350 Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Robifon. 



The ftudy of mathematics has generally the efTecl: to form 

 to penfive and compofed habits ofthought, the ftudent who 

 attaches himfelf to it earneftly. It had, at an early hour, 

 this influence on Dr. Robison. In focial converfe he 

 was the delight of his fellow-ftudents, and was capable of as 

 much vivacity and cheerfulnefs even as thofe among them 

 who might be the moil innocent of profound thought. But, 

 he delighted to (hut himfelf up and mufe alone in his cham- 

 ber, to fteal out in folitary walks along the banks of the 

 Clyde, to indulge in that ftudious melancholy which is fo 

 much akin to true genius. It was not without a fort of 

 friendly violence that he could be carried from this employ- 

 ment of his hours away into fociety. But his converfation, 

 when he could be brought among them, was too engaging, 

 not to invite his companions often thus to break in upon, 

 what they though^ the extreme feverity and reclufenefs of 

 his ftudies. 



He was contemporary as a ftudent in the univcrflty of 

 Glafgow with a number of gentlemen, profeflfors and ftu- 

 dents, who, like himfelf, will ever be diftinguifhed among 

 the firft ornaments of the age to which they belong. He ob- 

 tained the friendfhip of Mr. Windham, lately Secretary at 

 IVar, who was then acquiring, under Millar and Smith, 

 the principles of political, oecumenical, and legiflative phi- 

 lofophy. Richardson, fince eminent as a poet, a critic, 

 a philofopher, and a profeflbr, about that time finifhed his 

 ftudies at Glafgow, and went to Ruffia in the family of the 

 late Lord Cathcart, the Britifti Ambaflador to that Court. 

 Dr. John Gilltes, the learned interpreter of Ariftotle, 

 was then entering fuccefsfully upon the ftudies in which he 

 has become flnce fo eminent. Dr. Rob i son lived, for a 

 time, in the houfe of Principal Leech man, one of the moft 

 pious, learned, and liberal-minded divines, that adorned any 

 religious eftablifhment in the eighteenth century. 



The civilization of Russia, as far as it has advanced, 

 has been the work chiefly of the Germans and the Scots. 

 Her Imperial Majefty, Catherine the Second, was then re- 

 viving the great naval defigns of Peter the Firft. She was, 

 for that end, defirous to eftablifh marine fchools, in which 

 young fea-officers might be inftru&ed in thofe parts of ma- 

 thematics without which a {hip's reckoning cannot be 

 kept, obfervations cannot be made at fea, nor can the duties 

 of a naval engineer be performed. By the intervention, we 

 believe, of Lord Cathcart, an invitation from the Ruffian 

 Government was fent, to draw a number of young mathe- 

 maticians from the univerfities of Scotland, to teach in thofe 

 6 marine 



