Enoch Perrine was born in Highstown, NJ in 1853. After preparation for college at the Peddie Institute, he attended Brown University, from which he graduated in 1874. After graduation, Perrine served as the editor for two different newspapers in New Jersey until 1878, when he became an instructor in Latin at the Peddie Institute. He receive a master's degree from Brown in 1881 and a Phi Beta Kappa key. Perrine was appointed the John P. Crozer Professor of Rhetoric at Bucknell in 1886, and he became Professor of the English Language and Literature in 1888. He received an honorary Doctor of Literature degree from Gettysburg College in 1892. He served on the faculty until his death in 1920.