The man who won this triumph was BENJAMIN WEST. He was born in
Springfield, Pennsylvania, on the 10th of October, 1738. His parents
were Quakers, plain, simple people, who feared God, lived a just life,
and desired above all other things that their children should become
pious and useful men and women. The old mansion-house where the future
artist was born was situated in Chester County, and is still standing.
It is not far from Philadelphia, and the place is now called Westdale.
His father's family emigrated from England to America with William Penn,
at his second visit, in 1699. John West married the daughter of Thomas
Pearson, by whom he had ten children. Of these, Benjamin was the
youngest son. His mother was a woman of great piety, and, being once in
attendance upon a memorable religious revival, at which she was terribly
agitated by the preaching of one Edward Peckover, an itinerant Quaker
minister, was taken with premature labor, of which Benjamin West was
born.
It was predicted that a child who had been brought into the world under
such circumstances would be a man of more than ordinary fame, and the
good mother treasured these prophecies in her heart, and watched the
career of her boy with the keenest interest.
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