Peithessophian Society

"[1] According to Rutgers, the literary societies allowed students to develop "the skills of rhetoric and statesmanship that helped more fully utilize the classical education being taught in college classrooms.

"[1] In 1832 the society's library is recorded as holding 771 books, mostly literature (384 volumes), compared to the college's 1,290 titles which were largely theological texts.

[1] On July 20, 1830, former U.S. Attorney General William Wirt delivered an address before Peithessophian and its rival Philoclean which foreshadowed the coming American Civil War.

[1] In the late 1990s, having rediscovered the central role played by Peithessophian and Philoclean in the intellectual life of the college for more than three-quarters of a century, a small group of students began spontaneously to meet informally for regular debate and discussion.

[8] Among the current objectives of the Peithessophian board of officers is a permanent allotment of college space, equivalent to its Van Nest library and meeting rooms in the nineteenth century, to the Society.

In the nineteenth century, Van Nest Hall housed the meeting rooms and libraries of the college's two rival literary and debating societies.