USA > New Jersey > Genealogical and memorial history of the state of New Jersey, Volume I > Part 11
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He instantly won popularity with his stu- dents as a stimulating lecturer and a keen judge of human nature. His introductory lec- ture "On the Method in which Metaphysics should be prosecuted" showed that he was neither content with Scottish philosophical methods nor intended to lead his classes along quite the traditional lines. In the main he fol- lowed experimental methods in his lectures on Psychology and Metaphysics, while in Logic he recast the elements. He laid special emphasis on the written work of his students, and took great delight in examining their aptitudes and characters. Several of his pupils fulfilled his prophecy of eminence.
Side by side with his professional duties he was active in evangelical work. He not only organized a school in the slum district of Bel- fast, which grew to have six hundred pupils, but in another neglected portion of the city he formed a congregation from the people whom he found to be without a pastor, and when the time was ripe he secured a minister and con- trived the erection of a church. He organized a club house for temperate working men to offset the social attractiveness of the saloon. He aided to found the Ministerial Support Fund of the Irish Presbyterian Church. His arguments against establishment and state en- dowment largely influenced Mr. Gladstone in disestablishing the Irish Church. He advo- cated the abolition of the Regum Donum, or government addition to clerical stipends, and in his essay on the "Duty of Irish Presbyteri- ans to their church at the present crisis in the sustentation of the Gospel Ministry" (Belfast, 1868) afforded much needed guidance to
troubled Irish Presbyterians. Meanwhile he was reading widely and observing keenly, as is shown in his address "The present Tendency of Religious Thought throughout the three Kingdoms" read before the British Organiza- tion of the Evangelical Alliance in July, 1864. He served also as examiner for Queen's Uni- versity, Ireland, for the Indian Civil service, and for the Fergusson scholarships. He strongly advocated a system of intermediate schools for Ireland, and supported the cause of national elementary schools as one method to break down the narrow class exclusiveness so prevalent in Ireland. In 1854 he published a series of letters to the Lord Lieutenant on "The Necessity for an Intermediate System of Education between the National Schools and the Colleges of Ireland." In 1867 he brought the question up again when, at the Belfast meeting of the National Association for the promotion of Social Science, he read a paper on "The Present State of the Intermediate Education Question in Ireland." It is clear that he touched on many of the great causes of the day, and it has been remarked, not without truth, that he earned distinction in winning the friendship and praise, in calling on himself the antagonistic criticism, of men like Chalmers, Guthrie, Hugh Miller, Sir Will- iam Hamilton, Gladstone, Huxley, Thackeray, Ruskin, and John Stuart Mill.
While at Belfast he continued his literary work by publishing, in 1855, his "Typical Forms and Special Ends in Creation" (with Professor George Dickie) which went into sev- eral editions; in 1860 his "Intuitions of the Mind," also several times republished ; in 1862 his "Supernatural in Relation to the Natural," published simultaneously in Cambridge, Bel- fast and New York; and in 1866 his "Exam- ination of J. S. Mill's Philosophy." The first of this group of works is directly traceable to his genius for observation, which led to the discovery that the venation in the leaves of a tree corresponds in general with the branches, a theory which is practically en- clorsed by all botanists to-day. In "Typical Forms and Special Ends in Creation," the au- thors expound the general order and design running through creation and illustrate the great principles of analogy in divine plans and works. This work, while ably presenting the results of profound scientific research in their higher relations, was overshadowed by the ap- pearance of Darwin's "Origin of Species." Dr. McCosh, however, was great enough to be able later to accept evolution provisionally, as
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will be shown when his philosophy is exam- ined. On the appearance of his "Intuitions of the Mind" the Jahrbücher fur Deutschen Theologie gave an approving notice, and later especially recommended its moderation and clearness. The London Quarterly Reviewe praised the same qualities, while the Prince- ton Review, representing orthodox Amer- ican Presbyterianism, pointed out that on all the great issues between Mill and Hamilton and their respective schools, as on nearly every issue between philosophical scepticism and Christian philosophy, Dr. McCosh had taken the right attitude.
In May, 1858, having already learned the German language, he sailed for Germany to spend five months examining Prussian schools and universities, and familiarizing himself with their methods and organization. He also at- tended the philosophical lectures of Trendel- enburg and Michelet and met other leaders in German thought. He returned to his Belfast lecture room in September, 1858. In 1866, to rest from his ardous duties and his literary labors (he had just published his important "Examination of J. S. Mill's Philosophy"), he sailed for America. During the Civil War he had staunchly upheld the Union in the face of strong opposition. In America he visited the principal cities and leading institutions and was received with distinction. His habit of keen observation stood him in such good stead that, when in 1868 the trustees of Princeton extended to him a call to the presidency. he was well informed as to the condition of the country and the outlook for higher education.
He came to Princeton at an opportune time. The Civil war had just ended and the coun- try at large was beginning to turn its attention to the development not only of its natural, but also of its educational resources. Harvard. Yale and Columbia had just entered on new eras of growth and Johns Hopkins University was soon to be founded. Dr. McCosh was soon called to Princeton to bring it abreast of the times and to lay the university foundations it now enjoys and on which it is still building. The foretaste of future material growth hinted at in his Inaugural Address was not merely rhetorical. It was evident from the beginning that he had grasped the situation and would live up to the promise of his ad- dress. During the twenty years of his presi- dency the campus was enlarged and beautified ; to the six buildings on that campus in 1868 fourteen were added by 1888; the faculty was increased from sixteen to forty-three, and the
number of students from two hundred and sixty-four to six hundred and four; the Princeton restricted elective system was intro- duced and courses leading to the degrees of B. S. and C. E., were added, together with graduate courses leading to the higher degrees ; the library was increased from 30,000 to 70,- 000 and a library building, in its day one of the handsomest in the country, was erected ; fellow - ships were endowed and several special annual prizes were founded ; alumni associations were organized to keep the graduates in touch with the institutions and with each other. Nearly $3,000,000 came into the college treasury dur- ing the two decades; faculty espionage, Greek letter fraternities. class-room disorder, and most of the vicious hazing of earlier days. were done away with or suppressed.
Dr. McCosh advocated the restricted elec- tive system in the college curriculum as op- posed to the free elective method introduced by President Eliot at Harvard. The latter ad- vocated his views before the Nineteenth Cen- tury Club of New York in February, 1885, and Dr. McCosh was invited to criticize them. His comments were published in pamphlet form under the title "The New Departure in Col- lege Education." He favored freedom of elective studies under limitations, holding that certain fundamental studies should be compul- sory in any curriculum leading to the historic academic degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts. Moreover he believed firmly that all education should have Christian foundation and he never let this point of view be lost. He constantly endeavored to develop the Christian element in college life, but as earn- estly avoided anything like denominationalism in the college chapel. As a teacher he stands pre-eminent in American academic history with Woolsey, Mark Hopkins, and Wayland, as one who contrived by his earnestness, his enthusiasm and his knowledge, to spur the in- terest of his classes. He was prominent in all educational gatherings and his last public ap- pearance was as presiding officer at the Inter- nal Congress of Education held at Chicago, in July, 1893, when his eminence as a teacher and philosopher made him the recipient of every mark of honor and distinction.
He believed in the parental theory of college government and did not confine his theory to his undergraduates. He ruled and moulded his faculty. He won the affection of his stu- dents by his strong personality, his dry humor, his shrewdness, his perfect understanding of them, and his favor of gymnastics and ath --
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letics. And in his personal relations with them he was wonderfully aided by his wife whose gentle solicitude for, and motherly in- terest in, any that were sick or in need of care made her the sharer in the affection that he enjoyed. It was to perpetuate the memory of her goodness especially to undergraduates that the Isabella McCosh Infirmary was erected on the Princeton campus.
Dr. McCosh was as prolific a writer after his advent to America as he had been in Bel- fast. Beginning with his striking Inaugural Address on "Academic Teaching in Europe," published in New York in 1869, he continued publication until the very year of his death. In 1870 he brought out a text book of formal logic. "The Laws of Discursive Thought," which was reissued in revised and enlarged editions at least three times during the next twenty years. In 1871 he delivered a series of lectures at Union Theological Seminary, New York, on natural theology and apologet- ics, which was published in New York and London in 1871, and again in 1875, under the title of "Christianity and Positivism." In 1874 he issued his well known "Scottish Phi- losophy, biographical, expository, critical ; from Hutcheson to Hamilton" being a history and critique of the school of thought of which he was the most brilliant living pupil. Of more ephemeral character were his essays: "Ideas in Nature overlooked by Dr. Tyndall," being a searching examination of Tyndall's Belfast address (New York, 1875) ; his "De- velopment Hypothesis : is it Sufficient ?" (New York, 1876), and his "Conflicts of the Age" (New York, 1881). In 1882 he began to issue a valuable "Philosophical Series" of eight small volumes discussing the leading philo- sophical questions of the day and setting forth his contention that while the old truths may have to be put in new form and their defense taken up on new lines yet they are as deeply founded as ever. This series was republished in two volumes in 1887. In 1886 he published his "Psychology: the Cognitive Powers," and in the following years its second part, "Psy- chology : the Motive Powers." In 1887 he de- livered the Bedell Lectures, publishing them in 1888 under the title "The Religious Aspect of Evolution," enlarging them in a new edition which was called for in 1890. In 1889 he issued his treatise on metaphysics "First and Fundamental Truths" and in the same year he delivered a series of lectures before the Ohio Wesleyan University on "The Tests of various Kinds of Truth," being a treatise on applied
logic, published in New York and Cincinnati in 1889. The following year he issued a small work "The Prevailing Types of Thought : can they reach Reality logically?" and in 1892 his brief volume on ethics "Our Moral Nature." In 1894 he published his last work, "Philoso- phy of Reality : should it be favored by Ameri- cans?" His belief contributions to purely American educational discussions were, not in- cluding his reply to President Eliot on the Elective System and several addresses at edu- cational conventions, his papers "Discipline in American Colleges" (North American Review, vol. 126, pp. 428-441), "Course of Study in the Academical Department of Princeton Col- lege" (Princeton Book 1879), "What an American University should be" (1885), "Re- ligion in College" (1886).
As a philosophical writer Dr. McCosh be- longs to the great school of traditional Scot- tish thought whose history he wrote. Here he stands next to his great teacher, Sir Will- iam Hamilton. During his lifetime his po- sition, as has been pointed out, suffered be- cause of the reaction against that school led by John Stuart Mill, and because of the evolu- tion movement begun by Darwin and led philo- sophically by Herbert Spencer. His emphatic and positive tone moreover, says Professor A. T. Ormond, his foremost pupil and his suc- cessor in the Princeton school of philosophy, had something to do with the mistaken tend- ency to undervalue his work. Much of this work was necessarily transitional, as for in- stance his attitude toward evolution itself. He may be said to have accepted evolution pro- visionally, that is, rejecting its atheistic and irreligious forms while adopting its scientific truth. His attitude is thus summed up: He maintained the possibility of conceiving evo- lution from the theistic basis as a feature of Divine government and this led him to take a hospitable view attitude toward the evolution idea at the same time that it enabled him to become its most formidable critic. It is be- lieved, however, that he has contributed ele- ments of value to the thought of the time as for instance his treatment of intuition by a more discriminating, keen and careful analysis than had hitherto been given to it. He was an ardent realist and had an almost virulent an- tipathy for idealism and the phenomenal the- ory. The progress of thought since his time would prevent an unqualified acceptance of his views at this day, but his basic realistic prin- ciple is one "which a very wide view school of thinkers have at heart." He had a genius for
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observation and an intense interest in human character which he cultivated incessantly and turned to good account in his psychological work becoming in reality a pioneer in the sci- ence of physiological psychology. In the sphere of religious thought his work will be valued for its union of philosophy and religion. Excepting his annual baccalaureates and a vol- ume of "Gospel Sermons" (New York, 1888), few of his sermons were given to the press.
Dr. McCosh left an autobiography which has been expanded and edited by Professor William M. Sloane ("Life of James McCosh : A Record Chiefly Autobiographical," New York, 1896) and which contains a very exten- sive list of Dr. McCosh's writings extending from 1833 to 1894 and numbering one hundred and seventy-four titles.
He received the honorary degree of A. M. from Aberdeen in 1850, D. D. from Edin- burgh in 1851 and from Brown and Wash- ington and Jefferson in 1868, LL. D. from Dublin in 1863 and from Harvard in 1868, and Litt. D. from Queen's University in 1882. He was a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the American Philo- sophical Society.
Dr. McCosh married, September 29, 1845. Isabella, born April 30, 1817, daughter of Alexander and Mary (Stirling) Guthrie. Al- exander Guthrie was the well known physician, and brother of Thomas Guthrie, Dr. Mc- Cosh's intimate friend. Five children were born of this marriage beside a son who died in infancy : Mary Jane, born July 7, 1846, mar- ried, June, 1881, Alexander Maitland, of New York City. Alexander Guthrie, born January 16, 1850, died October 30, 1881, at Princeton. Margaret, born June 21, 1852, married Dr. David Magie. Andrew James, born March 15, 1858, at Belfast, a graduate of Prince- ton of the class of 1877, and now the bril- liant surgeon in New York. Mrs. McCosh is still residing in Princeton and continues active in her charity and philanthropy.
MACLEAN John Maclean, D. D., LL. D., tenth president of the Col- lege of New Jersey, now Princeton University, was the oldest son of Professor John Maclean, M. D., and Phoebe Bainbridge, of Princeton. He was born March 3, 1800, and was prepared for college by his father and at the Princeton Academy. Entering college in 1813 he was graduated in 1816, one of its youngest students. For a few months he taught at Lawrenceville. In 1818
entering Princeton Theological Seminary he remained there two years. At the same time he had been appointed a tutor in Greek in the college, and had thus commenced his long career in connection with that institution. In 1822 he was elected to fill the chair of Mathe- matics and Natural Philosophy; in 1823 he was made professor of Mathematics alone ; six years later he was transferred to the chair of Languages and in 1830 to that of Ancient Languages, and in 1847 he was made professor of the Greek Language and Literature. He had been elected vice-president of the college in 1829, and in 1854, on the resignation of President Carnahan, he was made president, resigning in turn in 1868 to be succeeded by Dr. James McCosh. From 1868 he was a regent of the Smithsonian Institution. He was also president of the American Colonization Society. He received the honorary degree of D. D. from Washington and Jefferson in 1841, and the similar degree of LL. D. from the Uni- versity of the State of New York in 1854. He was a director of the Princeton Theological Seminary from 1861, and a member of the New Jersey State Board of Education. He died of old age on August 10, 1886. at Princeton, and is buried in the Princeton cemetery. He was unmarried.
Dr. Maclean was ordained a minister by the Presbytery of New Brunswick in February, 1828, and from that time, although he never held a formal pastoral charge, he was promi- nent in the affairs of the church. He was re- peatedly a member of the general assembly, taking active part in all matters pertaining to the constitution of the church, to education, to temperance and to the doctrinal discussions that led to the division of the church in 1837- 1838. In order to promote a better under- standing between the parties at odds, and to defend the more important proceedings of the general assembly on the issues between the old and new school branches of the church, he wrote in 1837 for the Presbyterian a ser- ies of six exceptionally able letters, republished the following year in pamphlet form under the title "A Review of the Proceedings of the General Assembly at the Session of 1837." In 1838, as a representative of the Presbytery of New Brunswick, he was present at the as- sembly when the division in the church oc- curred, and was appointed to draw up a "Cir- cular Letter to the Foreign Evangelical Churches," on the issues involved. Again in 1843 and 1844 he was a member of the as- sembly when the important question of the
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office of ruling elder was settled, and his abil- ity in defence of the majority's view again led to his appointment as the official public spokesman in drawing up a reply to the mi- nority's dissent and protest. In 1844 he pub- lished under the title "Letters on the Elder Question" the thirteen communications which he had written on the question for the Pres- bytcrian and which contain a clear summing up of the majority's position.
His most pretentious literary work was a "History of the College of New Jersey" in two volumes, written after he had resigned from the presidency, and published in 1877, con- taining the history of the institution from the founding in 1746 to his inauguration in 1854. He left materials for the history of his own administration partly in the form of an auto- biography which has not yet been made public. Furthermore in 1876 he issued for private dis- tribution a memoir of his father, Professor Maclean, which was republished in a second edition in 1885. In addition to these publica- tions he was the author of several essays and sermons which not only testify to his piety and orthodoxy and to his beautiful Christian char- acter, but reveal powers which lead to the be- lief that, had he not been so continuously overwhelmed with the petty duties of college administration during times more troublous than pleasant, and with other cares which a too generous disposition induced him to shoul- der, he might have produced writings of per- manent and prime importance.
Beside his essays on the general assembly of 1837 and on the elder question of 1844 one of his most remarkable productions was his reply in 1841 to two prize essays published in Eng- land and sanctioned by the National Temper- ance Society maintaining the duty of total abstinence on the grounds that the Scripture condemned all use of intoxicating drinks, and asserting that the wine used in instituting the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was the un- fermented juice of the grape. Dr. Maclean's exhaustive and conclusive argument entitled "An examination of the Essays Bacchus and Anti Bacchus" originally published in the Princeton Review, and reprinted in pamphlet form (140 pages) in 1841, in opposition to this doctrine attracted much attention and se- cured for him a reputation for classical, bib- lical and patriotic scholarship. While not a total abstainer he approved cordially of tem- perance, but his mental and moral integrity could not allow him to confuse temperance with total abstinence nor to admit a position
in favor of the latter, when alleged to be based entirely on Scripture and on the testimony of antiquity. He proves such a position to be utterly untenable. An interesting and valu- able piece of work was an article published in the Presbyterian of October, 1873, entitled "The Harmony of the Gospel Accounts of Christ's Resurrection," defending the cred- ibility of the various accounts of the Resur- rection on the basis of the mathematical The- ory of Probabilities. Two of his exegetical essays are "On the Words This Day have I begotten Thee" (Presbyterian for 1853) and "Some thoughts on I Corinthians xv, 35" (Presbyterian, 1886). Specimens of his ser- mon style may be found in his baccalaureates of 1857, 1858, 1859, in a "Sermon preached in the Chapel of the College of New Jersey" in 1846, and a sermon on "Filial Piety" published in 1852 in Dr. John T. Duffield's "Princeton Pulpit."
Beside his college work Dr. Maclean was engaged in manifold public enterprises, and no scheme of benevolence, educational advance, or public welfare failed to secure his earnest and active co-operation. Indeed, he had been called the "pastor at large" to the people of Princeton and its vicinity. He was largely in- strumental in securing for New Jersey its com- mon school system, having been one of its earl- iest and strongest advocates. As early as Jan- uary, 1828, he had delivered before the Liter- ary and Philosophical Society of New Jersey a "Lecture on a School System for New Jer- sey" which, published in 1829, aided consider- ably in promoting public interest in the ques- tion and had large influence in the establish- ment of the present system. He was secre- tary of the state board of education, and a life director and for a time president of the American Colonization Society, an address of his on the objects of the Society being pub- lished in the fifty-fourth annual report of the Society.
Elected a regent of the Smithsonian Insti- tution in 1868, he was one of its most faith- ful officers. When attending the meetings of the regent, which he did with scrupulous regu- larity, he was accustomed to make his home with Professor Joseph Henry, the secretary of the institution, whose intimacy he had en- joyed ever since the beginning of Henry's professorship at Princeton.
Excepting the devastating period of the Revolution, the most critical era in the history of Princeton University occurred during the half century that Dr. Maclean was connected
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with the institution and it was his energy, his confidence and persistence that alone kept the institution intact. There was a time when its condition was so low that it was seriously thought wiser to close the college and wait for better days. Happily Dr. Maclean was able to combat successfully this feeling of utter discouragement on the part of his colleagues. Owing to unfortunate mistakes in faculty dis- cipline, voted against the judgment of Presi- dent Carnahan and Dr. Maclean, the number of students had dwindled until in 1829 only sev- enty were on the rolls. Inasmuch as the college was almost entirely dependent on tuition re- ceipts to meet its current expenses this situa- tion was wellnigh paralyzing. Perceiving that strength in the faculty meant for the college increase of reputation, students and funds, Dr. Maclean set about securing the funds that en- abled Princeton to call men like Henry Veth- ake, Joseph Henry, John Torrey, Albert B. Dod and the Alexanders. The effect on the college was immediate. In 1832 there were one hundred and thirty-nine students; in 1839 there were two hundred and seventy. Partly in recognition of his work and partly to give a wide authority to the executive ability which he had revealed as a subordinate, the trustees in 1829 had made him vice-president of the College.
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