In 1768, Mr Ferguson was applied to by the Earl of Warwick to take charge of his two younger sons, the Honourable Charles and Robert Greville, whose eldest brother Lord Greville had received pert of his education under the eye of Principal Robertson. These young gentlemen resided some years in his house, and both they and their tutor Mr Macpherson repaid his attention to their improvement by the warmest affection and gratitude. Lord Warwick, who had been advised by General Clerk to place his sons under Mr Ferguson's care, was not insensible of the " great benefit they had reaped from his tui tion, and advantageous as well as manly and friend ly conversation." Mr, afterwards Sir John, Mac pherson, at the same time acknowledged, that " to him he owed all his knowledge, as well as all his suc cess in life." On the appointment of Mr Balfour to the Profes sorship of the Law of Nature and Nations, in 1764, Mr Ferguson was elected by the Magistrates of Edin burgh to succeed him in the chair of Moral Philoso phy. This had long been a favourite object of his ambition, and about ten years before, when the able and accomplished Mr Cleghorn was on his death-bed, he urged his young friend to apply for the elle% which, in his apprehension, no man was more capa ble of adorning. Mr Cleghorn, after expressing his regret at having no such influence with the patrons as to secure such an arrangement, added, as Mr Fergu -son sometimes related with much emotion, " I can only say of you, as Hamlet did of Fontinbras, He has my dying voice." Mr Ferguson entered on his new duties with a de gree of spirit and activity, from which the most splen did results were to be anticipated. In one particular, his mode of lecturing was singular, and not easily imi tated. After having delineated the general plan of his course, and committed it to writing, he resolved not to write a system of lectures, but to endeavour to make himself master of every part of his subject, and to trust to the moment of delivery for the expression of his sentiments. This method of discoursing was in his hands very happily executed; but its success depended, in a great measure, on the state of his health and spirits, as well as upon the interest excited by the different subjects of discussion. Perhaps no lec turer, with the exception of his immediate successor, was ever more admired. His class was crowded by great numbers of gentlemen of high rank and offi cial station, as well as by younger students. In the mean time, eagerly as he applied to the discharge of his professional duties, his attention was extended to other branches of inquiry; and within little more than a year after he commenced his labours as a lecturer on morals, he sent to the press, his Essay on the History of Civil Society ; a work which was received with an expression of public applause, which even exceeded the high expectations of his friends. " Ferguson's book (says Mr Hume, writing to Dr Robertson from London) goes on here with great success." Gray, the poet, says, a There are uncommon strains of elo quence in it; and I was surprised to find not one single idiom of his country (I think) in the whole work." Mr Hume, in a letter to the author (dated 10th March 1767), congratulates him on the success of the book, adding that he had " met with nobody that had read it who did not praise it. Lord Mans field is very loud to that purpose in his Sunday So cieties. I heard Lord Chesterfield and Lord Lyttle. ton express the same sentiment; and what is above all; Caddel, I am told, is already projecting a second edition of the same quarto size." Mr Hume then informs him, that Lord Shelburne and Lord Bute were among his most zealous partizans; the last de claring the look one of the best he ever read. Charles Townshend appears to have been of the same opi nion, as he rad it five times over.
General Clerk had pressed the author to dedicate his work to Lord Shelburne, who had signified his • intention of offering Mr Ferguson the government of West Florida; upon which occasion his Lordship laughed very heartily, when the General expressed his conviction, that Mr Ferguson was more usefully em ployed as a teacher of science. The book, however, appeared without any dedication. In the course of the Wowing year, Lord Shelburne intimated a hope of getting Mr Ferguson established with a proper ap pointment at Oxford ; and some other persons of in fluence meditated a design of employing him in one of the departments of state. This purpose was fru*.
trated in all probability by a temper, which did not permit him to accommodate himself to the views of those whose maxims of conduct be did not entirely approve. Another circumstance may be con sidered as having also operated to obstruct the fulfil ment of the schemes which were devised for his ad vancement. At this time he married Miss Burnet, a young lady nearly connected with his mother's fa mily, and still more nearly related to his intimate friend Dr Black. Soon afterwards he began to cul tivate a farm in the parish of Currie, and, at a con siderable sacrifice of private interest, gratified his taste for improvement by transforming a barren heath into a scene which became distinguished for beauty and fertility.
It was impossible, however, for any combination of circumstances to abate his literary .. activity; and he
not only continued to conduct the business of his class with unremitted diligence, but seized every interval of leisure which he could command, to collect materials for a history of the Roman Commonwealth. While be was proceeding in his researches, he was solicited by Philip, Earl of Stanhope (the editor of Dr Robert Simson's posthumous works), and the other guar dians of Charles, Earl of Chesterfield, to superintend the education of that young nobleman, then in his nine teenth year. The negociation was conducted through the mediation of Dr Adam Smith, who, judging the offer to be advantageous to his friend, exerted himself with great earnestness to induce him to accept it. Lord Stanhope was extremely anxious to obtain the able services of Dr Ferguson without delay, as he con ceived it to be of the utmost consequence to his young kinsman to be placed under the care of " a person so well qualified to complete the remaining part of his education, and to repair the neglects, omissions, and errors, which had unfortunately been committed in the former part of it." The proposal had originally been made early in the year 1773, and was renewed in De. cember, soon after the commencement of the session of the college, when Dr Ferguson was engaged not only in teaching his own class, but also in lecturing on natural philosophy, the professorship of which had recently become vacant by the death of his relation Mr Russell. He was not able to prevail on the pa trons to accept of a substitute to complete the labours of that session ; but after obtaining leave of absence for the next session, he joined his young charge at Geneva, in May 1774, and at first entertained hopes that his labours might prove beneficial. The connec tion, however, was not so agreeable as he expected, and it terminated about twelve months afterwards. In the mean time, he had very nearly been deprived of his office in the University. The town-council had, at his desire, appointed Mr John Bruce (then assist ant, and afterwards successor to Mr Stevenson) to teach the Moral Philosophy during, the session 1774 and 1775; but before of the session, they thought fit to rescind this act, and to declare the office vacant. His friends in the University, particu larly Drs Robertson, Blair, and Black, were exceed ingly indignant at this proceeding; more especially as Sir John Pringle had been permitted to be several years absent; and at that very time the Professors of Mathematics, and of the Theory of Medicine, hail both been allowed to discharge their duty by substi tutes for two years without quarrel. As the council, however, seemed to have determined to fill up the place by a new election, it became necessary for his friends to apply to the Court of Session to put a stop to their proceedings. 1( I have been much obliged (says he, in a letter to a friend) to the general voice that was raised in my favour, as well as to the ar dent zeal of particular friends. Ilay Campbell (af terwards Lord President) has given me proofs of friendship which I can never forget. Pulteney has behaved to me in every thing as he would have done at the beginning of the Poker Club. I have always been an'advocate for mankind, and am a more deter mined one than ever; the fools and knaves are no more than necessary to give others something to do." After his return, he continued, as formerly, to divide his time between his literary and agricultural pursuits, and engaged occasionally in the political controversies which agitated the country during the progress of the American war. Besides his pamphlet, in answer to Dr Price's observations on liberty, he communicated his views from time to time to Sir William Pulteney, and other members of Parliament; and when it was resolved by government to send out Commissioners to quiet the disorders in the colonies, he was appointed secretary to the Commission. It appears from a letter of General Putnam, dated July 1778, that the nomi nation of Dr Ferguson was very agreeable to the more intelligent part of the Americans, who, not without reason, were dissatisfied to find that the commissioners were fettered by restrictions, which rendered their ap pointment nugatory. " I am very sorry (he writes) that the Parliament of Great Britain is still so blind to their own and our interest, as to send Dr Ferguson and the rest of the worthy gentlemen over to America with limited power, and that to last only till July 1779. and then to be revoked by them if they think fit, by which means I am deprived of seeing your friend Dr Ferguson, which gives me great pain, as I always have heard of his being a gentleman of the first character for learning, good pense, and humanity." It is well known, that the Commissioners returned without accomplishing the object of their mission; but they had an opportunity of acquiring more useful information of the state and temper of the country than government had received in all the previous course of the contest. While Dr Ferguson was absent during the session 1778, 1779, his place was sup plied by Mr Dugald Stewart, who, about five years afterwards, was destined to succeed him in the Chair of Moral Philosophy.