Levi Frisbie was born in Ipswich, Massachusets. He was the eldest child of Levi and Mehitable (Hale) Frisbie.
His father was one of the four students in the first graduating class (1771) of Dartmouth College.
After studying divinity under President Eleazar Wheelock he was ordained and labored as a missionary among the Indians, first along the Muskingum in Ohio and later in Maine and Canada.
On February 7, 1776, he was installed as pastor of the First Congregational Church of Ipswich, where he continued until his death.
Education
The younger Frisbie received his preparatory education at Andover and helped to defray his expenses at Harvard College by copying papers for several hours a day while the college was in session and by teaching a school during the winter vacation.
Career
Upon his graduation in 1802, Frisbie went to Concord, where he taught for a year, and then began the study of the law.
An affection of the eyes soon compelled him to relinquish his ambition, and thereafter he was unable to read for himself.
Friends were at hand, however, who willingly read to him in Latin and English, and by laying a ruler or a thin octavo across the page as a guide to his hand he managed to write.
In this way, he acquired sufficient knowledge to discharge his duties as a teacher at Harvard and to be esteemed by his colleagues as an ornament to their society.
He was a tutor in Latin, 1805-11, professor of Latin, with no substantial change in his work, 1811-17, and Alford Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy, and Civil Polity from 1817 to the end of his life.
He was also something, though not much, of a minor poet.
Sometime about 1821, he developed tuberculosis, and the disease ran its course quickly.
Achievements
Frisbie was a professor of Latin and Alford Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy, and Civil Polity. Of his literary remains the weightiest is the inaugural address delivered when he assumed the Alford professorship.
Views
Of Frisbie's literary remains the weightiest is the inaugural address delivered when he assumed the Alford professorship.
In this, he expounded the doctrine that the principles of ethics should be derived from the precepts and narratives of the Bible and pointed out the great service that literature might, but seldom does, do for morality.
In dignified, academic language but much in the spirit of a New England Tertullian he denounced Chaucer, Swift, Pope, Fielding, Smollett, Goethe, Byron, and Moore for their licentious writings, but gave his approval to Cowper, Campbell, Scott, and, with reservations, to Maria Edgeworth.
Andrews Norton reviewed the address at length and with enthusiasm in the North American Review (January 1818).
Personality
At a young age, Frisbie had an eye affection and was unable to read for himself. Friends were at hand, however, who willingly read to him.
Quotes from others about the person
“The last act of his life, ” wrote Norton, “was an expression of affection for his aged mother, who was adjusting his pillow. ”
Connections
On September 10, 1815, Frisbie married Catherine Saltonstall Mellen of Cambridge.
