David Verner (d. 1752)

About Verner

  • Regent at Aberdeen

Teaching

  • ‘Natural jurisprudence figured in his 1731 thesis…since he there alluded to Grotius and Puffendorf, and touched on the origins of private property rights.’ (Wood, Aberdeen Enlightenment 39*)

Publications, Manuscripts and other Resources

  • Dissertatio philosophica, de passionibus sive affectibus, quam … in auditorio publico Academiae Novae Abredonensis, ad diem [ ] Aprilis, propugnabunt, David Verner praeses, et hi candidati laurea magisteriali condonandi (Abredeis : Nicol, 1721) [University of Aberdeen, Special Collections: SBL 1721 N 1 (Xerox copy)]
  • Dissertatio … philosophica … de finibus bonorum et benevolentia (Aberdeen, 1730) [University of Glasgow, Special Collections: Sp Coll BG57-k.34]

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

 

James Beattie (1735-1803)

About Beattie

  • Professor of Moral Philosophy and Logic at Marischal College (1760-1797)
  • Sometime librarian at Marischal College

NPG D23555; James Beattie by James Watson, after  Sir Joshua Reynolds

James Beattie
by James Watson, after Sir Joshua Reynolds, mezzotint,
published 1775 (1773)
NPG D23555
© National Portrait Gallery, London
Creative Commons Licence

Publications

  • An essay on nature and immutability of truth; in opposition to sophistry and scepticism. By James Beattie, Professor of Moral Philosophy and Logic in Marischal College and University of Aberdeen (Edinburgh: printed for A. Kincaid & J. Bell. Sold, at London, by E. & C. Dilly, in the Poultry, 1770) [multiple editions into the 19th century] Second edition (1772) available online from Google Books.
  • Dissertations moral and critical. On memory and imagination. On dreaming. The theory of language. On fable and romance. On the attachments of kindred. Illustrations on sublimity. By James Beattie, LL. D. Professor of Moral Philosophy and Logick in the Marischal College and University of Aberdeen; and Member of the Zealand Society of Arts and Sciences (London: printed for W. Stahan, and T. Cadell in the Strand; and W. Creech, at Edinburgh, 1783) First volume available onine through Google Books.
  • Elements of Moral Science. By James Beattie, LL. D. Professor Of Moral Philosophy And Logick In Marischal College, Aberdeen (printed for T. Cadell, London, and William Creech, Edinburgh, [1790-93])
  • James Beattie’s Day-book, 1773-1798, edited with an introduction and notes by Ralph S. Walker (Aberdeen : Printed for the Third Spalding club, 1948)

Material in Libraries and Archives

  • Papers of and relating to James Beattie (1735-1803) Professor of Moral Philosophy and Logic, poet, essayist and moral philosopher, c. 1758-c. 1799, University of Aberdeen (Archives Hub Description of Material)
  • ‘James Beattie’s day book’, 2 vols (1768-1798), Universitiy of Aberdeen, Special Libraries and Archives (AUL), MS 30/14-15
  • ‘James Beattie’s “Journal of Session”‘ (1761-1793) and diary of his first visit to London (1773), AUL MS 30/16
  • Notebook entitled ‘List of Books belonging to Dr Beattie, Aberdeen, 27 July 1785’, AUL MS 30/47
  • J Beattie, ‘Essay on Slavery and copy of lectures on moral philosophy and logic’ (1788 and undated), AUL MS 30/49
  • J Beattie, ‘Abstract of lectures on Philosophy of human mind, 1779-1780′(transcribed by Adam Martin), AUL MS M.185
  • J Beattie, ‘Notes on Moral Philosophy, Vol 1, 1773-1774’ (transcribed by James Smith), AUL MS M.185.2
  • J Beattie, ‘Notes on a System of Philosophy’ (1776) (transcribed by W Duncan) , AUL MS M.185.3
  • J Beattie, ‘Abstract of lectures on Philosophy of human mind’ (c 1784), AUL MS M.186
  • J Beattie, ‘Abstract of lectures on Philosophy of human mind’ (nd), AUL MS M.187
  • J Beattie, ‘Elements of moral science’ (1776-1777), AUL MS M 18./1
  • J Beattie, ‘Logicae compendium sub dialogi forma’ (nd),AUL MS M 187.2
  • J Beattie, ‘Abstract of lectures on moral philosophy'(1777-1778) (transcribed by J Findlater), AUL MS M.187.3
  • J Beattie, Lectures, 1780s (transcribed by W Paterson), AUL MS M.404
  • J Beattie, ‘Philosophy’ (1762-1773), AUL MS 555 [514 pages of notes including on jurisprudence and on ethics and moral philosophy and various aspects of ethics (Johnson’s Handlist: Text similar to M.185/30)]

Links

Short James Beattie biography at Northern Lights: The Scottish Enlighenment.

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

Alexander Gerard (1728-1795)

About Gerard

  • Studied with David Fordyce
  • First professor of moral philosophy and logic at Aberdeen, 1753-1760
  • Professor of divinity at Marischal (1760-1771) then King’s College (from 1771), Aberdeen
  • Sometime college librarian at Marischal, c. 1768

Teaching

  • ‘Under the heading of speculative jurisprudence, he focussed on the cluster of concepts connected with the notion of natural law, and claimed that most of these concepts were derived from the immediate perceptions of moral sense’. (Wood, Aberdeen Enlightenment 114*)

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

George Turnbull (1698-1748)

About Turnbull

  • Regent at Aberdeen, 1721-1727
  • Tutor to Andrew Wauchope of Niddry and Thomas Watson

Teaching

  • ‘In his elaborate manual for the education of the virtuous republican citizen and dutiful office-holder in the divine corporation [Observations upon Liberal Education (London, 1742)], Turnbull includes the study of Roman law, followed by natural law, as essential. More particularly, he recommends Grotius, Pufendorf, and his own Heineccius….’ (Haakonssen, Natural law 98*)

Publications, Manuscripts, and other Resources

  • Johann Gottlieb Heineccius, A Methodical System of Universal Law: Or, the Laws of Nature and Nations, with Supplements and a Discourse by George Turnbull. Translated from the Latin by George Turnbull, edited with an Introduction by Thomas Ahnert and Peter Schröder (London 1741; repr Indianapolis: Liberty Fund 2008). Available from Online Library of Liberty.
  • G Turnbull, The Principles of Moral Philosophy (London, 1740) Available from Google Books and the Internet Archive

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

Henry Scougal (1650-1678)

About Scougal

  • Regent at Aberdeen

Teaching

  • Cited Cumberland, De legibus naturae (1672) in theses of 1673 (Haakonssen, ‘Natural’ 262*)

Publications, Manuscripts and other Resources

  • Philosophiae moralis tractatus (1678) University of Aberdeen, Special Libraries and Archives MS 1026

 

NPG D30917; Henry Scougal by Thomas Trotter

Henry Scougal
by Thomas Trotter
line engraving, published 1796
NPG D30917
© National Portrait Gallery, London
Creative Commons Licence

*For references, please see the Site Bibliography.

James Dunbar (d. 1798)

About Dunbar

  • At King’s College, Aberdeen 1765-1795

Teaching

  • ‘Dunbar’s lectures comprised three principal elements: the philosophy of mind, in which he was greatly influenced by Thomas Reid; ethics, which saw him draw on Francis Hutcheson‘s idea of innate human sociability and a universal moral code based on natural benevolence; and political economy, a new subject at King’s and one influenced by Adam Smith‘s Wealth of Nations (1776).’ [ODNB*]

Publications, Manuscript, and other Resources

  • J Dunbar, ‘Institutes of moral philosophy’ [1789-1794], University of Aberdeen, Special Collections MS 3107/5/2/6

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

Patrick Hardie

About Hardie

  • Regent at Aberdeen

Teaching

  • ‘…critical of Hobbes, and it would appear from Hardie’s thesis that he attacked Hobbes’s account of moral laws in his lectures on natural jurisprudence’. (Wood, Aberdeen Enlightenment 39-40*)

Publications, Manuscripts and Other Resources

  • Amplissimo ac ornatissimo Domino D. Gulielmo Forbes … theses hasce philosophicas … D.D.C.Q. Patricius Hardie praeses et hi candidati laurea magisteriali condecorandi … Qui … theses hasce … publice propugnabunt, in Collegio Novo Universitatis Carolinae Abredonensis, ad 11 diem Aprilis, 1722 (Aberdeen, 1722)

*For references, see the Site Bibliography.

1 2