Misfortunes never come singly: an unsuccessful attempt to burn the buildings had been made in the fall of 1788, and now, on December 4, 1795, a completely successful one was made, and the building and its contents were consumed. Rewards to discover the incendiary were offered in vain, and Asbury writes:[[38]] "We have a second and confirmed report that Cokesbury College is consumed to ashes—a sacrifice of £10,000 in about ten years. If any man should give me £10,000 to do and suffer again what I have done for that house, I would not do it. The Lord called not Mr. Whitefield, nor the Methodists to build colleges. I wished only for schools; Dr. Coke wanted a college. I feel distressed at the loss of the library."

Asbury despaired, but Coke did not and, going to work, he raised £1,020 from his friends. After the determination was made to move the College to Baltimore, the Church there gave £700, and a house to house solicitation brought in £600 more. A building originally erected for balls and assemblies was purchased and fitted up. It stood next the old Light Street Methodist Church and a co-educational school was opened therein on May 2, 1796. The high course planned for girls is especially noticeable at this early period. The school opened with promises of success, and within a month there were nearly 200 scholars.

Fatality pursued the enterprise, however, and a year to a day from the burning of the first building, this second one was reduced to ashes, with the adjoining church and several houses.

Asbury writes rather philosophically:[[39]] "I conclude God loveth the people of Baltimore, and he will keep them poor to make them pure;" but even Coke gave up hope at this new disaster, and it was twenty years before a second Methodist College was attempted.

ASBURY COLLEGE.

This was the second Methodist College in the world, and was organized in 1816, the year of Bishop Asbury's death. After a year or two of successful work, a charter was applied for and it was granted to the College February 10, 1818.[[40]] The President, Samuel K. Jennings, M.D., a Methodist local preacher, was a rather remarkable man. Coming from New Jersey, graduating at Rutgers, and settling in the practice of the medical profession in Virginia, he was converted by the preaching of Asbury, and was persuaded by him some years later, to move to Baltimore and take the leadership of the new enterprise.[[41]] He was said to be, at one time, the only Methodist preacher with a collegiate education and was well adapted to the task, from his administrative ability and wide learning. Around him, he gathered an undenominational faculty of four professors and began the life of the institution in a large brick building on the corner of Park Avenue and Franklin Street. In March, 1818, the Methodist Magazine tells us that there were one hundred and seventy students, and that "The Asbury College has probably exceeded in its progress, considering the short time it has been established, any literary institution in the country."[[42]] In that spring, a class was graduated, and yet only a few months later Dr. Bangs wrote that the College "continued for a short time and then, greatly to the disappointment and mortification of its friends, went down as suddenly as it had come up, and Asbury College lives only in the recollection of those who rejoiced over its rise and mourned over its fall."

This statement is not absolutely correct; it is probable that there was some catastrophe, and possibly Dr. Jennings then began to break away from the Methodist Episcopal Church, which he left entirely, when the Methodist Protestant Church was formed in 1828. Still some sort of an organization was kept up under the old name; for does not good Hezekiah Niles, of Register fame, tell us of examinations and exhibitions he witnessed in the early spring of 1819,[[43]] at which time prodigies of learning and cramming were exhibited, and do we not find in 1824, a pamphlet published by Dr. Jennings, entitled "Remarks on the Subject of Education, to which are added the general rules of the school under the appellation of Asbury College." Apparently the College had passed entirely out of the control of the church, and having lowered its grade, was now little more than Dr. Jennings' private school. The school was then situated on the corner of Charles and Baltimore Streets and, in 1833, when we catch the last glimpse of it, another removal had taken it to the corner of South and Fayette Streets. It was then merely a boys' day school and doubtless soon perished. So the second Methodist College failed as the first had done and another was added to the many abortive attempts to found a college in Maryland.

OTHER EXTINCT COLLEGES.

Three other attempts to found colleges demand a passing notice.

Mount Hope College stood at the corner of Eutaw Place and North Avenue, and was charted as a college in 1833.[[44]] The building was constructed by the Baltimore branch of the United States Bank in 1800, during an epidemic of yellow fever in the city. People feared to come into town to transact business and so a suburban banking house was built. This building was bought by the Rev. Frederick Hall in 1828 and in it a school was begun, which was later expanded into the College. The institution lasted some ten years and is worthy of note from the fact that among the teachers were two young Yale graduates, who afterwards obtained considerable renown: Professor Elias Loomis and Rev. S.W.S. Dutton.