ber had reached
forty-nine. In 1850, there were 120 colleges, manned by 1,300
teachers, with 17,000 students. There were besides 42 theological
seminaries, 35 medical schools, and 12 law schools.

By 1890, the number of colleges and universities had grown to 415,
having 7,918 instructors and 118,581 students. There were in the same
year 117 medical schools, with 7,013 students, and 54 law schools,
with 4,518 students. These facts bear witness to the determination of
the American people to satisfy the needs of their higher nature, and
not to rest content with material growth and the bare necessities of
life.

The spirit of our early ancestors was never more manifest than in
their earnest advocacy of religious liberty, and their protest against
all ecclesiastical authority. The numerous settlements in different
sections of the country, with their different nationalities and
diverse religious opinions, tended to multiply the religious
denominations and to establish churches with divergent aims and plans.
These independent sects gave rise to a great number of schools
claiming to be colleges. These schools they regarded as essential and
supplementary to their churches. Harvard owes its origin to
non-conforming clergymen. The Episcopal Church claimed William and
Mary College. The Congregationalists of Connecticut founded Yale.
Princeton was founded under the auspices of a Presbyterian synod, and
Brown was established by an association of Baptist Churches. One
hundred and four of the first one hundred and nineteen colleges
established in the United States had a distinctively Christian origin.
Their founders intended that they should be, in some sense,
ecclesiastical as well as religious. Notwithstanding their diversity,
there was unity in their general character and design. While they
maintained a denominational character, they were in nowise illiberal,
and set up no religious test for entrance.

The Christian Churches have been not only pioneers of education, but
their followers recognize as never before the power and efficiency of
the Christian College to further the Kingdom of God on earth. Out of
415 colleges in 1890, 316 of them were under the control of some
religious denomination. These were distributed in 1890 among the
several denominations as follows: Methodist, 74; Presbyterian, 49;
Baptist, 44; Roman Catholic, 51; Congregational, 22; Christians, 20;
Lutheran, 19; United Brethren, 10; Protestant Episcopal, 6; Re