_Tottenham-Court Road_,
_June 17, 1767_.
♦ removed duplicate “the”
_The Archbishop to Mr._ Whitefield.
_To the Reverend Mr. Whitefield_,
THE Archbishop of _Canterbury_ hath put Mr. _Whitefield_’s draught of a charter for a College in _Georgia_, into the hands of the Lord President; who hath promised to consider it: but desires to know from Mr. _Whitefield_, what present endowment, and to what value, he proposes for his College.
_July 1, 1767._
_Mr._ Whitefield _to the Archbishop_.
_London, July 4, 1767._
_May it please your Grace_,
MY obligations are much increased by your Grace’s putting the last draught of the _Georgia_ College so speedily into the hands of the Lord President. As by this, (I presume) it hath been honoured by your Grace’s, so I make no manner of doubt, but it will also meet with his Lordship’s approbation. In obedience to your Grace’s desire, I herewith send your Grace an account of “what present endowment, and to what value, I propose for the intended College.” Upon a moderate computation, may it please your Grace, I believe its present annual income, is between four and five hundred pounds sterling. The house is surrounded with eighteen hundred acres of land; a plan of which, and likewise of the house itself, I herein inclose, and humbly present for your Grace’s inspection. The number of negroes young and old, employed on various parts of these lands, in sawing timber, raising rice for exportation, and corn with all other kinds of provision for the family, is about thirty. Besides these, the College will be immediately possessed of two thousand acres of land near _Altamaha_, which were granted me by the Governor and Council, when I was last at _Georgia_; and a thousand acres more, left, as I am informed, by the late reverend and worthy Mr. _Zubberbuler_. So that, by laying out only a thousand pounds in purchasing an additional number of negroes, and allowing another thousand for repairing the house, and building the two intended wings, the present annual income may very easily and speedily be augmented to a thousand pounds _per annum_. Out of this standing fund, may be paid the salaries of the Master, professors, tutors, &c. and also small exhibitions be allowed for some orphan or other poor students, who may have their tutorage and room-rent gratis, and act as servitors to those who enter commoners. What these salaries and exhibitions ought to be, may at a proper season be submitted to your Grace’s future consideration. At present, I would only further propose, that the negroe children belonging to the College, shall be instructed, in their intervals of labour, by one of the poorer students, as is done now by one of the scholars in the present Orphan-house. And I do not see why an additional provision may not likewise be made for educating and maintaining a number of _Indian_ children, which, I imagine, may easily be procured from the _Creeks_, _Choctaws_, _Cherokees_, and the other neighbouring nations. Hence the whole will be a free-gift to the colony of _Georgia_: a complex extensive charity be established; and at the same time, not a single person obliged, by any public act of assembly, to pay an involuntary forced tax towards the support of a seminary, from which many of the more distant and poorer Colonist’s children cannot possibly receive any immediate advantage; and yet the whole Colony, by the christian and liberal education of a great number of its individuals, be universally benefited. Thus have I most readily, and I humbly hope, gratefully complied with your Grace’s desire, which to me is as a command. I am constrained to trespass on your Grace’s patience, whilst I congratulate your Grace on the goodness of GOD, who, amongst many other signal marks of his peculiar providence, hath honoured your Grace, in making you an happy instrument of establishing two _Northern-American_ Colleges; the one at _New-York_, and the other at _Philadelphia_: and if (as I pray may be the case) your Grace should yet be made further instrumental in establishing a third College in the yet more southern, but now flourishing colony of _Georgia_, I trust it will be an additional gem in the crown, which I earnestly pray that GOD, the righteous judge, may give your Grace in that day. In his great name, I beg leave to subscribe myself, may it please your Grace,
Your Grace’s most dutiful, obliged son and servant,