ME small's biographical SKETCH OF PROF. ADAM FERGUSON. 607 



" If the Justice Clerk considers the matter aright, he Avill never agree to so 

 unreasonable a demand as that of paying more ; and I hope you will second 

 these arguments with all your usual eloquence, by which you so successfully 

 confound the devices of Satan, and bring sinners to repentance. — I am, Rev. Sir, 

 your most obsequious humble servant."* 



The negotiations above referred to were unsuccessful, and Mr Abercromby 

 was succeeded in the Chair of the Law of Nature and Nations by Mr Robert 

 Bruce in 1759.f 



The long wished for opportunity of obtaining for Ferguson an academic 

 appointment soon after occurred, for a vacancy took place, in 1759, by the death of 

 Dr John Stewart, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh . 

 The Town Council, who were the patrons of this Chair, after consultation with the 

 ministers of the city, appointed Ferguson on the 4th of July of the same year. 



Ferguson immediately began to prepare his lectures, so as to be ready to 

 conduct his class when the University session was opened in October. Notwith- 

 standing the shortness of the time at his disposal, he was so successful in his 

 teaching, that " David Hume said Ferguson had more genius than any of them, 

 as he had made himself so much master of a difficult science, — viz., natural 

 philosophy, which he had never studied but when at college, — in three months, 

 so as to be able to teach it."t 



In 1760, Ferguson was instigated by Dr Carlyle to publish a little volume, 

 to which the following quaint title was given, — The History of the Proceedings 

 in the Case of Margaret, commonly called Peg^ only lawful sister to John Bull, Esq.% 



The object of this publication, which went through two or three editions, was 

 to turn into ridicule the opposers of the Scotch Militia Bill, which had been 

 rejected in the preceding session of Parliament. The Act of Parliament by which 

 the militia of England was constituted did not apply to Scotland, as, on account 

 of the Rebellion of 1745, and the still existing jealousy of the Jacobites, Govern- 

 ment had felt alarm at the proposal to extend to the sister kingdom a measure 

 which should put arms into the hands of those who might turn them to revolu- 

 tionary purposes. This jealous feeling towards Scotland was the cause of con- 



* Hume's Life, by J. H. Burton, vol. ii. p. 47. 



t It may here be mentioned, that the Professorship of the Law of Nature and Nations — the 

 patronage of which was vested in the Crown — was then a sinecure, and was abolished in 1832. It 

 has however, been again revived as the Chair of Public Law, by the Universities' Commissioners of 

 1858. X Carlyle's Diary, p. 283. 



§ Lond. 1760, 12mo. — It may be interesting to those who possess this curious little volume, 

 which (from its having been published anonymously) has sometimes been attributed to Swift, to have 

 the following key to the principal characters referred to in it : — John Bull, England ; Sister Peg, 

 Scotland ; Nurse, Lord Hardwicke ; Jowler, Mr Pitt ; Hubble Bubble, Duke of Newcastle ; Boy 

 George, George Townshend, Esq. ; Bumbo, Lord President Dundas ; M'Lurcher, The Highlanders ; 

 Sir Thomas, The King ; Gilbert, Sir Gilbert Elliot, Bart. ; Squire Geoffrey, The Pretender ; Small 

 Trash, Charles Hope Weir ; Lick Pelf, Earl of Hopetoun ; James, James Oswald, Esq. ; Suckfist, 

 General Watson. 



VOL. XXIII. PART III. 8 B 



