Page:The History of the University of Pennsylvania, Wood.djvu/94

88 in lowering the general standard of character and attainment in the school, and bringing down its reputation to that inferior level upon which it stood for many years.

The resignation of Dr. Rogers gave the trustees an opportunity of abolishing the professorship of English and the belles-letters; and the English school, which, from the foundation of the institution had constituted a part of it, was shortly afterwards dissolved. Under the name of the academy, a grammar school was retained, in which were taught the various inferior branches of learning, necessary as a preparation for entering upon a collegiate course. Over this school was placed one or more teachers, without the title of professor, without any authority in the general management of the institution, and subject to the superintendence and control of the collegiate faculty. The charity schools, which constituted a third division of the department of arts, were also placed under the care of the faculty; so that the college, while in itself independent, was enabled to exercise over the inferior branches a degree of authority, sufficient to preserve them in accordance with its own interests, and to give the character of a regular system to all the operations of the seminary.

Such were the first steps in the path of improvement Further advances were gradually made, as the way became clearer, and experience began to demonstrate the safety if not expediency of the course pursued. To raise the character of the college, higher qualifications for admittance were made requisite; and among these qualifications, a suitable age was considered essential. Formerly, boys had not unfrequently been permitted to pass through and receive the honours of the institution, whose immaturity of years was, of itself a sufficient evidence of their unfitness for these honours; and men who beheld these unfledged alumni, could not but doubt the judgment and prudence of that alma mater, who