Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/222

208 learners of Latin and Greek filled the college with children. This rendered it diſagreeable and degrading to young gentlemen already prepared for entering on the ſciences, they were diſcouraged from reſorting to it, and thus the ſchools for mathematics and moral philoſophy, which might have been of ſome ſervice, became of very little. The revenues too were exhauſted in accommodating thoſe who came only to acquire the rudiments of ſcience. After the preſent revolution, the viſitors, having no power to change thoſe circumſtances in the conſtitution of the college which were fixed by the charter, and being therefore confined in the number of profeſſorſhips, undertook to change the objects of the profeſſorſhips. They excluded the two ſchools for divinity, and that for the Greek and Latin languages, and ſubſtituted others; ſo that at preſent they ſtand thus:

A Profeſſorſhip for Law and Police;

&emsp;Anatomy and Medicine:

&emsp;Natural Philoſophy and Mathematics:

&emsp;Moral Philoſophy, the law of Nature and Nations, the fine Arts:

&emsp;Modern Languages:

&emsp;For the Brafferton.

And it is propoſed, ſo ſoon as the legiſlature shall have leiſure to take up this ſubject, to deſire authority from them to increaſe the number of profeſſorſhips, as well for the purpoſe of ſubdividing thoſe already inſtituted, as of adding others for other branches of ſcience. To the profeſſorſhips uſually eſtabliſhed in the univerſities of Europe, it would ſeem proper to add one for the ancient languages and literature of the North, on account of their connection with our own language