$58 
commerce, began now alfo, from time to 
time, to appear. Various juridical tracts. 
and collections, of great merit, were pub- 
lithed. The love of poetry was now 
fafhionable among the GREAT in Eng- 
Jand. And Miichell, Mallet,  Ramfay, 
Thomjfon, with various cther perfons from 
among the Scots, attempted to diftin- 
guifh themfelves in an art which had con- 
ferred fame and wealth upon Pepe, Ad- 
difon, Swift, Young, and Gay. Ram/ay was 
a man of but little vigour of imagination 
or comprehenfion of mind : it cannot be 
doubted but he received much affiftance 
from fome of his literary friends and pa- 
trons, in compofing the Gentle Shepherd. 
Forbes, prefident of the court of Sef- 
fion, wrote, about this time, fome valu- 
able traéts upon the truth of Chriftianity. 
Freebairn, a printer of fome learning, 
emitted from his prefs, good editions of 
feveral works, relative to the hiftory and 
antiquities of Scotland, as well as of fome 
of the Roman claflics. 
Ruppimawn, the learned keeper of the 
Advocates labrary, difinguifhed himfelf 
by the publication of many works, anti- 
quarian and philofophical, of various me- 
rit, and becoming alfo a printer, pro- 
duced new editions of Livy, and of fome 
ether claffical authors, which are, for 
correGinefs, fiill the pride of Scottifh - 
typography. Wor is it to be forgotten 
that the celebrated Ardu‘hnot, the Tory- 
phyfician, the friend ef Pope and Swift, 
illuftrious by his wit, his tafte, his claf- 
fical erudition, his medical fcience, was a 
Scotf{man. 
Inthe univerfities, Maclaurin, at Edin- 
burgh, now taught the. philofophy of | 
Wewton, with eminent fkill and fuccefs ; 
lackwell, at. Aberdeen, diftinguithed 
himfelf asa {cholar of erudition, unrivalled 
among his countrymen; asa philofopher 
and a critic, capable of refearch. inven- 
tien, and acute difcrimination ; as a wri- 
ter, lively, vigorous, interefting, but 
pompous, affected, impure in diétion, and 
ancorreét. At Glafsow, Huichefon im- 
proved, embellithed, and fyftematized - 
that mcral philofophy which Shafie/bury had 
borrowed from the ancients; teaching it 
with an amenity of manner, and with a 
partly Socratic, partly Platonic, elo- 
quence, which enchanted every ftudent, 
and recommended his doétrines toa very 
ardent reception ameng all his hearers.— 
din hifiory, were publifhed the collec- 
tions of Keb, Woarow, Mackenzie the 
biographer, <Adercromby, and others, of 
-no great merit. A medical {chool began 
te be formed.at Edinburgh, in imitation 
Interefling Progrefs of Literature in Scotland. 
[ N ov. 
of that of Leyden. Martin, of Sr. An- 
drew’s, publifhed an excellent eflay upon 
the thermometer. The ufe of Latin be- 
gan to yield to that of Englith, in the 
leétures in the univerfities. The clergy 
began flowly to join to the ftudy of Dzicb 
and Genevaa fy ftems of theology, that of 
the fermons and other works of thofe il- 
luftrious Englifh divines who flourifhed 
in that golden age of the church of 
England, which comprehends the laft 
forty years of the feventeenth century, 
and, the irk twenty years of the 
eighteenth. New/papers and a Magazine 
likewife began to be regularly publithed 
at Edinburgh, and with a fuccefs fufa- 
ciently encouraging to the publifhers. In 
proportion as the accumulated wealth of 
Scotland continued to increafe ; in pro- 
portion as its conneétion with England_ 
was drawn ftill clofer and clofer; direét- 
ly in thefe proportions did the Scots, 
during the firft half of this eighteenth 
century, erthance their earneftnefs in the 
cultivation of the arts and {ciences, and 
advance with increafing fuccefs in this 
career. The chief defeét in the Scor- 
_tifh literature of this period was, that 
the Scots had in general ceafed to write 
their own peculiar dialeét, of which they 
were now aihamed, but had not yet learn~ 
to write génuine idiomatic Englith. 
But it was not till after the Whigs aad 
the Yorzes had united in that fort of im- 
perfeét coalition, which drove Sir Robert 
Walpole from the-helm of the Britith 
adminiftration ; it was not till after the 
laft effort of the Scots in favour of the 
Houfe of Stuart had been’ defeated ; it 
was not till after the national govern- 
ment and the court had adopted a, new 
plan of policy in regard tothe Scottifh . 
Tories, and had determined to foothe, to | 
conciliate, to favour—no longer to dif- 
countenance, to thwart, to opprefs 
them; that the Scots began to apply 
themfelves to almoft every branch of li- 
terature and f{cience, with an ardour and 
a fuccefs which were to awaken a new 
emulation in their neighbours of Eng- 
land, and to make the Scotéi/a rank with 
the Greciaz, the Roman, the Ttahan, and 
the Gadlic names, in the €ftimation of all 
the votaries of either profound or elegant 
learning. While this zra was faft ap- 
proaching, Thom/fon, the friend of Taltot 
and of Lyttelton, publithed fome of his — 
beft plays and poems ; Gordoz diftinguifh- 
ed himfelf by a nervous, although harfh, 7 
tranflation of Tacitus ;-Gwtbrie and Dux =" 
cax produced feveral other tranflations” 
of high excellence frem different Romaw 
authors, 
