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JUNE MEETING, 1880.

The stated meeting was held on Thursday, the 10th instant, at 3 o'clock P.M.; the President, Mr. WINTHROP, in the chair.

The Recording Secretary read the record of the previous meeting, and it was approved.

The Librarian read the monthly list of donors to the Library. He called attention to an important work by an associate member, the Rev. Dr. H. M. Dexter, an early copy of whose "Congregationalism as seen in its Literature," was presented just before the meeting.

The Corresponding Secretary read a letter from Dr. Alfred L. Elwyn, of Philadelphia, accepting membership in the Society.

The Cabinet-keeper reported that he had hung several portraits upon the walls of the staircase to the Society's rooms, it having been thought wise to display in this way some of the interesting pictures in our collection. As long as the exigencies of the Society required the Cabinet to be kept in an upper room, it was not to be expected that any large number of persons would visit it. The portraits now exhibited included, among others, those of Vespuccius, Sebastian Cabot, John Endicott, Governor Winthrop, Sir Richard Saltonstall, Edward Winslow, Dudley, Hutchinson, Pownall, Washington, and Lafayette.

The President then announced the death of a Corresponding Member, as follows:

Edmund B. O'Callaghan, M.D., LL.D., was born in Ireland. After studying for two years in Paris he came over to Canada, where he was a member of the Provincial Assembly, and the editor of a newspaper. Having been concerned in the revolutionary movements of 1837, he removed to New York, where he devoted himself to historical pursuits. He published a History of the New Netherlands, in two volumes, in 1846-48, and afterward edited four volumes of the Documentary History of the State in 1849-51, and in 1855-61 eleven volumes of Documents relating to New York Colonial History. His name is also associated with many translations, and reprints of rare historical tracts. He died at about 77 or 78 years of age, having accomplished a large and valuable work for American history.

John C. Ropes, Esq., of Boston, and Paul A. Chadbourne, President of Williams College, were elected Resident Members.

The Society voted to subscribe £20 toward a proposed memorial to Sir Walter Raleigh, whose grave in St. Margaret's, Westminster, is marked only by an insignificant brass. It had been suggested by Canon Farrar that a window in memory of Raleigh would be an appropriate tribute from Americans, in whose history his name occupies so prominent a place. A letter from Canon Farrar was read, and a subscription paper started by American residents in London exhibited. The project excited considerable interest among the members present, and the President was requested to bring the matter to the attention of other historical societies. The subscription paper was committed to the Treasurer for the gifts of individual members.

It was agreed to omit the stated meetings for July and August, authority being reserved, however, to the President and Secretary to call a special meeting at any time during these months, if they deemed one expedient.

Professor EDWARD J. YOUNG presented a paper on the "Subjects for Master's Degree in Harvard College from 1655 to 1791," prefacing it with the following remarks: —

The subjects discussed at Cambridge by candidates for the degree of Master of Arts, in the century and a half preceding our own, seem not to have attracted the attention of those who have described the ceremonies at Commencement, or who have written the history of the College. A single order of exercises, with a parallel English version, reprinted from the American Magazine and Historical Chronicle of 1743, is given in the Appendix to Peirce's History of Harvard University (pp. 111-113); and four similar ones are published, in the original Latin, in Sibley's Biographical Sketches of Harvard Graduates (vol. i. pp. 322, 358, 488, 593). With these exceptions, the pieces referred to have remained undisturbed in the dead language in which they were written, and no one, so far as I am aware, has made a collection, translation, and classification of them. This is not a little surprising, since several of them bear the names of men who have become famous in the history of the country, and since they throw such light on the character and spirit, the thought and temper of their time. It is surely interesting to know what themes engaged the minds of scholars who lived in the days of the Colony and the Province, as

well as of those who were to take part in the Revolutionary struggle, some of whom afterward received the highest honors in the gift of the people. It is likewise important, in an historical point of view, to note what views were adopted at successive periods on political, social, scientific, and other questions, and to mark the progress which has since been. made.

The earliest programme which has been preserved bears the date of 1655, thirty-five years after the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth; and we are carried back by it, and by those that follow, to an age when the Commonwealth was in its infancy, and when topics were discussed before public assemblies which appear almost infantile to us. Then the opinion was entertained that there really was a philosopher's stone, that it was possible to square the circle, and that the planets exerted an influence on terrestrial objects. Though astrology was on the wane, questions relating to divination were still debated, alchemy had not given place to chemistry, and modern science had not yet been born. Men argued whether the earth moved, and whether it was the centre of the universe. In medicine, it was taught that a wound could be cured by dressing the implement that caused it. The Bible, literally interpreted, was the rule of faith in regard to all matters. Theological subjects predominated, because the training of ministers was one of the chief objects for which the College had been founded, dedicated, as it was, "to Christ and the Church." The first settlers were Calvinists, who believed in a church without a bishop, and who subsequently demanded a state without a king; and they were vehemently opposed to the Episcopalians and Roman Catholics on the one hand, and to the Baptists on the other. We smile as we read some of the inquiries that were proposed, and some of the answers that were given. But the speakers merely represented the period in which they lived, and two hundred years hence some of the theories which are now popular may seem equally fantastic, and may afford as much merriment to our descendants as those of our ancestors do to Our forefathers contended for what they deemed vital and essential, and they were animated by a pure and lofty purpose to promote the highest welfare of the people.

us.

We can trace unmistakably, however, in the titles of these essays, a marked progress, bearing witness to a steadily increasing enlightenment as the years went on. A thesis which was defended by one speaker is afterward controverted by another, and a judgment which was maintained in one age is

at a later period reversed. With altered circumstances there came naturally an altered state of opinion on many questions. What appeared reasonable and fit in the "day of small things," was rejected as inadequate or inexpedient when the community had increased in power and wealth. Especially do we see this larger spirit of tolerance and catholicity in the religious questions that were propounded. Even when the doctrine remained unchanged, theological asperities were softened; and, as the war for national independence drew near, men were less disposed to berate each other, since they were all preparing to engage in a contest with the common enemy.

Inasmuch as the views put forth by these disputants on theological and other subjects were extremely conservative, it is remarkable that they held and advocated such advanced sentiments about matters pertaining to political science. In the beginning, they did not doubt that a monarchical form of government was the best; and we know that the leaders of the Revolution did not at the outset contemplate that the Colonies should be entirely independent of, the mother country.* Afterward, however, when abuses increased, men went back to first principles; they inquired into the origin and basis of civil government, the foundation and justification of hereditary royalty, and particularly "the right divine of kings to govern wrong." We gather from these pieces hints as to the difficulties which they encountered, especially those arising from the over-supply of paper money, and we see also the brave and resolute spirit which controlled them and which enabled them finally to surmount all obstacles. The eloquence of these brief texts enables us in a measure to conceive what patriotic appeals were subsequently made by these stirring champions of liberty, and causes us the more deeply to regret that their dissertations have not been preserved

to us.

Among the papers, prepared for these occasions, the titles of which arrest attention, are those relating to the Hebrew language, which even in its punctuation is declared to be of divine origin, and which, it is maintained, will be spoken by the saints in heaven. Since for a long time all undergraduates were compelled to acquire a knowledge of this tongue

* John Adams was in favor at first only of a temporary independence, to be surrendered again by treaty in case safety, liberty, and peace could be obtained upon honorable terms; and he said that about a third of the people were opposed to the Revolution. 5 Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. iv. pp.

350, 506.

so as to be able to read the Old Testament in the original, (which was necessary in order that they might receive their first degree,) and since a Hebrew oration was annually delivered at Commencement even down to the year 1817, it has been a matter of surprise and wonder to those who know how this study is generally regarded, that such a requisition could be enforced, and that such a general interest could be awakened and sustained in this department of learning. It appears, however, from the diaries and written recollections -which may be regarded as partaking of the nature of private confessions of the instructors, that this was far from being to all a fascinating or favorite study. Michael Wigglesworth, who taught in 1653, writes:

--

August 29: "My pupills all came to me ys day to desire yy might ceas learning Hebrew: I wthstood it wth all ye reasō I could, yet all will not satisfy ym thus am I requited for my love; & thus little fruit of all my prayers & tears for y' good.”

August 30: "God appear'd somew' in inclining ye sp of my pupils to ye study of Hebrew as I had pray'd yt god would do."

March 7: "I was much pplexed in mind wth many thoughts to & fro, about leaving ye colledge, one while ready to resolv upō it almost, and quite another way; & I know not wt to do, how to liue here & keep a good cōsciece bec. my hands are bound in point of reforming disorders; my own weakness & pupils froward negligece in ye Hebrew stil much exercise me. yet for all this trouble god hath bin with me in my psonal studys; for this day I began & finished all yt p of my synopsis wch treats about Method."

Sidney Willard, who was Professor from 1807 to 1831, writes to the same effect:

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'My Hebrew classes were small, much as they had been in past times. In translating a Hebrew word, the eyes of a pupil would sometimes wander, and seize upon the wrong Latin word in the margin for its meaning, producing a ludicrous effect. One of the students, a grave youth, who never meant to do anything wrong, acquired the habit of translating the Hebrew word Jehovah into Jupiter.

"I suppose there were and are scholars who might excite some zeal in the study of the Oriental languages; but the general impres sion is, and ever has been, at our University, that the value of such learning does not repay the labor and pains necessary to be undergone in its acquirement. I once asked Professor Stuart whether there were many good Hebrew scholars in his classes, and his reply was emphatically and in substance, Very few."†

*Sibley, Harv. Graduates, vol. i. pp. 265–268.

† Memories of Youth and Manhood, 1855, vol. ii. pp. 201, 202.

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