 1820 by a native who was not awarded a place upon the faculty, though on one occasion, at least, the college treasurer assumed the payment of his fees.
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In September, 1825, the Boards voted "that a professorship be established for the instruction of the Junior and Senior classes in the modern languages of Europe, particularly in French and Spanish, and that until a professor be elected, the executive government make the best provision in their power for such instruction at an expense not exceeding $500." This temporary provision was made by engaging Joseph Hale Abbot, of the class of 1822, who had pursued post-graduate studies at Cambridge, and who was subsequently a successful teacher in Boston. A professor, it is said, was informally selected at the same time in the person of a talented young man of the graduating class, whose well-known literary ability had recently, according to tradition, forced itself upon the attention of a prominent trustee by the fine rendering of an ode of Horace. It was soon after arranged that Henry W. Longfellow, after three or four years of study abroad (he was then a youth of nineteen), should fill the chair now known as the Longfellow Professorship. Upon this he entered in 1829. One who enjoyed his instruction writes as follows : 1
" He had secured a large place for his department in the curriculum and he awakened great enthusiasm among the students. In studying French we used a grammar which he had himself prepared. In study- ing Italian we used a grammar in the French language also prepared by the professor. His painstaking in preparing these grammars was one of many indications of his enthusiasm in his teaching. But he did not confine himself to linguistic teaching. He aimed to open to us the literature of these languages, especially the French, and to arouse us to interest in it. In addition to the recitations already mentioned he gave a course of lectures on French literature. They were given in the chapel to the students of all the classes who chose to attend. I remember these lectures as highly elaborated and in their style highly finished and polished. Under his teaching we were able to gain a knowledge of these languages which it was easy to retain and complete after gradu- ation so as to use them through life in the study of their respective literatures. But he did not attempt to teach us to converse in them. His literary attainments, spirit, and enthusiasm did not fail to exert an inspiring and refining influence on those thus associated with him through four years."
1 Rev. Dr. Samuel Harris, in Bowdoin Orient, v. 14, p. 203.
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Of Mr. Longfellow's own view of his work, the following extracts from his inaugural address, delivered 17 August, 1830, give an interesting glimpse :
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