ring at Stockbridge, in the midst of poverty and privation,
Jonathan Edwards wrote the treatise on the Freedom of the Will, the
greatest of all existing polemics. A portion of the old parsonage
remains in the village, and there are still shown marks and scratches on
the wall, made by him, as it is said, in the night, to recall by
daylight the abstruse meditations of his wakeful hours.

The children learned the Indian tongue, and when Pierrepont Edwards was
established at New Haven, the old sachems used to visit the
boy-companion of their early days, when the pipe of peace was smoked in
his kitchen in ancient form.

Having studied law with Judge Reeve of Litchfield, who married Edwards's
niece, the only sister of Aaron Burr, he became highly distinguished in
his profession. It is said, indeed, that Alexander Hamilton pronounced
him the most eloquent man to whom he had ever listened. Pierrepont
Edwards bore the name of his mother's family, an old English stock,
which reckons its descent from the days of the Conqueror. The
Pierreponts dwelt near Newstead Abbey, the seat of Byron, and not far
from Sherwood Forest, the home of Robin Hood and his merry men of old.
The name of Sarah Pierrepont, wife of Jonathan Edwards, is still fresh
in honored memory for wisdom and piety. She rests by her husband's side,
among the tombs of the presidents of Nassau Hall, in Princeton cemetery,
and is the only female name in that array of the mighty dead. It was
once suggested that these remains should be conveyed to Northampton, but
this was refused. Having banished this pair after the service of a
quarter of a century, it was not meet to grant to that place the honor
of their graves, and hence of the whole family but one rests at
Northampton. This is Jerusha, a lovely girl of seventeen, of whom it is
recorded by her father, in the simple terms of primitive piety, that she
said on her death-bed that 'she had not seen one minute for several
years wherein she desired to live one minute longer for the sake of any
other good in life, but doing good and living to the glory of God.' A
cenotaph has been placed by her grave to the memory of her father, but
it can not wipe away the error of the past, and this expression of
regret only recalls a biting line from Childe Harold:

'Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar.'

Pierrepont Edwards was the government attorney during the Revolution,
and prosecuted the confiscation of tory estates. When Bened