BLAIR, HUGH (1718-1800), Scottish Presbyterian divine, was born on April 7, 1718, at Edinburgh, and educated at the university there. After holding various preferments he became pastor of the High Church, Edinburgh, the most important charge in Scotland. In 1762 he became the first occupant of the chair of rhetoric and belles-lettres in Edinburgh university, with a salary of f70 a year. He published in 1763 a laudatory Disserta tion on Macpherson's Ossian. His Sermons (1777-1801) were praised by Samuel Johnson, and were translated into almost every language of Europe. In 1780 George III. conferred upon Blair a pension of £200 a year. In 1783 he retired from his pro fessorship and published his Lectures on Rhetoric, which have been frequently reprinted. He died on Dec. 27, 1800.
See J. Hall, Account of Life and Writings of Hugh Blair (1807).