AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY.-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

LIFE OF JOHN EWING, D. D. LATE PROVOST OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA.

THE following life is an eminent example of the beneficial results of persevering industry, and the object of recording it will have been attained, if it shall teach the timid, a proper confidence in his own efforts, and the presumptuous, an humble confidence in his God.

Dr. JOHN EWING was born on the twenty-second day of June, 1732, in the township of Nottingham, in Caecil county, Maryland, near to the line which separates that state from Pennsylvania. Of his ancestors little is known. They emigrated from Scotland at an early period of the settlement of our country, and fixed themselves on the banks of the Susquehanna, near to the spot where he was born. They were farmers, who, if they did not extend their names beyond their immediate neighbourhood, yet maintained within it that degree of reputation which their descendants can speak of without a blush.

His father was enabled by his industry to support his family* from the produce of his farm, and to give to his children that degree of education which country schools at that time had to offer. This indeed was little, but it was all that was necessary to such a mind as Dr. Ewing's. It was sufficient to furnish the rudiments of science, which, however early they are lost by ordinary minds in the distractions of a life of business, only serve to fan the fire of ambition in stronger intellects, and to direct and guide their possessors to fame.

The school-house at which Dr. Ewing was taught the elements of his native language and the first rules in arithmetic, was at a considerable distance from his father's residence. The daily exercise of walking thither in his youth, tended to invigorate a constitution naturally strong, and enabled him to acquire a stock of health which carried him through sixty years without sickness. At this school it cannot be supposed that he learned much, but he was soon removed from it and placed under the

* There were five brothers: William, George, Alexander, John, and his twin brother, James, who is the only one now living.

superintendance of Dr. Alison, a clergyman eminent for his erudition and piety, who then directed a school at Newlondon cross roads, in the state of Pennsylvania. After having finished those studies usually taught in his school, he remained with him three years as a tutor. To this he was led, not merely by inclination, but by necessity. His father died about this time, and left his small property to be distributed according to the laws of the state of Maryland, in which that of primogeniture prevailed. The eldest son inherited the patrimonial estate, and left Dr. Ewing and his remaining brothers, to struggle in the world with twenty pounds each. At this distribution of his father's property he did not repine, for he then felt a confidence in his own powers which did not deceive him, which poverty could not diminish, and which enabled him subsequently to attain that honourable elevation which he adorned by his virtues as well as his talents.

Under the kind care of Dr. Alison he made considerable progress in his favourite pursuit, the study of mathematics. Books of science were not at that time easily obtained in America, especially in places remote from cities; but such was his thirst for knowledge that he frequently rode thirty or forty miles to obtain the loan of a book which might afford him some information on the subject of his favourite speculations. Those authors who were safe guides could not always be obtained. Incorrect writings sometimes fell into his hands, the errors of which did not escape the detection of his penetrating and original genius. It often occurs that difficulties only quicken the eagerness of the mind in its pursuits, and bring into action its latent energies. Such was the result of difficulties on Dr. Ewing at this early period of his life. His mind did not shrink from intellectual conflict, but gathered vigour from hindrance, and bade defiance to difficulty. At this period he certainly learned much from books, and much from the conversation of Dr. Alison, of whom indeed he always spoke with kindness, but he acquired more from the habits of close thinking in which he early indulged. To the two former he was much indebted, but if we allow to those sources of information all that they merit, it will yet not be hazardous to say that in the science of mathematics he was selftaught, and could never have reached that station which he afterwards adorned, struggling as he was with poverty and harassed

with difficulties, without receiving from other than human aid the impulse which carried him forward.

In the year 1754 he left the school of Dr. Alison, and removed to Princeton for the purpose of entering the college. Mr. Burr, the father of the late vice-president of the United States, was then president of that institution, and of that great and celebrated man he was a favourite pupil. He joined the senior class, and, impelled by pecuniary embarrassments, engaged at the same time as teacher of the grammar school which was connected with the college. His intention was to graduate, and for this purpose it was necessary that he should study in private some branches of learning to which he had previously been unable to attend. These causes made his labour greater than that of his classmates. His studies were arduous and multiplied; but he brought to the contest a mind which difficulties did not easily subdue. He graduated with his class in the year 1755, and finding that he had still to toil for a subsistence, he immediately accepted the appointment of tutor in the college. At this period he resolved to choose his profession; and feeling the study of theology congenial with his wishes, and calculated to permit him to mingle with it scientific researches, he adopted it with his usual promptitude and his usual zeal.

In pursuance of this design, he returned to Dr. Alison, his former tutor and friend, and, after the usual period of preparatory study, he was licensed to preach the Gospel by the presbytery of Newcastle, in the state of Delaware. At the age of twenty-six, before he undertook the pastoral charge of any congregation, he was selected to instruct the philosophical classes in the college of Philadelphia, during the absence of the provost, the late Dr. William Smith. Whilst he was engaged in the discharge of this honourable office, he received an invitation from the presbyterian congregation of his native place to settle himself among them as their pastor. This was an invitation on which he deliberated, before he declined it. To be selected by the friends of his youth as their spiritual guide; to fix himself with a decent stipend on his native spot among his relations and former associates, was a temptation calculated to win a man who was social in his affections, and who was little troubled with the unquiet spirit of am

bition. But he was by this time married, and having early known the value of a liberal education, he wished to give his offspring the opportunity of possessing those instructions which he himself had so long toiled to acquire; which, during his life, he prais ed as more valuable than wealth, and recommended to the attention of his children by all the persuasions of paternal affection. Whilst, however, he was deliberating, he received, in the year 1759, an unanimous invitation from the first presbyterian congregation in the city of Philadelphia to undertake their pastoral charge. This he did not feel himself at liberty to decline, but accepted it, and fixed himself for his life.

From this period until the year 1773, he continued to discharge his duties with a diligence and zeal seldom surpassed. In the bosom of his congregation he found affection and friendship, and learned that life has few stations to offer to an unambitious heart more valuable than that of a pastor beloved by his flock. He was now at liberty to pursue his favourite studies without other intrusions on his time than method and diligence could render harmless. During this period his studious researches enabled him to accumulate materials for the compilation of his Lectures on Natural Philosophy, and such was the vigour of his understanding, such his habits of constant study, and so ample his stores of knowledge, that the volume published in 1809 is copied from the original manuscript.

New scenes now opened upon his view. In the year 1773 he was commissioned, with the consent of his congregation, in conjunction with Dr. Hugh Williamson, late a member of congress from the state of North Carolina, to solicit subscriptions in Great Britain for the academy of Newark in the state of Delaware. He took with him letters of recommendation from men of science and respectability to several eminent characters. These, aided by his own reputation for mathematical science, his general information, and his virtues, procured for him the intimacy and friendship of several persons, who at that period and since held the highest stations of literature. Among these were the celebrated historian Dr. Robertson, Dr. Webster, Mr. Balfour, and Dr. Blacklock, the blind poet of Scotland. He visited every place of importance in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and in all

of them was received with that attention and respect which are due to the man of science and the minister of God. The cities of Glasgow, Montrose, Dundee and Perth, presented to him their freedom, and, from the university of Edinburgh, of which Dr. Robertson was then the Principal, he received, without application, the degree of Doctor of Divinity. Dr. Robertson, on presenting his diploma, declared that he had never before conferred a degree with greater pleasure. The acquaintance, thus commenced with this celebrated personage, ripened into intimacy, and until the death of the latter, in 1793, he made constant and affectionate inquiries about Dr. Ewing from travelling Americans who visited him at Edinburgh. A few days before his death, some young American gentlemen waited upon him, to whom he spoke of his friend "as a man of great talents for whom he entertained a great personal regard,” and his last words at parting were, "Do not forget to present my kind regards to Dr. Ewing."

. Such a testimonial from such a man as the historian of Charles the Fifth, the descendants of Dr. Ewing may be permitted to remember and to speak of to the world.

When he first visited England, the approaching contest with his native land was a topic of conversation in every society. He was warmly and uniformly the friend of his country, and although he had frequent offers of reward from men, high in power, if he would remain in England, yet his knowledge of the causes of the revolution; his acquaintance with the spirit and resources of his countrymen, and his integrity forbade him to listen to them. He held frequent conversations with the minister, lord North, to whom, with that frankness and independence of sentiment which characterized him, he communicated all his information respecting the resources and power of the people of the united colonies. To the minister he predicted the issue of the contest, and urged him to pause before he alienated irretrievably from the mother country the affections of loyal subjects. These conversations he was in the habit of repeating to his friends on his return from England, not without some degree of surprise that the minister should have involved his country in a war with a people, of whose character, numbers, spirit and resources he was utterly ignorant.