Warren, then as
now, a delightful and flourishing inland town, situated ten miles from
Providence, seemed to meet the requisite requirements; and thither,
accordingly, Manning removed with his family in the spring of 1764. He
at once commenced a Latin school, as the first step preparatory to the
work of college instruction. Before the close of the year a church was
organized, over which he was duly installed as pastor. The following
year, at the second annual meeting of the corporation, held in Newport,
Wednesday, September 3, he was formally elected, in the language of the
records, "President of the College, Professor of Languages and other
branches of learning, with full power to act in these capacities at
Warren or elsewhere." On that same day, as appears from an original
paper, now on file in the archives of the library, the president
matriculated his first student, William Rogers,[C] a lad of fourteen,
the son of Captain William Rogers of Newport. Not only was this lad the
first student, but he was also the first freshman class. Indeed, for a
period of nine months and seventeen days, as appears from the paper
already referred to, he constituted the entire body of students. From
such feeble beginnings has the university sprung.

The first commencement of the college was held in the meeting-house at
Warren on the seventh day of September, 1769, at which seven students
took their Bachelor's degree. They were all of them young men of
promise. Some of them afterwards filled conspicuous places in the
struggle for national independence, while others became leaders in the
church, and distinguished educators of youth. Probably no class that
has gone forth from the college or university in her palmiest days of
prosperity has exerted so widely extended and so beneficial an
influence, the times and circumstances taken into account, as this first
class that graduated at Warren. The occasion drew together a large
concourse of people from all parts of the Colony, inaugurating, says
Arnold, the earliest State holiday in the history of Rhode Island. A
contemporary account preserves the interesting facts that both the
President and the candidates for degrees were dressed in clothing of
American manufacture, and that the audience, composed of many of the
first ladies and gentlemen of the Colony, "behaved with great decorum."

Up to this date, "the Seminary," says Morgan Edwards, "was, for the most
part, friendless and moneyless, an