John Fea

The Way of Improvement Leads Home: Philip Vickers Fithian's Rural Enlightenment

On the morning of Friday, July 16, 1773, Philip Vickers Fithian awoke early and traveled from his Greenwich, New Jersey, house across the Cohansey River to Fairfield, where he spent several days with William Hollingshead, who would soon be installed as minister of the Fairfield Presbyterian Church. There they dined, drank tea, supped, and exchanged the “Usual Civilities” with friends and relations. The friends passed their time together conversing on topics including “the state of Affairs in Philadelphia,” Fithian’s candidacy for Presbyterian ordination, Hollingshead’s upcoming sermon entitled “States of Man,” and the “useful and well-chosen books” in the minister’s library. Fithian and Hollingshead ate breakfast on Monday with Jonathan Elmer, their representative in the New Jersey assembly. Later that day this gregarious duo traveled back to Greenwich, where Fithian observed a “long confabulation” between Hollingshead and Andrew Hunter, minister of the Greenwich Presbyterian Church, on the subject of “whether there is Scripture Authority for Diocesan Bishops.” Here they also encountered Richard Howell, one of Fithian’s former classmates at the local Presbyterian academy, who shared with them news of his legal studies in New Castle, Delaware. Fithian lamented that although Howell was a “young Gentleman of considerable Genius, & had made good proficiency in his Studies,” he was “remarkably profane in his Principles, & Loose in his Behav-