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.

David Fordyce (bap. 1711, d. 1751)

About Fordyce

  • Professor of Moral Philosophy at Marischal College, University of Aberdeen, 1742 to 1751

Teaching

  • The Elements of Moral Philosophy – based on his ethics lectures (Wood, Aberdeen Enlightenment 53*)

Publications, Manuscripts, and other Resources

  • David Fordyce, The Elements of Moral Philosophy, in Three Books with a Brief Account of the Nature, Progress, and Origin of Philosophy, ed Thomas Kennedy (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2003) Available from Online Library of Liberty.
  • David Fordyce, ‘A Brief Account of the Nature, Progress and Origin of Philosophy delivered by the late Mr. David Fordyce, P. P. Marish. Col: Abdn. to his Scholars, before they begun the Philosophical course. Anno 1743/4’. (Johnson’s Handlist: ‘Fair copy written after death of Fordyce’) [AUL, MS M.184]

*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.