Page:The History of the University of Pennsylvania, Wood.djvu/60

54 in the board were evident, as well in the uncertain and fluctuating measures which were adopted, as in the condition of the financial concerns, which even the liberal grant of the legislature did not preserve from embarrassment. With the teachers, the unsettled state of their accounts was a frequent source of complaint; and the numerous changes which took place among them, owing probably to this as much as to any other cause, were calculated very materially to injure the reputation of the school. Besides the want of proper energy in the management of the university, another impediment to its prosperity existed in the unfriendly feelings with which it was regarded by many respectable citizens. Attached to the old school and its officers, and considering the new as having been founded in usurpation, they were disposed both from inclination and principle to prefer some distant seminary for the education of their children; thus not only withdrawing their immediate support from the university, but arraying against it the influence of their example with their fellow-citizens, and the force of new attachments among those who were hereafter to become active members of society. To this period we may perhaps trace the origin of those partialities which have directed away from our highest literary institution so much of the public patronage, and at this moment are operating to the disadvantage and dishonour of the city.