162 SIMSON. 



pupil, Dr. Moore, the Greek professor, and author of 

 the celebrated Grammar, also an excellent mathema- 

 tician and great admirer of the ancient geometry, wrote 

 the inscription which appears under it, marking its 

 author's own taste in more ways than one : 



" Geometriam sub tyranno barbaro, sseva servitute, diu langnentem. 

 vindicavit unus." 



His character was lofty and pure : nothing could 

 exceed his love of justice, and dislike of anything 

 sordid or low; nor could he ever bear to hear men 

 reviling one another, and, least of all, speaking evil of 

 the absent or the dead. In this he closely resembled 

 his celebrated pupil Mr. Watt. His religious as well 

 as moral feelings were strong, and they were habitual. 

 No one in his presence ever ventured on the least 

 irreverent or indecorous allusion; and we find the 

 periods of his geometrical discoveries mentioned with 

 the date and the place, and generally an addition of 

 "Deo" or "Christo laus," an example of which we 

 have above presented. 



He never was married. Of his brothers, one, Thomas, 

 was Professor of Medicine at St. Andrew's, and author 

 of an ingenious and original work on the Brain ; his 

 son succeeded him as professor. Another brother was 

 a dissenting minister at Coventry; and a third, also 

 settled there, had a son, Robert, first in the army, 

 afterwards in the English Church Mr. Pitt, probably 

 from his love of the mathematics, having presented 

 him to a living in the north of England. He was Dr. 

 Simson's heir-at-law, and to him the estates were left. 

 He sold them in 1789, as well Kirton Hill as Knock 

 Ewart, which had been purchased by the Professor's 

 father in 1713. A niece of Dr. Simson was married 

 to Dr. Moore, the well-known novelist, and was mother 

 of the General. That illustrious warrior was therefore 

 great nephew of the mathematician. Mrs. Moore sur- 

 vived to a recent period, and died in extreme old age. 



