MEMORIAL 
? < T* > * ■ 
3^1 " 
■ -S ' ' ; ■■ ■ ■ 
OF THE 
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND^ 
AND THE 
TRUSTEES OF BALTIMORE COLLEGE, 
TO THE 
LEGISLATURE OF MARYLAND. 
BALTIMORE: 
JOHN D. TOY, PRINTER, 
Corner of Market and St. Paul streets. 
1830. MEMORIAL. 
To the Honorable the General Assembly of 
Maryland: 
The Joint Memorial of the Trustees of the University of 
Maryland, and the Trustees of Baltimore College. 
Your Memorialists, reverting to the various legislative 
acts by which the State of Maryland has manifested 
her concern to foster the great interests of Education 
within her limits, approach her legislature with the 
purpose of drawing its attention once more to this sub- 
ject, with a confidence inspired by a review of its past 
measures, and with the expectation that what remains 
to be done, in order to attain all the objects originally 
proposed, will be done with cheerfulness and effect. 
Among the liberal provisions of the state to this end, 
was the establishment and endowment of the Universi- 
ty of Maryland in its principal city. This measure, 
and the liberal pecuniary appropriations which follow- 
ed it from the hands of the State, have resulted in a 
Medical and a Law school, both in practical operation, 
and both destined, it is hoped, to fulfil, in the diffusion 
of their appropriate science, the liberal views of the 
legislature. Large and commodious edifices have been 
erected; philosophical apparatus provided; and various 
other accommodations gradually accumulated, in fur- 
therance of the design of establishing a University, in 
the true and enlarged sense of that term. 
As was natural, and as might have been expected 
from the condition and necessities of the population of 
a young country, the first success of these efforts has 
been manifested in the departments of Medicine and 4 
Law, the most necessary, and of the most obvious prac- 
tical utility. In this particular, the progress of Univer- 
sity Education in this State would seem to justify the 
preponderance given in the universities of the older 
Continent, those at least of more ancient date, to stu- 
dies connected with the three great scientific professions 
of Divinity, Medicine and Law. But, of late, newr 
views have been taken, both at home and abroad, of the 
subject of university education; and either new institu- 
tions have been founded, or old ones remodelled, con- 
formably to these views; views founded themselves 
on the altered condition both of society and science. 
This interesting topic will be returned to hereafter; 
it is only adverted to, at this time, as affording an op- 
portunity to remark, that the constitution of the Uni- 
versity of Maryland coincides with the spirit of these 
improvements, and its organization may be expanded, 
as need may be, in conformity with these more enlarg- 
ed views of education. Nevertheless, the Faculty of 
Arts and Sciences in the University, a department em- 
bracing within its scope the great body of modern 
science, as well as those liberal studies in mathematics, 
in the languages, in letters, and in morals, which are 
universally deemed the basis and the portal of all other 
education,-has remained unorganized until recently, 
when the attention of the Trustees has been drawn by 
various circumstances, which will be detailed presently, 
to the high importance of giving body and shape to 
this principal feature in the design of a State Universi- 
ty, and which was undoubtedly, also, a principal aim of 
the legislature when it established and endowed it. 
In the prosecution of this object, the Trustees proceed- 
ed to fill such chairs of the Faculty in question, as had 
either remained unfilled, or had been vacated by various 
accidents. These chairs, as at present constituted, are 
the following: of Ancient Languages, of History, of Po- 5 
litical Economy, of Natural Philosophy, of Mineralogy 
and Geology, of Natural History, of Rhetoric and Belles- 
Lettres, of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, of Botany, 
of Mathematics, and of Chemistry applied to the Arts. 
These professorships embrace, as was remarked, a large 
range of studies, both important to education in general, 
and necessarily preliminary to a successful subsequent 
pursuit of such as are more immediately professional. 
It was obvious, however, to the Trustees, that in order 
to render the course of lectures contemplated by these 
various chairs duly profitable to students, a previous 
course of elementary instruction would be requir- 
ed. They contemplated, therefore, the organization of 
a Collegiate Department, immediately dependent on the 
University, in which students might receive such ele- 
mentary instruction, attending at the same time the lec- 
tures of the various chairs of the Faculty of Arts and 
Sciences, accordingly as they advanced from class to 
class in the collegiate course. Passing afterwards to 
the studies connected with the Law or the Medical De- 
partment, the student might thus be enabled to complete 
his entire education in the bosom of a state institution, 
instead of going for that purpose, as the habit is, to uni- 
versities or colleges remote from home. 
Many years ago, the state had founded and endowed 
a collegiate institution in the City of Baltimore, under 
the name of "Baltimore College." This seminary has 
subsisted ever since, and many of the youth of the city 
have been educated in it. It was empowered also to 
grant the usual degrees, and it was hoped that it would, 
together with the other valuable seminaries of education 
in the same city and in the state, become adequate to 
the wants and wishes of our citizens in this particular. 
The celebrity, and, in some cases, the superior existing 
advantages of other institutions, have hitherto prevented 
the accomplishment of this object. It has been suggest- 6 
ed, however, that a union of this institution with the 
University of Maryland, might be advantageous to both: 
to the University, by furnishing the necessary collegiate 
department, under its immediate supervision and con- 
trol; to the College, from enlarging its sphere of instruc- 
tion by this assumption of it into the University, at which, 
as before remarked, its pupils might attend while in 
their collegiate course, and to which they might finally 
be transferred when that preliminary course was com- 
pleted. The Trustees of the respective institutions, after 
considering this subject with much attention, are inclin- 
ed to view it in the same light; and the measure now 
only awaits the decision of your honorable body, in order 
to be carried into effect. 
It is proposed, with the consent of the legislature, 
that the charter of Baltimore College shall be surrender- 
ed to the state, on condition that the property belonging 
to the College shall be invested in the Trustees of the 
University of Maryland with a special provision that the 
amount thereof in value shall for ever hereafter be care- 
fully appropriated by them to the support and accommo- 
dation of the collegiate and academical departments of 
the university; that is, that the property itself, or the 
proceeds of the property, (should it be deemed advise- 
able to dispose of it,) shall be exclusively applied to the 
accommodation and benefit of those students of the uni- 
versity who are pursuing the appropriate elementary and 
classical studies pointed out in the collegiate or academi- 
cal course connected with the organization of the Faculty 
of Arts and Sciences. Such a surrender contemplates, 
of course, the assumption by the trustees of the Univer- 
sity of Maryland of all the present responsibilities for 
debt of the trustees of Baltimore College; and the Uni- 
versity will be required, by the terms of the surrender, 
to take in charge the interests of education as fully as 
the same devolve on the trustees of Baltimore College. 7 
It is believed that all the ends will, by this measure, be 
answered to the community, which were proposed in the 
grant of the charter of Baltimore College; that, indeed, 
they will be much more effectually answered, by means 
of the more liberal patronage that may be expected in 
consequence of this extension of its original scheme of 
instruction. The Collegiate Department, thus organized, 
went into operation on the 3d of January instant. 
Your Memorialists entertain the hopeful expectation 
that the organization of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, 
connected with the arrangement just detailed, will thus 
accomplish a principal object contemplated by the State 
of Maryland in the foundation of the University bearing 
its name. They conceive it of high importance, that a 
state which has not been behind the other members of 
the Union in promoting the great cause of education, 
by the erection and endowment of elementary free 
schools, of academies, and of colleges, should also con- 
tain within its bosom a university so constituted and 
endowed as to furnish to its youth the means of education 
in the whole circle of letters and science, in at least 
the same degree as other institutions in sister states. The 
course of studies contemplated in the Faculty of Arts and 
Sciences will embrace those topics of education which 
are not usually comprehended in collegiate courses, 
at least not in so extended and ample a degree, and 
which are essential nevertheless to complete that ele- 
mentary and general education which ought to be con- 
sidered preliminary to that which is strictly profes- 
sional. The College and the University thus allied, 
will furnish many mutual aids, as will be seen when the 
course of instruction which it is designed to adopt, shall 
be considered more in detail. It may also be anticipa- 
ted as a natural result of thus perfecting the scheme of 
education within the state, that very beneficial effects 
will be produced on the humbler, though not less neces- 8 
sary parts of the system; and that a new vigor will be 
imparted to that class of seminaries which the endow- 
ments of the state have already put into partial, and only 
partial, operation. 
Your Memorialists would draw the attention of your 
body for a moment to the measures which have been 
taken in the useful design of diffusing education in 
Maryland; both to demonstrate the importance which 
was attached to it in the view of preceding legislatures, 
and to indicate the nature and extent of the plan which 
seems to have been conceived necessary in order to at- 
tain the object in the most enlarged and effectual way. 
By a supplement passed at the December session, 
1813, ch. 122, to the act of November session, 1812, ch. 
79, it was enacted, that, after the 1st of January, 1815, 
each incorporated bank of the state should annually 
pay to the Treasurer of the Western Shore the sum of 
twenty cents on every hundred dollars of capital stock, 
and that the sums so received should be invested in 
stock of the Commercial and Farmers' Bank of Balti- 
more, and the Mechanics' Bank of Baltimore, together 
with the dividends arising from such stock, the same to 
constitute a fund for the establishment of Free Schools, 
which, with its accumulations, was inviolably pledged 
for that purpose, to be equally divided among the seve- 
ral counties of the state. 
To this fund the legislature has since added the 
money returned by the United States' government to 
this state on account of interest on disbursements made 
during the late war; and the sum of $65,000, part 
thereof, has been invested in stock or placed at interest. 
The income derived from the aforesaid tax and fund is 
stated in the report made at December session, 1829, 
to the House of Delegates by its Committee of Claims, 
to have been $27,361 for that year; and the payments 
and appropriations made from the ordinary receipts of 9 
the state, for donations to colleges, academies and 
schools, are in the same report stated to be $15,150, 
which, with $24,101, part of the income derived from 
the above mentioned tax and school fund, make an ag- 
gregate sum of $39,251 disbursed by the state to col- 
leges, academies and schools during that year. More 
than the interest on a capital of $650,000 is thus be- 
stowed by the state on the important object of education, 
so far as it depends on the free and other elementary 
schools, academies and colleges. In this brief review, not 
intended to be precise, but only to exhibit the spirit and 
views of our state government in regard to education, it 
is unnecessary to do more than mention the endowment 
also of St. John's and Washington Colleges, in Annapo- 
lis and Chestertown, institutions well known, and where 
much of the talent of the state has been fostered and de- 
veloped. The benefactions of the state have been on a cor- 
responding scale of liberality to the University of Mary- 
land. 
In 1807 a lottery was granted to raise the sum of 
$40,000, with which the medical buildings were com- 
menced. and prosecuted till 1812, when, on the acces- 
sion of the other faculties, a further privilege was granted 
for raising $ 100,000. Moneys were successively raised 
on these grants, till a sum amounting to $77,000 had 
been raised, which, with $30,000 advanced by the state, 
and further sums borrowed and disbursed by the medical 
professors, forms an aggregate amount of more than 
$117,000 that has been applied to the purchase of 
ground, and the erection of the medical and infirmary 
buildings, and to provide a library, museum, apparatus 
and furniture therefor;-which sum has been applied 
to these objects in the following proportions: 
For the lot on which the medical buildings 
stand, with the enclosure thereof, . . $15,600 
For the said buildings, . . . 65,000 10 
For the chemical apparatus, . . . 8,300 
For the medical library, &c. . . 2,600 
For the anatomical museum, . . . 8,000 
99,500 
For the Infirmary building, . $15,000 
For the furniture thereof, . . 2,500 
17,500 
$117,000 
Until 1823, however, none of the other faculties con- 
templated by the act of 1812 were brought into actual 
operation. In that year the Law Professor commenced 
his lectures, and has continued them ever since; but 
no appropriation was obtained for him until 1826, the 
period when trustees were substituted for the regents 
in the government of the University, and when the le- 
gislature undertook to direct the application of the 
balance of the sum of $140,000, for raising which a 
privilege had been granted as above mentioned. At that 
time $14,000 were appropriated to the uses of the law 
chair, as one of the chairs in actual operation, being a 
share proportional to the sums which had been expended. 
Of this sum, $5,000 have been paid to the professor for 
his law library, which is now the property of the Uni- 
versity," and the balance has been invested by the trus- 
tees for the purpose of hereafter erecting the necessary 
buildings for this department. In the mean time, the 
trustees pay annually $400 for the rent of a building suit- 
able to the purposes of the law chair. The further sum 
of $7,000 has been raised with the view of paying to the 
medical faculty certain disbursements made by them for 
the Infirmary, and thus completely vesting the title in the 
trustees. By the same act, an appropriation of $6,500 
was made to the chemical chair, and 2,500 were placed 
by the trustees at the disposal of the professor of that 11 
chair, that he might proceed to Europe, and there en- 
large the apparatus of chemistry and natural philosophy. 
This apparatus is now complete. It will be observed 
that of the whole of this fund, only $2,000 have been 
specially applied to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences; 
and it is needless to remark to your honourable body, 
that of a department of so wide a range, embracing no- 
thing less that a complete system of general science and 
letters, such a sum is scarcely adequate to fix the first 
foundations, with any reasonable hope of ultimate success. 
Such considerable funds having thus been expended 
on the faculties of medicine and law heretofore in ope- 
ration in the University, and accommodations provided 
in buildings and otherwise, (augmented by the junction 
of Baltimore College,) which will subserve the con- 
venience of other faculties, as well as those of law and 
medicine, it is submitted to the wisdom of the legisla- 
ture to lend its aid in such manner as may seem expe- 
dient, to complete the whole scheme of the University, 
and thus establish in the most populous and central 
city of the state a seminary of general, as well as pro- 
fessional learning/attractive, from the extensiveness of 
its course of instruction, both to the youth of the state, 
itself, and of other parts of the union. The design, 
if successful, would conduce to the prosperity of the 
institutionary seminaries of education on the one hand, 
and of the professional schools on the other. A variety 
of important considerations combine to recommend this 
subject to the serious attention of the legislature. 
The topic of education has of late attracted great 
interest both at home and abroad, among all classes of 
society, and from some of the best talents and wisdom 
of the age. It presents itself in two aspects, both high- 
ly important; its general diffusion, and its accommoda- 
tion to the altered condition both of science itself and 
of society. At no remote period, learning, like pro- 12 
perty, was in a few hands, and inaccessible to the great 
body of the people, from the conjoined causes of their 
own depressed condition, and of the restricted circula- 
tion of the vehicles of thought. A happy revolution 
in the state of society has elevated the general condition 
of the labouring class; the middle ranks have grown up 
into opulence and consideration. In the mean while, 
the boundaries of knowledge have been extended; new 
sciences have been created; the physical ones especial- 
ly, which have contributed so largely to the improve- 
ment of the useful arts, form a body of knowledge 
peculiarly appropriate to the large class engaged in the 
occupations connected with these. The extension of 
commerce has originated a new science embracing its 
principles, and has added to the study of modern lan- 
guages a practical value independent of that which 
they possess as repositories of their respective literature. 
The ancient universities and elementary schools of 
Europe, founded before these accessions were made to 
the stock of human knowledge, failed to answer, in 
many instances, from their organization, the new de- 
mands thus created in the department of education. 
The first improvements were made in the continental 
institutions, in those of France first, which were imi- 
tated by those of Germany. Scotland is entitled to the 
next praise on this point. The principle of these im- 
provements was, to modify and extend the course of 
education conformably with the additions and the im- 
provements which had been made in science, and with 
the requisitions of the large class of students other than 
those intended for the three learned professions of di- 
vinity, medicine and law, to which the aims of these 
institutions had originally been chiefly, almost wholly 
confined. The English universities, as likewise the 
great schools of that country, have lagged much in the 
rear of these innovations; and a comparison of their 13 
course of instruction with that pursued on the conti- 
nent,-for example, in the Polytechnic school at Paris, 
(whose name denotes its design and plan,) and in the 
German universities,-would best exhibit the nature of 
the improvements which have been alluded to above. 
While the course of education in the great schools of 
England is confined to the mere acquisition of Latin 
and Greek, to which the course of instruction in the 
universities themselves (the public course at least,) 
adds only more Latin, with some mathematics; that of 
the schools, the colleges, and the universities of France 
and Germany embraces all the various branches of the 
moral, mathematical, and physical sciences, as these 
have been extended or improved by modern research 
and discovery. 
The complaints which are urged against the system of 
the English universities may serve to show what, in the 
opinion of the objectors, who number among them some 
of the highest names for intelligence in England, should 
form the features of a system really adapted to the 
wants of modern society, and to the expansion of mo- 
dern science. Without descending to details unneces- 
sary to our purpose, it may be remarked that, in the 
first place, their organization excludes from any parti- 
cipation in their benefits, (such as they are,) not only 
the class of artisans and merchants, but even the larger 
proportion of all the middling classes. Little of the 
knowledge requisite to the practical purposes of life, of 
those sciences which have been created or greatly en- 
larged in the present age, nay, even of polite letters and 
the liberal arts, is comprehended in their public course 
of instruction. It is an extraordinary fact, too, that of 
the three learned professions, they offer adequate in- 
ducements to the students of divinity alone. Those of 
medicine and law resort to London or elsewhere. In 
this respect they are singularly contrasted with the 14 
continental seminaries of learning. These defects in 
the two great universities have conduced to the erec- 
tion of other institutions; of Mechanics' Institutes, for 
example, and of lectures, intended to instruct the arti- 
san in the philosophy of his art. They led likewise to 
the scheme of the new London University, where both 
general education might be conducted on a plan more 
enlarged and practical, adapted also to such as are not 
designed for the learned professions; and where the 
students of these last, the law and medical at least, might 
pursue the studies which, oddly enough, flourish neither 
at Oxford nor Cambridge. 
The same wants in that part of our own population 
which is not destined to a learned profession, have sug- 
gested some alterations of a like character in the col- 
leges of our own country. This was one of the topics 
agitated at the Literary Convention held lately in New 
York. The same cause has given rise to our Mechan- 
ics' Institutes, to Lyceums, and other establishments for 
instruction. Here, as in Europe, the principle aimed 
at by the alterations projected, is to afford to youth that 
course of instruction which may best prepare them for 
their peculiar occupation; to the mechanic, for instance, 
some knowledge of those elements of mechanical science 
which may make him an intelligent workman; to the 
agriculturist, an acquaintance with those discoveries in 
chemistry which bear upon agriculture; to the mer- 
chant, a familiarity with those great principles which 
regulate the commerce of the world, and with the lan- 
guages of the foreign nations with whom his traffic 
may lead him to some intercourse. It seems better, on 
the ground of expense, to modify the course of in- 
struction in our colleges conformably with these objects, 
than to erect another and independent class of semina- 
ries, such as the mechanics' institutes, lyceums and 
lectures. We may thus attain, in some instances, the 15 
ends of these valuable institutions; in others, we may 
promote their aims, and lend them valuable aids. 
It is apparent from this hasty view of a subject whose 
details would lead us into too great length, that univer- 
sity education, according to the enlarged modern un- 
derstanding of it, should embrace the following requi- 
sites. It should afford, in an academic and collegiate 
course, the means of that general education, classical, 
literary and scientific, which is preparatory alike for 
all professions; next, such instruction as a particular 
occupation, though in none of the learned professions, 
may require or recommend; and, lastly, such an insti- 
tutionary course, and such other facilities, as are de- 
manded for the pursuit of the learned professions. At 
present, these several objects are attained in this coun- 
try in distinct institutions. The classics, with the other 
elements of education, are taught in the ordinary schools 
and academies, from which the student is transferred 
to the colleges, to complete his acquaintance with the 
classics, and to learn the higher branches of mathemat- 
ics, and some parts of the physical sciences. For law, 
medicine and divinity he resorts again to other schools. 
For such instruction as is appropriate to professions not 
learned, which embraces very interesting portions of 
physical science, he must depend on private study, on 
the lectureships established by individuals in some of 
our towns, and on the lyceums and mechanics' institutes 
which are found in others. 
In the city of Baltimore, where a large portion of a 
rapidly increasing population is destined for mechanical 
or mercantile pursuits, the demand for the latter of 
these three sorts of education has originated a very 
useful institution, the Mechanics' Institute of that city. 
Some courses of appropriate popular lectures have been 
delivered in it by gentlemen since appointed to chairs 
in the lately organized Faculty of Arts and Sciences in 16 
the University of Maryland. These lectures have been 
resumed the present winter, and are numerously at- 
tended by the class of persons for whose use they are 
particularly designed. This is one instance among 
many of a demand in an important class of our popula- 
tion, for a kind of instruction either not furnished it by 
the ordinary seminaries, or else not conveniently acces- 
sible to it. There is no doubt that there are many 
others who would seek this channel of instruction, es- 
pecially if these lectures were multiplied so as to em- 
brace other topics, whether of science or literature, of 
popular interest and usefulness. By opening to this 
valuable institution cheap access to the lectures of the 
University, in which the Faculties of Law and Medi- 
cine are already in operation, and to which, with the 
consent of the legislature, it is proposed to unite Bal- 
timore College, as a Collegiate Department, under the 
control and supervision of the University Faculty of 
Arts and Sciences; a course of education comparatively 
enlarged and complete, embracing at least all the 
branches, both general and professional, now pursued 
at various, and often distant institutions, and adapting 
itself, from its intended plan, to the wants of particular 
classes, might, as has already been remarked, be found 
within the limits of a single university, in the midst of 
a populous city, which of some branches of profession- 
al science, the medical certainly, appears to be the 
proper, and almost the only home. 
Many reasons unite to make this object desirable. 
It is important to the large population already collected 
and constantly augmenting, and likely hereafter to be 
still more rapidly augmented, in the third city of the 
union, which comprehends also perhaps a sixth part of 
the whole population of the state. It is not illiberal, 
withal, to wish that our own youth might be provided 
with the means of education within our own state. It 17 
is not sanguine to anticipate that to an institution in the 
centre of the union, and otherwise favorably situated, 
numbers would be attracted from other quarters. It is 
believed, moreover, that the situation of the University 
in a large town will, independently of its utility to the 
resident population, be attended with various advan- 
tages and facilities to every branch of the institution 
itself: and though this be contrary, perhaps, to the 
opinion and the usage in England and in this country, 
it is conformable to the practice on the Continent, and 
justified besides by many satisfactory reasons. 
These are sufficiently apparent as regards the Medi- 
cal School. The want of large hospitals elswhere, and 
the difficulty of procuring subjects for anatomical dissec- 
tions, seem almost necessarily to confine schools of this 
description to large cities. It is in them, too, that teach- 
ers of the largest knowledge and experience are found, 
as it is in them only that eminent talents and knowledge 
can be adequately rewarded by lucrative practice. 
The latter reason is applicable also to law schools, to 
which the presence of the courts of justice, and the 
opportunity of seeing the conduct of business, are valu- 
able advantages. The law schools are in London, says 
a popular English journal, because the courts are 
there. Not above a hundred of the physicians now 
practising in England, have graduated at Oxford or 
Cambridge, nor above six of the six thousand members 
of the College of Surgeons. The same thing is true of 
the greater part of the practitioners of law; yet in those 
celebrated universities there are both law and medical 
schools of ancient existence. 
Again, if it is desirable to extend some branches of 
modern university and college education to merchants 
and artisans, it is also desirable that the seminaries them- 
selves be established in large towns, where the pupils 
from those classes of society are collected in the great- 18 
est numbers. Though these may be unable to encoun- 
ter the expense of money and time required by our or- 
dinary collegial course, they could profitably, and would 
gladly, avail themselves of some branches of scientific, 
and also of literary instruction. The eagerness with 
which they frequent the lyceums and the mechanics' 
institutes, has already been cited to prove that to this 
large and important class of our communities the re- 
moteness of the higher seminaries is a sensible evil, 
which they would gladly alleviate by means of instruc- 
tion on the spot of their usual occupations. 
Nor is the advantage very obvious of removing the 
seminaries for mere classical instruction, to situations 
remote from great towns. It certainly seems an object 
not to be overlooked by parental solicitude, that as few 
as possible of the youth frequenting them should be re- 
moved from its immediate supervision. The habit of 
sending these from home, to consort in numbers during 
the most critical years of life, produces such conse- 
quences as might be expected. These "solitary haunts 
of the muses" have their full portion of riot and low 
debauchery. On the contrary, a large number of the 
students at the university thus established in our most 
populous town, would, as they reside on the spot, still 
retain the benefit of that parental influence whose moral 
and gentle force is ill'supplied by the more rigorous dis- 
cipline of a college, even were it effectual. Of those, 
likewise, resorting from other parts of the state, many 
more would be under the roofs, or within the superin- 
tendence of relatives, than are likely to be so in the more 
remote institutions in other states. Even the portion 
coming from a greater distance, and therefore without 
this advantage, would probably find in the large and 
various society of a tow n, and even in its amusements, 
less dangerous and debasing recreation than in secluded 
seminaries, to say nothing on the score of manners and 
refinement. The State of Maryland, in establishing the 19 
ancient seminaries of St. John's and Washington Col- 
leges, wisely placed them in those towns on the Eastern 
and Western Shore which wrere the most central in 
position, and which were then also the most populous 
in those respective divisions of the state. A similar 
policy now recommends for the same purpose the popu- 
lous commercial emporium which has sprung up in its 
bosom, and to which access is easy from every district 
of Maryland. It has been objected, indeed, to those 
schools, the German and Scotch universities, for exam- 
ple, where the pupils are not collected into colleges, but 
reside in the towns, that they are inconsistent with due 
discipline. On the contrary, the assemblage of great 
numbers of youths, at an age the most critical and pre- 
sumptuous, within the walls of a single seminary, is more 
likely to expose them to the evil influence of mutual 
example, to turn their ill directed esprit du corps into 
improper combinations for resisting the authorities, and 
bring them into collisions with these on such ignoble 
topics of complaint, their commons for example, as now' 
and then disturb and disgrace colleges established on 
that plan. The insubordination, moreover, which mani- 
fested itself in the German universities at the conclusion 
of the late continental war, had its root, as is remarked in 
an eminent English Review, in the political feelings and 
bitter party spirit engendered by peculiar circumstances 
of the period; and the disturbances which arose in the 
Scottish universities on the banishment of the Stuarts, 
were paralleled by those on the same occasion at Oxford, 
where an opposite organization subsisted. At Cam- 
bridge, in the same country, the students are allowed to 
reside in the town, without any obvious injury to disci- 
pline. Though a late English traveller in Germany has 
drawn a very unfavorable picture of the universities 
there, and though amidst such large assemblages of 
youth some extravagances may be committed, yet, as is 
remarked by a writer in one of our principal reviews, 20 
who had probably every opportunity to know, Germa- 
ny surpasses all other countries both in the number and 
excellence of her universities, and the greater part of 
the students pursue in their closets "the pure delights of 
intellectual improvement." There is no reason to doubt, 
therefore, that their system, the professorial, as it is cal- 
led, in opposition to the collegiate, is perfectly consistent 
with the watchful superintendence of the teacher, and 
his intimate acquaintance with the progress of each 
individual. The comparative unsuccessfulness of the 
new London University has also been objected; but 
whoever recollects the array of aristocratic and party 
prejudice against that institution, and the opposition it 
encountered from those who were the ill disguised ene- 
mies of popular instruction, will see other sufficient causes 
for this failure, if it be such, though a late official exhi- 
bition of the state of that University, which has been ex- 
amined by your memorialists, indicates no such result. 
The immediately subsequent effort to establish King's 
College in the same metropolis, a rival institution under 
the patronage of the aristocratic and high church party, 
serves to show what the true grounds of objection were. 
In the event of establishing successfully the Universi- 
ty of Maryland on the plan proposed, important advan- 
tages would arise from the concourse of many minds 
brought together with the common aim of prosecuting 
learning. It has been observed by one of the many 
popular writers on this subject, that the object of a 
university is to blend the various elements of which 
society is composed; to soften prejudices arising from 
distinct occupations; and promote that exchange of ideas 
which is most rapid when persons, possessing in com- 
mon some general information, are at the same time 
engaged individually in distinct pursuits. The mind of 
Washington seems to have duly appreciated these useful 
effects. It was his wish to see established at some cen- 
tral point of the country, a university in which youths 21 
from all parts might be educated in all the branches of 
polite literature, in arts and sciences, in the principles 
of politics and good government; and where they might 
free themselves from prejudices by association in early 
life. 
It will be seen from the laws of the Collegiate Depart- 
ment, submitted with this memorial, that a part of the 
College course of study contemplates attendance by the 
pupils on the lectures of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. 
This suggests some remarks on this mode of communica- 
ting instruction, the prominent one in medical and law 
schools, and the only one contemplated for such other 
attendants on the University, as may not be pupils in the 
Collegiate Department. 
Oral instruction, before the invention of printing, 
was the principal mode of communicating knowledge. 
It has been urged sometimes that the subsequent multi- 
plication of books has rendered lectures no longer ne- 
cessary, and that private reading and the private tutor 
now accomplish the object of instruction more effectu- 
ally. In fact, a great part of the education at the uni- 
versities and even the great schools of England, is de- 
rived from private tuition, and not the public course; 
otherwise the business of instruction would be perform- 
ed there very imperfectly indeed, as not only the chairs 
devoted to professional learning are wholly inactive, 
but even those comprehended in the faculty of arts. 
A very different plan has been pursued in the universi- 
ties of France and Germany, and with reason, one 
would think, as undoubtedly the advantage derived 
from the subdivision of labour is not less in literature 
than in the useful arts. If the duty of the lecturer 
were confined to the reading of text-books, the text- 
book, read in private, might no doubt supply his place. 
His duty, however, is of a very different, and much 
higher sort. In the expanded condition of modern 22 
learning^ it may well employ all the capacity, and satis- 
fy the ambition of a single individual, to select one sci- 
ence, and discover its multiplied relations with others; 
to learn what the eminent have already written; to di- 
gest what is valuable in their works into a condensed 
form, and to add original ideas and comments. Lec- 
tures, says the same American journal before quoted, 
"are the very soul of instruction in Germany, and the 
spring of the rapid success and celebrity of her literary 
institutions;" while the neglect of oral communication 
"has frustrated all attempts to render philosophical pur- 
suits popular at Oxford and Cambridge." The emula- 
tion of a popular lecturer before his audience, unconfin- 
ed to a text-book, must produce an effect ill supplied 
by any private study of the learner, who, in such case, 
must find his way in the dark, extracting principles as 
he can from the accumulated tomes which embarrass his 
progress. In fact, the private tutors who at the English 
universities supply the place of public instructors, are 
a kind of professors, as in the larger colleges they usu- 
ally form private classes, to which they deliver lectures 
of an intermediate character "between the familiar con- 
versation of a private tutor, and the didactic discourses 
of a public professor." But besides the expense of this 
plan, it involves the further objection, that, as these tu- 
tors must necessarily direct their attention to very vari- 
ous topics, all the benefit is lost that arises from the un- 
divided attention of one mind to one department of 
knowledge, stimulated as it is in the public lecturer, by 
the sympathy of his audience, and by mutual emula- 
tion. "It is," says the American writer just quoted, 
"by means of that academical art," (the art of oral in- 
struction in public lectures,) "that the branches of theo- 
logy, law, logic, philosophy, mathematics, history, ge- 
neral literature, natural history, belles-lettres, are and 
must be communicated." In the elements, indeed, of 23 
some of these, as will appear from the college course, 
the student will be instructed in the collegiate depart- 
ment, that he may attend with more advantage the lec- 
tureships on these subjects comprehended in the plan of 
the university. A few words may properly be added 
here as to the topics of learning embraced by this plan, 
and especially as to the value of the professorships of 
physical science, and of some other branches of know- 
ledge included in the scheme. 
Much as the bounds have been enlarged, and the va- 
lue increased, of the physical sciences, the trustees are 
far from attaching to them a preponderance over clas- 
sical and literary learning. Their collegial course em- 
braces at least as extensive a field of classical instruction 
as that of any like institution in this country. The ne- 
glect of the physical sciences, and of the knowledge 
more immediately appropriate to the practical business 
of life, in the too exclusive attention which has been 
bestowed on classical learning in the English schools 
and universities, has caused public opinion in that coun- 
try to react perhaps too strongly against the latter. 
That objection is less applicable to the colleges in our 
own country, nor is classical learning likely to be here 
pursued to excess. It is certain that in developing the 
faculties, in imparting a strain of general and generous 
thought, in refining the diction, and elevating the fancy, 
its advantage as a part of that general preparatory edu- 
cation which is preliminary to all higher acquisitions, 
and to professional studies, has not been overvalued. 
An influence not less powerful, in imparting the facul- 
ty of combining and reasoning, is ascribable to the ear- 
ly pursuit of the mathematical sciences, of which the 
elements are taught in the collegiate course, and for the 
more enlarged study of which provision has been made 
in the erection of the Mathematical Chair of the uni- 
versity. 24 
In regard to the chairs of Natural Philosophy, Mine- 
ralogy and Geology, Natural History, Botany, and Che- 
mistry as applied to the arts, it may be observed, that the 
application of the physical sciences to the useful arts 
has more promoted the practical interests of life than 
any other effort of human understanding. The more 
modern organization of university education has a prin- 
cipal reference to these studies. Ample provision is 
made for them in the French and German seminaries, and 
to the neglect of them is partly to be ascribed the small 
comparative usefulness of the great English universi- 
ties. It is not necessary to insist on the particular be- 
nefits of each. Natural History is highly recommended 
by Bacon and Locke; Geology, by its striking discove- 
ries still more than its novelty, has drawn audiences 
even at Oxford and Cambridge; and Chemistry applied 
to the arts, suggests by its name alone its popular use- 
fulness and attractiveness. The successful establish- 
ment of all these chairs would much promote the pros- 
perity of the medical school. It is observed by an En- 
glish writer, that "if physical science, if experimental 
philosophy, if chemistry and comparative anatomy had 
been pursued with that ardour which we might have 
expected in the chief literary and scientific seminaries 
of Great Britain; if botany and zoology had been culti- 
vated there with a view to the science of organization; 
the body of medical students could never have been 
reduced in them to their present insignificant num- 
bers. Of these branches of science several, it is appa- 
rent, are immediately useful to the laborious professions; 
and all of them, together with the remaining chairs of 
History, Political Economy, Belles-lettres, and Moral 
and Intellectual Philosophy, are interesting to that large 
class that must exist in every populous community, who 
are ambitious of general knowledge. The professor of 
Theology in the university will deliver stated lectures, 25 
to such students as desire to attend, on the general topics 
of Natural Theology, and the Evidences of Christianity. 
Some curiosity in observing physical phenomena, 
and examining into the works of nature, is observable 
in most persons, especially in the young. This tenden- 
cy, directed by systematic instruction, may be rendered 
available to the acquisition of highly valuable practical 
knowledge to such as are engaged in mechanical em- 
ployments, and of liberal pleasure to a different class. 
For the numerous persons of both sorts, who have 
either not the opportunity or not the taste for classical 
attainments, the physical sciences, as furnishing one 
more kind of discipline for developing the faculties of 
the mind, are not to be neglected in a system of educa- 
tion having regard to the whole body of society. It is 
most important, in a country where an indirect share 
in legislation belongs to the mass of the people, and 
where, in the progress of the arts and wealth, large 
bodies of the working classes begin to be accumulated 
in great towns, to provide for them modes of intellec- 
tual amusement, and to have ascertained, as has been 
done, that the lyceums, the institutes and the lectures may 
be made to take, in this respect, the place of the tavern 
and the ale-house. Besides the natives of our cities, 
"young men are constantly pouring in to supply the 
demand for industry and talent, or with a view to 
amusement, whom it is important to supply with pursuits 
which may abstract them from the allurements of vice."* 
For these reasons it is desirable to see scientific in- 
stitutions created in our cities, which should not, as 
some of our colleges do, strictly confine their instruc- 
tion to their own pupils, and jealously exclude such as 
wish to pursue a partial course. The plan of the Uni- 
versity contemplates an opposite procedure, which will 
* Am. Quart. Rev. Sept. 1829. 26 
exert, it is believed, a useful influence both on the pub- 
lic and the teachers. It is intended., by opening the lec- 
tures to all classes., and by permitting every one to select 
from the course of instruction furnished there, such 
branches as may be indicated by his occupation or by his 
choice, to render the institution as accessible, as popu- 
lar, and as flexible to the public wants in this respect, as 
possible. The tendencies of minds are as various almost 
as the objects of knowledge; and every system of edu- 
cation must be regarded as erroneous which, forgetful 
of the differences which arise from the original constitu- 
tion of individual minds, the tastes inspired by accident- 
al circumstances, or the habitual contemplation of a par- 
ticular profession, thus neglects, in effect, to avail itself 
of so many impulses by which the higher powers of the 
intellect may be brought into activity. "In Paris, the 
public lectures are attended by hundreds of all classes, 
ages and countries, and the perpetual stimulus that is 
thus kept up, accounts in no small degree for the cele- 
brity of the teachers of that metropolis." * The pro- 
fessor, thus drawn from his academic solitude into the 
world, will be less likely to adhere to any beaten path 
of science, and more incited to follow the career of its 
improvement. Nor must it be lost sight of, that it is 
to great towns, where it may expect, from other fields 
of literary or professional employment, the most lucra- 
tive rewards, that the highest talent will naturally 
resort, and be found to fill the chairs of letters or of 
science. It is only under these circumstances that pro- 
fessors can be so remunerated that, in the language of 
Bacon, "the ablest man may be content to appropriate 
his whole labour, and continue his whole age, in that 
function." 
* Am. Quart. Rev. Sept. 1829. 27 
There is an obvious and particular inducement, more- 
over, for organizing a general seminary of learning in 
Baltimore, in the fact already noticed, that, by the liber- 
ality of the state, many important accommodations and 
aids both to science and learning have already been 
successively collected in the University in partial opera- 
tion there. As experiments are indispensable to the ex- 
position of medical science, and as, with this view, ana- 
tomical theatres, hospitals and other clinical institutions, 
establishments for the practice of obstetrics, and collec- 
tions of pharmaceutic specimens, for the illustration of the 
materia medica, are instituted in medical schools; so ex- 
periments are either necessary or valuable for the phy- 
sical, and some of the mathematical sciences. Obser- 
vatories are wanting for the study of astronomy; natural 
philosophy, and some other physical sciences, require 
an apparatus, instruments, and adequate collections of 
natural curiosities; chemistry can be effectually studied 
only in a laboratory, and botany in a botanical garden. 
As by former donations of the state, many of these aids 
already exist, to a great extent, in the University, so 
others can nowhere be added, so profitably to the 
public, and at so little expense, as in a large town, 
where, besides, the want of a sufficient library in the 
institution can best be supplied by resort to private or 
public collections. It is possible that an arrangement 
might be made with the proprietors of one of the lat- 
ter, by which its very excellent collection might be 
made available to the University. 
Your Memorialists are deeply persuaded that the 
highest interests of the state are involved in the educa- 
tion of its citizens; and they are as deeply persuaded 
that she will be far from having gained this object by 
the diffusion of mere elementary instruction by means 
of the institutionary seminaries, however valuable these 28 
may be in their appropriate sphere. It is an important 
point, only attainable by fostering the higher seminaries 
of learning, to send abroad into this field of primary and 
elementary instruction a sufficient number of teachers 
adequate, in point of learning and morals, to the delicate 
task they are charged with. Not only in the elementa- 
ry schools, but in those of the next highest order, it is 
to be lamented that the price of this sort of labour, rather 
than its value, is often the inducement in the choice of 
the teacher. If the state would have this field of educa- 
tion produce the expected fruits, it must be properly irri- 
gated, so to speak, from reservoirs of learning of a high 
elevation, from which the fertilizing waters of knowledge 
may flow down with due force and abundance. But 
while a humane and wise policy will always seek to 
elevate the condition of the labouring classes, by what- 
ever may promote their ingenuity, and increase their 
moral and physical comfort, the inevitable circumstances 
of all human societies, even the most republican, con- 
fine the greater body of the people to pursuits which 
preclude the acquisition of liberal thought, or enlarged 
notions of the relations of society and government. If 
we would prevent, therefore, the evil influences of fac- 
tious demagogues upon them, we must endeavour to give 
to the class which administers their laws, and solicits 
their choice, such a strain of thought, and such refine- 
ment from science, as will fashion their aims to honour, 
and turn their ambition to ends of usefulness and 
true patriotism. It has been thought that the legis- 
lative assemblies of this country are composed too ex- 
clusively of those who, accustomed from their profession 
to argue on either side of a question, lose the nice dis- 
crimination which should be the attribute of a statesman.* 
Though in no country are the members of that profes- 
*Amer. Quar. Rev. 29 
sion more honorable or more liberal than in this, or less 
narrowed in mind by technical learning, yet it must be 
thought no unimportant object, by placing the shrines of 
learning within the access of every class, to draw legis- 
lators from each, and thus diversify the talent of our 
legislative bodies, and throw into the elective meetings 
and assemblies another class of intelligent and discrimi- 
native minds. A last suggestion is perhaps admissible- 
that another sphere of ambition may thus be opened, in 
the pursuits of learning, to minds which now, from the 
want of such a sphere, and from the fashion of the coun- 
try, seize on the popular career as the most obvious and 
the most honoured. 
Germany, to whose literary institutions such frequent 
reference has been made, is a triumphant and truly ad- 
mirable example of the benign influence of education, 
fashioned, as it is there, to the wants of the age and to 
the state of its science, on all the great interests of human 
society. In that country, according to the description 
of a writer, whom we quote in effect, though not in his 
own words, and who probably gives it in chief part from 
personal observation,* the learning of the universities is 
zealously turned by the youth to the practical purposes 
of their professions. By the multitude of competitors 
in all of these, the intellectual powers are stimulated to 
their highest action. Hence they have combined in all 
the branches of learning, the soundest systematic ideas 
with profound practical knowledge. The latter position 
is proved "by a number of the best improvements, dis- 
coveries and inventions, in the enjoyment of which 
the whole civilized world now rejoices." Liberality in 
the discussion of opinions and affairs has produced a 
general tolerance, and absorbed national prejudice, and 
given to their literary decisions a general reception and 
* See N. Amer. Rev. No. 70. 30 
popularity. Their genius and philanthropy; the rapid 
exchange of generous ideas through their public prints; 
the intercourse of their men of talents, of different 
countries; have reared an intellectual alliance which 
even "the Holy Alliance must respect, in order to pre- 
serve the power of the laws, and the security of the 
government." In this condition of intellectual improve- 
ment, civil society is safe forever hereafter against abso- 
ute power. The late revolution in France, we may 
add, has only justified what was predicted of her, in 
viewing the advanced state of her knowledge, and her 
wise system of education. Our own country has the most 
powerful reasons to foster that intelligence which has 
here the more grateful task of preserving that liberty 
which it is engaged in creating in others. Your me- 
morialists do not suppose that all these results can be 
accomplished by a single institution, or that that single 
institution will at once produce all the fruit which it 
may contribute to the general stock of intelligence. Time 
must develope its capacities; talent and knowledge must 
gradually be fostered by patronage; and another genera- 
tion may reap the full effect of what it is our duty to 
begin. 
Your Memorialists therefore pray that your honour- 
able body will accept the surrender of the property 
and charter of Baltimore College herewith tender- 
ed, and invest the title to the said property in the 
Trustees of the University of Maryland, with authority 
to hold and use the same for the contemplated Collegi- 
ate and Academical Department of the University, (or 
to sell and dispose of the same, if it be deemed more 
advantageous and expedient, and apply the proceeds to 
the purposes contemplated by said department;) and 
that your honourable body will, by the aid of a com- 
mittee from the legislature, or by any other means best 
suited to the ends and purposes of this memorial, and the just views of your honourable body herein, procure 
a valuation to be made upon the property of Balti- 
more College aforesaid, and appropriate an amount of 
money equal thereto, in such manner as your wisdom 
may best devise, to be placed at the disposal of the 
Trustees of the University aforesaid, to be applied to 
the accommodation and benefit of the students of the 
University who are pursuing, or may hereafter pursue, 
the appropriate elementary and classical studies pre- 
scribed in the academical and collegiate course con- 
nected with the organization of the Faculty of Arts 
and Sciences in said University. And your memo- 
rialists will ever pray, &c. 
31 
Trustees of the University of Maryland. 
NATHANIEL WILLIAMS. 
R. B. MAGRUDER. 
J. H. M'CULLOH, Jr. 
J. W. M'CULLOH. 
WM. GWYNN. 
WM. H. MARRIOTT. 
WM. FRICK. 
ISAAC M'KIM. 
JAMES COX. 
J. P. K. HENSHAW. 
JOHN CAMPBELL WHITE, 
President. 
ALEX. BROWN. 
W. E. WYATT. 
P. H. CRUSE. 
J. P. KENNEDY. 
WM. FRICK. 
THO. E. BOND. 
J. H. M'CULLOH, Jr. 
H. W. EVANS. 
C. WILLIAMS. 
U. S. HEATH. 
R. B. MAGRUDER. 
Trustees of Baltimore College. 
F. LUCAS, Jr. 
J. T. DUCATEL. 
N. WILLIAMS. 
R. W. GILL. 
JOHN GILL. 
PETER LEVERING. 
PATRICK MACAULAY. 
JOHN GIBSON. 
WM. DONALDSON. 
WM. STEUART. 
CHARLES F. MAYER. 
CHARLES WORTHINGTON. 
E. DENISON.