LORD WOODHOUSELEE. 529 
placed in some one of those public literary stations, where his 
talents and his industry might be more conspicuously displayed 
than in the retirement of private study. An opening of this 
kind soon occurred, which Mr Tytxer willingly embraced. The 
late Joun Prinexe, Esq. had been recently appointed to the 
Professorship of Universal History and Roman Antiquities in 
the University of Edinburgh ; but finding the discharge of the 
duties of it incompatible with his other employments, had ex~- 
pressed his inclination to resign it. The Class, (I believe,) in. 
its original institution, in this and in other Universities of Scot- 
land, had been intended as subsidiary to the study of the Civil 
Law. It had been taught always by Members of the Faculty 
of Advocates, and attended by students of that description : 
And it had, therefore, that degree of relation to Mr Tyt1izn’s 
own profession, that forfeited none of the hopes or expecta- 
tions he might form of its future distinctions. An arrange- 
ment was soon made with Mr Prinexe. In 1780, Mr Tyrrer 
was appointed Conjunct Professor, and in 1786, sole Professor: 
of Universal History. 
From that period until the year 1800, Mr Tyr1ter devoted 
his life almost exclusively to the duties of his Professorship ; 
and ten years of assiduous study were employed in the com- 
position and improvement of the Course of Lectures which he 
annually read in the University. 
- Of the character and value of that Course of Lectures I 
should have felt it a duty to have attempted some slight de- 
scription, if I were not prevented by the presence of many, to 
whom every attempt of this kind would be superfluous, and by 
the recollection, that while they remain unpublished, they 
cannot be the objects of public criticism. I may be permit- 
ted, however, to offer to the Society a few observations upon 
the views with which Mr TytLex entered upon his Professor- 
ship, 
