L COMPENDIUM OF THE HISTORY OF AMERICAN COLLEGES. a

COLUMBIA common (1154).

Tnn first authentic information with regard to the establishment of a college in the city of New York is contained in the records of Trinity Parish, from which it appears that as early as 1703 the rector and wardens were directed to wait upon Lord Cornbury, the governor, to know what part of the “Kings Farme," then vested in Trinity Church, had been intended for the college which he designed to have built (Note, Historical Sketch Col. Coll., p. 5). The design thus indicated was again thought of in 1731i, when Berkeley, disappointed in his expectations regarding the establishment of a college in Bermuda, sought to transfer the establishment intended for that island to New York. Berkeley's plans having failed, the subject was not again revived until about twenty years afterward, when provisions were made in the laws of the colony for the raising of a fund by means of a lottery for the founding of a col- lege. These provisions were for the raising of the sum of £2,250, and were made in an act passed Dec. 6, 1746. Other similar acts followed; and in 1751 the funds raised, amounting to £3,443 18s., were vested in ten trustees, of whom the majority were members of the Church of England. The royal charter was finally obtained in 1754; and the organization was completed the following year, under the name of “King's College.” The charter named as governors, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and various ofiicers of the colony, with leading clergymen and citizens of New York In 1755 the corporation of Trinity Church delivered to the college certain lands provided for in the charter; the conditions of the delivery being, that its president should continue to be a member of the Church of England, and that certain services of the English Church should be regularly observed in the college. While thus establishec under religious auspices, and under the direction of members of the Church of England, the charter expressly denied to the college the power of making any laws or regulations tending to exclude any person of any religious denomination whatever from equal liberty and advantage of education, or from any of the liberties and privileges of the college, on account of his religious tenets. The affairs of t-he col lege under its first government were thus conducted in a catholic and generous spirit; and when its title was changed, and its control passed into the hands of the Protestant Episcopal Church of America the wise and liberal provisions of its original charter were scrupulously adhered to. The college thus remains, as at its origin, under denominational direction, but so governed as to remove all traces of sectarian ism from its management. The first class was admitted in 1754, although a permanent building was not provided until 1756, when an edifice was erected in College Place. The first president, Samuel Johnson, S.T.D., was elected in 1754, and was succeeded by Myles Cooper, LL.D. In the exciting dis- cussions which preceded the war of the Revolution, Dr. Cooper took an active part, his sympathies being entirely on the side of the crown. His sentiments were so oifensive to the patriots, as to arouse a storm of indignation; and on the night of May 10, 1775, his lodgings were entered by a mob, to whose fury he would probably have fallen a victim had he not been absent) He was saved by the warning of a for- mer pupil, and took refuge on board a British man-of-war lying in the harbor, in which he soon after sailed to England. He did not return; and Benjamin Moore, an alumnus of the college, acted as tempo- rary president. No commencement exercises were “held that year, 1775, but degrees were conferred as usual. In 1776 the Committee of Safety took possession of the college-buildings for military purposes. This act, which was doubtless due to the hostility to the institution, engendered by its late president, was a serious blow, and resulted in the loss of a large part of its equipment. Degrees were nevertheless conferred on six graduates in 1776. During the subsequent eight years, the college suspended operations; resuming in 1784, when it received a new charter from the State of New York, under the name of Colum- bia College. The first student admitted at this time was DeWitt Clinton. In the same year, provisions were made, with a view to its ultimately becoming a thoroughly equipped university, for the organiza- tion of faculties of art, divinity, law, and medicine. Meantime the income of the college was about twelve hundred pounds per year, and the duties of president were discharged in turn by the professors. In 1787 William Samuel Johnson, LL.D., son of the first president, was elected to the presidency. From that time to the present, the history of the institution has been one of gradually increasing success. The buildings o1 the college have been removed and increased from time to time as necessity required, endowments have been added, and its various departments made more complete, until, under the able management of F. A. P. Barnard, S.T.D., LL.D., its president since 186i, it has taken rank among the very first of the elder American institutes of learning. The college now has five departments, — a School of Letters and Science; a School of Law, established in 1858; a School of Mining, established in 1861; and a School of Medicine, established in 1767, and re-established in 1860 under the name of the “ College of Physicians and Surgeons.” Each of these departments has won a high reputation for the character and thoroughness of the methods of instruction severally adopted. The warden of the School of Law is Theodore W. Dwight, LL.D., who is recognized as one of the ablest of instructors in his department. The college library, which is choice rather than extensive, contains about eighteen thousand volumes; and the college has choice cabinets and collections, illustrative of geology, chemistry, mechanics, &c. Seven- teen prizes of varying value are oifered for superior excellence in the diilerent departments of study

- Emtoflell Sketch 0! O01. COIL. D. 35.