the College without leave, after they are dismissed from their stated exercises with their Tutors, by which means they have lost the benefit of the instructions of the Professor of Divinity, and those also of the Professor of Natural Philosophy and the Mathematicks, which (by the sixth law in the third chapter of College Laws) they are obliged to attend till the twentieth day of June, therefore voted, That if any Senior Sophister shall, from the tenth day of March to the twentieth day of June, presume to go out of town, without leave from the President or, in his absence, from one of the Professors, he shall be punished, not exceeding five shillings, at the discretion of the President or one of the Professors. And in case any such Senior Sophister shall continue his absence beyond the time he had leave for, he shall be punished by the President and Professors, according to the law made and provided in such cases for all Undergraduates, viz. law second, in chapter fourth of the College Laws. Furthermore, in case any Senior Sophister, who shall have presumed to go out of town without leave, shall continue his absence, he shall be punished, not exceeding six pence per day, four shillings per week, and twenty shillings per month. And if his absence shall exceed two months, he shall be denied his degree that year. Provided nevertheless, that the President and Professors shall have power to abate, at their discretion, all or any part of the punishments above provided, according to the satisfaction such Senior Sophister shall give to them concerning his absence. And it is further ordered and directed, that the Senior Sophisters shall be continued in the monitor's bill, till the aforesaid twentieth day of June.

22. Whereas scholars may be guilty of disorders or misdemeanors, against which no provision is made by the foregoing laws, in all such cases the President with the Tutors shall inflict such punishment as they think proper, according to the nature and degree of the offence. And, in all punishments below expulsion, more than one may be inflicted for the same crime, according to the aggravation of it.

[At the end of each Student's copy of the College Laws, it was the usage to add the official certificate of his admission into the University. The following is the certificate granted to the late Dr. Holyoke, whose copy of the laws has been here followed.]

EDVARDUS HOLYOKE admi'tatur in Collegium Harvardinum, EDVARD. HOLYOKE, Præses.

Cantabr. 15to Calend.

Septembris, 1742.

Henricus Flynt,

Belcher Hancock, › Socii.
Josephus Mayhew,

(No. XXI. p. 211.)

Professor Wigglesworth's Reply to Whitefield's Charges against the College.

And this brings us to your "reproachful reflections upon

the Society which is immediately under our care."

The reflections

Dis

are these, as you rehearse them, p. 12. "As far as I could gather from some who well knew the state of it [the College] not far superior to our Universities, in piety and true godliness. — Tutors neglect to pray with and examine the heart of their pupils.. cipline is at too low an ebb:- Bad books are become fashionable among them. - Tillotson and Clark are read, instead of Shepherd, Stoddard, and such like Evangelical writers."

You say, first, that " as far as you could gather from some, who knew the state of the College well, it is not far superior to our Universities in piety and true godliness.' To know what you mean by this, we must look to the character you give of the Universities in England. Now this we have in your Journal at Williamsburgh, p. 109, where speaking of the College at that place, you say, "It may be of excellent use, if learning Christ be made the foundation of their study, and other arts and sciences only introduced and pursued as subservient to that. For want of this, most of our English Schools and Universities are sunk into meer Seminaries of Paganism. Christ or Christianity is scarce so much as named among them." As for this your character of the Universities in England, we only say, that you have taught us to believe you with discretion, by telling the world, that our state, with respect to "piety and true godliness, is not far superior to this." - Concerning our own Academy, we say, we are far from boasting of its piety and true godliness. We are heartily sorry, that there is not much more of these to be found among the youth under your care, than there is. And yet we may with great truth, and without any immodesty, affirm, that the knowledge of the only true God, and of Jesus Christ whom he hath sent, is earnestly recommended to the Students as that, in comparison whereof they ought to account all other things but loss and dung..

You go on and say, "Tutors neglect to pray with their pupils." To which we answer, that this is either not true, or not any just

matter of reproach, as you would have it thought to be. If you intended, by this account of us, to make the world believe, that social worship of God is not maintained in the College, that Tutors and pupils don't attend upon the public reading of the holy Scriptures, and join together in solemn prayers, morning and evening, you have represented us as sunk into something as bad, or worse, than mere Paganism. But then this representation is so vile a slander, that we can hardly believe, that, in the six days you gave yourself to be acquainted with credible persons, and take their information, you met with a single man, who was false and bold enough to give you such an account of us.

If you say, that this was not your meaning, that you intended no more than to let the world know, that besides those prayers which Tutors and Pupils conjunctly offer up to God morning and evening, each Tutor don't take his own pupils into his chamber and pray with them again; how does this prove what you seemed to have designed it for, viz. that our Society is "not far superior to such as are sunk into mere Seminaries of Paganism," as you say the Universities in England are? What law of Christ hath made this an ordinary duty of Tutors, that you should think the neglect of it such a reproach, that the world ought to hear it? If some credible person should tell you concerning any professed Christian householder, that besides worshipping God morning and evening with his whole family, he did not divide it into three or four parts, and pray with each of them again by themselves, would you think this such an heinous neglect, that all the British dominions ought to ring of it? And would you think that you represented the conduct of such an householder in a Christian manner, if you should print it in your Journal, that he neglected to pray with his children, only because he never shut out the rest of his family, when he pray'd with them? If you say, that the case of the Tutors differs from that of an householder, because it is not a Tutor, but the President, who is ordinarily the mouth of the College in their address to God; we answer, that this makes the difference not great; forasmuch as if the Tutors have any thing upon their hearts, which they desire their pupils should hear them offer up to God for them, they have frequent opportunities to present these desires of their souls to God in the hearing of their pupils, by the necessary absence of the President, upon one account or other, from morning or evening prayers; upon which occasions the Tutors supply his place by turns.

Your next reflection upon our College, is, that "Tutors don't examine the hearts of their pupils." What you intend by this, we are much at a loss to conceive. Indeed we are very sensible, that it is a great duty, which nearly concerns us all, to examine our own hearts with the utmost diligence and care. But that it is our duty ordinarily to examine the hearts of others, is not so clear. The Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, hath said, Rev. ii. 23, All the Churches shall know, that I am He who searches the reins and heart. Would you have Tutors invade his prerogative, and make the churches know that others beside the Son of God, may, and ought to undertake this scrutiny? Or, do you intend the expression in a Popish sense, and mean, that our Tutors neglect to bring their pupils before them to secret confession, as the Romish priests do by their people? If this be your meaning, speak out, Sir, and tell us plainly, that you think the Popish practice of auricular confession ought to be introduced in the College, that it may with more speed and ease be propagated through the country. Whenever you tell us in plain terms, we shall be at no loss for an answer. If you reply, that you meant nothing of all this, but only intended that the souls of the pupils are not taken care of, by those who have the government and instruction of them, that "Christ, or Christianity, is scarce so much as named among them," which you say is the case of the Universities in England; and that the counsels and warnings of God are not set before them; we answer, that if this, and not something much worse, be what you meant by saying, "Tutors neglect to examine the hearts of their pupils," it is a very injurious and false representation. And you might easily have known it to be so, upon much less than six days' enquiry, if your ears had not been more open to evil reports, than to good ones. Is not every exposition of the President, and every lecture of the Divinity Professor, an address to the Students upon the important points of our holy religion? Are not these all in some measure profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, or for instruction in righteousness? And is it not a distinguishing advantage to the youth of the College, which both they and their friends ought to be very thankful to God for, that they have the benefit of these four times a week, beside what they enjoy in common with other Christians, viz. The exercises of the Lord's Day, and Lectures on other days out of the College? And as for the Tutors, whom you particularly charge with neglect, if you mean, that they are generally so grossly negligent of their duty, with regard to taking proper opportunities

to talk seriously and closely with the pupils about their spiritual concerns, as does in any measure justify your reflections, they deny the charge and insist upon it, that it is a slander. And, others of us can with truth assure you and the world, that besides discharging the more public duties of our stations, we have not been wanting to reprove, rebuke, exhort, or encourage and direct more privately, whenever we have had reason to think, that the case of any particular person has called for it.

You tell us next, "that Discipline is at too low an ebb.". This is a reproach which we had little reason to expect at the time when you published it. We had not long before dropped one of our Tutors out of his place, for very corrupt and dangerous principles as soon as they came to be certainly known. And we had kept him out till he had given grounds for charity to hope, that he was come to a sounder mind. We had also expelled a Professor for immoral and scandalous practices. And can it be supposed, that a government, which upon just occasions, would not spare its own Officers, would at the same time wink at the faults of children? We have since, for immorality, expelled another Tutor, who was also a Fellow of the House. And these acts of Discipline, we believe, will convince others, whatever you may think of them, that Discipline neither was, nor is at so low an ebb, as to deserve that we should be reproached publicly with the want of it. - But you say, "Bad books are become fashionable among them; Tillotson and Clarke are read, instead of Shepherd, Stoddard, and such like Evangelical writers." We make no doubt but that bad books were, and are, and always will be, too often read in a society of such numbers, where many are supplied with money enough by their parents to purchase a bad book, if their inclinations lead them to it. But the question is, whether bad books were then read with the approbation or knowledge of the Governors of the House? Now the surest way to find this, is to examine what books were then borrowed by the scholars out of the public Library; for other books they may easily conceal, if they please, from their Tutors. Now upon a particular enquiry into the Library records on this occasion, as the world hath been informed by our worthy friend Col. Brattle, in the Boston Gazette, June 22, 1741, it was found, with respect to the books which you call bad ones, that "from the 28th Nov. 1732, to that very day (for almost nine years) Tillotson had not been so much as once taken out of the Library by any Undergraduate ; nor any of Dr. Clarke's works for above two years; whereas Owen,