MR small's biographical SKETCH OF PROF. ADAM FERGUSON. 651 



he had enunciated in 1769, when he published his " Institutes of Moral Philo- 

 sophy," In that work, when treating of Political Institutions, he had thus ex- 

 pressed himself, — " Institutions that preserve equality, that engage the minds of 

 the citizens in public duties, that teach them to estimate rank by the measure of 

 personal qualities, tend to preserve and to cultivate virtue." The progress of the 

 French Revolution, however, had, by the time when he published his lectures, 

 cooled the general enthusiasm for liberty; and Ferguson, who seems in 1769 to 

 have held extreme views, at length admitted the necessity for inequality in rank, 

 and the expediency of hereditary distinctions and of an aristocracy. * 



In 1793 Ferguson was elected an honorary member of the Academy of 

 Sciences of Berlin. He was also a member of the Academy at Florence, of the 

 Etruscan Society of Antiquaries at Cortona, and of the Arcadia at Rome. 



From his knowledge of the Gaelic language, and from his early friendship 

 with James M'Pherson, he was at this time consulted as to the proposed publi- 

 cation of the original Gaelic of the Poems of Ossian. 



M'Pherson had from the first professed his willingness to satisfy the public 

 as to the authenticity of Ossian's Poems, by printing the originals which had 

 come into his possession. At the same time, when urged by the Committee of 

 the Highland Society, he always pleaded want of leisure as his excuse for with- 

 holding them from the world. In 1793, however, a few years before his death, 

 he prepared to comply with the generally expressed desire, but a difficulty arose 

 as to the selection of the character and spelling to be adopted in printing the 

 Gaelic language. It appears from the following exceedingly interesting letter, 

 addressed to Ferguson, that he had resolved to adopt the letters of the Greek 

 alphabet, as more adequately representing the niceties of Gaelic pronunciation. 

 With the view of making a trial of this method, he printed a specimen sheet, 

 containing a passage from the Gaelic translation of the Bible in Greek characters, 

 which he submitted to the criticism of his friends : — 



" London, May 21 s#, 1793. 

 " My Dear Sir, — I wrote you a few lines some time ago, wherein, if I re- 

 collect aright, I promised to send you soon after an answer to your letter of the 

 8th of April, on the subject of the proposed printing the original of the Poems of 

 OssiAN in the Greek character. Having been, at the time of receiving your 

 letter, immersed in a hurry of business, from which I have not, as yet, wholly 

 extricated myself, I desired a gentleman, who has for many years, in conjunc- 

 tion with myself, thought critically, of the Gaelic language, to throw our opinion 

 upon paper, at his convenience, more for your satisfaction than from either a 

 wish or expectation of making converts of others. This he has done accordingly, 



* Institutes, 2d ed., page 293. The Lectures on Moral Philosophy were translated into 

 French, and attracted much attention abroad. 



VOL. XXIIl. PART III. 8 N 



