Nations lately become Literary. 335 



to crown all, being formed of members who, 

 though chiefly from one country, were less equal 

 in station, less homogeneous in character, and less 

 united by common sufferings, it was not to be 

 supposed that they would act with the same har- 

 mony and zeal, in any pursuit which had public 

 good for its object. 



Hence, during a great part of the seventeenth 

 century, the southern colonists paid but little at- 

 tention to literary institutions. Such as wished 

 to give their sons a liberal education, and could 

 afford the expense, sent them to Europe for this 

 purpose, and generally to some of the universities 

 of Great-Britain. This practice, indeed, was con- 

 tinued by many for a long time afterwards; and 

 accordingly it happened that, until near the mid- 

 dle of the eighteenth century, by far the greater 

 proportion of the young men of the Southern 

 States who were liberally educated, had received 

 their education at European seminaries. Those 

 who could not afford to adopt this plan were 

 obliged to content themselves either with such 

 private tuition as they could command, or with 

 the miserable system of instruction pursued in the 

 few small and ill-conducted schools which had 

 been formed. 



Such was the low state of literature in Virginia 

 when the Rev. James Blair, who went to that 

 colony as a missionary about the year 1685, observ- 

 ing the great want of seminaries for the religious 

 and moral, as well as literary instruction of the 

 youth ; and perceiving among other evils the obsta- 

 cles which this presented to the success of his mis- 

 sionary labours, formed the design of erecting and 

 endowing a college at Williamsburgh. For this 

 purpose he not only solicited benefactions from 

 the colonists, but also made a voyage to England 

 in 1693, to obtain the patronage of the govern- 



