Page:The History of the University of Pennsylvania, Wood.djvu/12

6 events, falls back, for the first generation, towards a state of ignorance, instead of advancing in knowledge and civilization. This remark applies, to a certain extent, to the early period of our own history. Though a few individuals, born and educated in the colonies, were elevated into distinction by the force of native talent, yet the great majority of those who were remarkable for literary attainments, had either emigrated from the mother country, or had received their education in her schools.

The first colonists of Pennsylvania, were, perhaps, less negligent in providing the means of elementary instruction, than those of most of the other settlements. In the year 1689, only seven years after the foundation of Philadelphia, a public school was established in this city, by members of the Society of Friends, which was incorporated in 1697, and after undergoing various changes in its organization, received, in 1711, a final charter from William Penn. Fifteen "discreet and religious persons, of the people called Quakers," were constituted a Board of Overseers, and were vested with all the property and privileges of the corporation, together with the right of supplying vacancies in their own numbers. George Keith, a native of Aberdeen, a man of learning, and famous in the history of the Friends, was the first teacher employed. In the school were taught the Latin language; the Mathematics, and the rudiments of an English education. Though Supported by funds derived from the Society of Friends, and under the exclusive direction of members of that society, it was open indiscriminately to individuals of all religious denominations; and for more than sixty years, continued to be the only public place of instruction in the province,

But, before the end of this period, the school had become entirely inadequate to the demand of a rapidly increasing