Leverett
so well, that we shall say the less of him. However, we cannot but give
this testimony of our great affection to and esteem for him; that we are
abundantly satisfied ... of his religion, learning, and other excellent
accomplishments for that eminent service, a long experience of which we
had while he was senior fellow of that house; for that, under the wise and
faithful government of him, and the Rev. Mr. Brattle, of Cambridge, the
greatest part of the now rising ministry in New England were happily
educated; and we hope and promise ourselves, through the blessing of the
God of our fathers, to see religion and learning thrive and flourish in
that society, under Mr. Leverett's wise conduct and influence, as much as
ever yet it hath done." [Footnote: _History of Harvard_, i. 504, App. xx.]
His salary was only one hundred and fifty pounds a year; but the man
worked for love of a great cause, and did not stop to haggle. Nor were he
and Dudley of the temper to leave a task half done. Undoubtedly at the
governor's instigation, a resolve was introduced into the Assembly
reviving the Act of 1650 by which the university had been incorporated,
and it is by the sanction of this lawless and masterly feat of
statesmanship that Harvard has been administered for almost two hundred
years.
Sewall tells how Dudley went out in state to inaugurate his friend.
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