Increase Mather resigns as president of Harvard College.

Displeased by the less than orthodox teaching of its professors and lack of scholarship by the students, he asks, “Should I leave off preaching to 1500 souls. . . only to expound to forty or fifty Children, a few of them capable of edification by such Exercises.” Mather returns to Boston after having moved to Cambridge to comply with the residency requirement for presidents of Harvard. He is succeeded by Rev. Samuel Willard, rector of the Old South Church.