Dr. Robifon, of Udinhurgh. $1 



John Robison, LL.D. is a younger fon of the late John 

 Robifon, etq. of Boghall, in the county of Stirling. 



Mr. Robifon, the father, engaged, at an early period of 

 life, in commerce,, and carried on, for many years, a lucra- 

 tive trade as a merchant in Glafgow; but before the birth. 

 of the fubject of this memoir he had retired from bufmefs, 

 and lived on his eftate. He is remembered both in Glafgow 

 and in the country with much refpee.t, as a man of great 

 pietv, honourable in his commercial dealings, kind to the 

 poor,, and a good landlord. 



Dr. R obifon was in 1739 born at Boghall, where he 

 pafl"ed the earlv years of childhood ; but there being no fchool 

 ofanvnote in the parifli of Baldernock, where Boghall is 

 fituaied, he received the whole of his education in Glafgow. 

 His progress through fchool muft have been rapid ; for be- 

 fore he was nineteen years of age he had completed the 

 ufual courfe of ftudy in the univerfity. 



I have indeed often heard him regret that he was but a 

 carelefs fcholar : but his apprehenfion is fo quick, and his 

 memory fo retentive, that he muft have acquired a compe- 

 tent knowledge of the Greek and Latin languages with very 

 little labour. His knowledge of thefe languages now is fuch. 

 as few men poflefs whofe lives have been devoted to the pur- 

 fuits of fcience; and this, in all probability, it would not have 

 been ; had not a folid foundation been laid at fchool. Senti- 

 ble, however, that by greater exertion he might have done 

 more than he did, he regrets, at prefent, what mod men, 

 who were clever boys, have caufe to regret, that, at fchool, 

 he contented himfelf with barely furpafiing his duller clafs- 

 fellows. 



In the univerfity he had the happinefs of ftudying under 

 the profeflbrs Moore, Simfon, Smith, Dick, and Leechman, 

 whofe eminence as teachers of the Greek language, of mathe- 

 matics, moral philofophy, natural philofophy and theology, 

 will be long remembered in Glafgow, To mathematics he 

 had no particular predilection till he perceived the ufe of that 

 fcience when ftudying natural philofophy under Dr. Dick ; 

 and to algebra he has at no period of his life been partial. 

 Dr. Simion's lectures were not, indeed, calculated to make 

 any of his pupils partial to that branch of fcience; and I have 

 heard Dr. Robifon fay, that he firft attracted the regard of 

 that admirer of antient geometry by owning his diflike of 

 algebra, and by returning a neat geometrical folution of a 

 problem which had been given out to the clafs in an algebraic 

 form. With this mode of folution the profeflbr was de- 

 lighted, though the pupil candidly acknowledged that it had 



B b % been 



