Bishop Burnet said of his college mate[1] "he was esteemed the most learned man that ever was in that Sect; he was well versed both in the Oriental tongues, in Philosophy and Mathematics." Dr. Wickersham says "his success was not great" at the school, and his disappointment may have opened the door for his restlessness in the Society.
He was succeeded by his usher, Thomas Makin, who continued in charge for many years. Franklin, in the Pennsylvania Gazette of 29 November, 1733, announces his death by drowning, and speaks of him "as an ancient man, and formerly lived very well in this city, teaching a considerable school." His Descriptio Pennsylvaniæ, anno 1729, Proud gives us and also favors us with an English version. He refers to the Publick School thus:
Hic in gymnafiis linguæ docentur & artes
Ingenuæ; multis doctor & ipse fui.
Una Schola hic alias etiam superemivet omnes
Romano & Græco quæ docet ore loqui.
The charter of 1701 placed the management of this school in the Monthly Meeting. That of 1708 took this from the Meeting and gave it to "fifteen discreet and religious persons of the people called Quakers" as a Board of Overseers. James Logan and Issac Norris were overseers when becoming Trustees of the College and Academy, but their acceptance of this trust in 1749 was deemed by the Friends inconsistent with their duties as Overseers of the Publick School. The opening of the new College and Academy by a form of divine service and a set sermon probably disqualified Friends from serving in its behalf, or at least made their presence in its counsels not in accord with the Society's testimony. James Logan attended for the only time a meeting of the Trustees of the Academy on 26 December, 1749. He had been from the outset an Overseer of the Publick School, the minutes of which show him to have been
- ↑ "One George Keith, a Scotchman with whom I had my first education at Aberdeen; he had been thirty six years among them; * * * after he had been about thirty years in high esteem among them he was sent to Pensilvania (a colony set up by Pen where they are very numerous) to have the chief direction of the education of their youth." History of My Own Times, ii. 248, 9.
