In a letter to his brother, President Ballou provides a brief update on the newly opened College: “…our principle is to work, work, and to let the work speak for itself before the world. With only the germ of a Library, and with no Philosophical apparatus, I am still persuaded that we are making our students more thorough scholars than those of other Colleges which I have visited. The smallness of our Classes gives us a peculiarly favorable opportunity for affecting this result."