[1] He succeeded Eliphalet Pearson (1752–1826), the first preceptor of the Phillips (Andover) Academy and in 1786–1806 was appointed professor of Hebrew and Oriental languages at Harvard.

At this time he knew hardly more than elementary Hebrew and not much more Greek; in 1801–12 he prepared for the use of his students a Hebrew grammar which they copied day by day from his manuscript; in 1813 he printed his Grammar, which appeared in an enlarged form, with a copious syntax and praxis, in 1821, and was republished in England by Dr Pusey in 1831.

However, recognition soon followed, partly as a result of his Letter to Dr Channing on the Subject of Religious Liberty (1830), but more largely through the growing favour shown to German philology and critical methods.

The historical setting of this work he alluded to in his Preface, writing, "It is time for the churches, in reference to the matters now before us, to seek some refuge from the tumultuous ocean on which they have of late been tossed."

(p. 5) This setting he more explicitly addressed in his Appendix, where he replied to the book George Duffield, D.D., of Detroit, published in 1842, Dissertations on the Prophecies Relative to the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.

Stuart as well mentioned Duffield's view of William Miller in regard to the time of the Second Coming (p. 172).