Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1906. Excerpt: ... IV WITHERSPOON, THE AMERICAN i. The New Jersey Convention FROM the day that he landed in America until the Revolution Witherspoon was a high type of British colonist. Scotchman as he was, he was British in sentiment and devotion. But he was likewise American to the core. He early perceived the possibilities of the new country. Its resources amazed him. The rich fertility of the soil, especially that which lay inland along the streams appealed to him in contrast with the less productive land in Scotland He was delighted with the men whom lje met and with the towns they had built. His admiration was not effusive, but his practical eye saw the evident advantages that would accrue from hard work. Clergyman and educator though he was, following professions not conducive to business sagacity, he had no hesitation in engaging in such enterprises as he thought would be profitable. He became one of a company which obtained from the crown a large grant of land in Nova Scotia. Witherspoon appears to have had friends at court to whom, as in the case of the charter for the Widows' Fund, he could apply for aid. Whether he used this friend on this occasion I do not know. But he used his own name freely, as he might very properly, to advertise, not only his land in Nova Scotia but the general advantages in America, for the purpose of encouraging emigration. When John Adams was at Princeton in 1774, Witherspoon said the Congress ought to urge every colony to form a society to encourage Protestant emigration from the three kingdoms of Great Britain. It was this motive more largely than the hope of making money that induced him to join the Nova Scotia land company. When his name appeared in the advertisements in Scotch papers, some of his old enemLS in that land took occasion to attack him. Ordinarily...