It is probable that the idea and purpose moving Bishop Asbury to found church schools, had never gone entirely out of the minds of the Methodists of Virginia, notwithstanding all the failures and disasters which had befallen the early enterprises. They found no school in the Conference territory of high grade where they felt safe in sending their sons. William and Mary College was under the control of the Episcopalians, and its location was noted for excess in worldliness and free-living, which did not invite Methodists, whose rules forbade such customs. The atmosphere of the college and town was unsuited to Methodists, and they were looked upon as unfit for the society of the so-called best people. Hampden-Sidney College, originally non-sectarian, had come under the control of the Presbyterians, with whom, in those days, Arminian Methodists did not think it safe to let their sons remain too long, lest they should become Calvinists. Washington College was then a feeble school, and remote from the eastern portion of the State, and outside the Virginia Conference. Under these circumstances, and for what were esteemed good reasons, the Methodists of the Virginia Conference, then composed of the eastern and middle portions of Virginia and North Carolina, moved in the matter of establishing a college of high grade. A resolution, adopted by the General Conference of 1824, recommending "that each Annual Conference establish a Seminary of learning under its own regulations and patronage," had the effect to direct the attention of the church throughout the connection to the subject of education. So almost simultaneously the New York Conference, with the Virginia Conference, moved towards the establishment of a college, as recommended by the General Conference, the result of which was the founding of the Wesleyan University at Middletown, Conn., and of Randolph-Macon College at Boydton, Va., the two oldest Methodist colleges, originally incorporated as such, now existing in America.