ROBERTSON, WILLIAM, file historian, was born in the year 1721, in the county of Edinburgh, and in the parish of Borthwick, of which his father was minister. He went to school at Dalkeith, a few miles distant from his home; but in 1733 his father's appointment to a charge in Edinburgh gave him the opportunity of attending school and college there. He was licensed as a preacher in 1741, and in 1743 was ordained to the parish of Gladsmuir, where the battle of Prestoupans was to be fought two years afterward, In "the '45," be showed his zeal for the govornment cause by joining a body of volunteers formed in Edinburgh; and when the majority of his comrades saw Unit it was useless for them to attempt to defend the town, he, with a few whom he had infected with his ardor, went to offer their services to sir John Cope. The latter, conscious that he had already too many elements of imperfect discipline in his army, had the prudence to decline this offer. Robertson afterward became a leader in what was called " the moderate" side in the ecclesiastical courts; and in 1758 was promoted to one of the Edinburgh charges, where he had increased opportunities of influence. In 1759 he published his celebrated History of Scotland. He avowedly passed over the earlier periods, speaking of them as "dark and fabulous," which no doubt they were in the hands of those who had treated them; but it may be regretted that Robertson did not bring his acuteness to bear on the materials for their elucidation. In 1762 he was made
principal of the university of Edinburgh. In 1769 he published the Ilistory tf the Reign of the Emperor Charles V, to which he prefixed a View of the State of Soeisty in Europe from the subversion of the Roman Empire to the beginning of the Sixteenth Century.
This is the most valuable of his works. The field has been often since gone over by authors who have discovered much new material, but all the use they have made of it has become a sort of tribute to the natural sagacity of Robertson. His History of America was published in 1777. These works are admirable for their elegant and vigorous style. Robertson died in 1793. Ile was a genial man, with a large circle of friends. • He had great conversational powers, and was reputed to be fond of displaying them. Interesting notices of his early life will be found in the autobiography of his friend Dr. Carlyle, and a sketch of the closing years is given in lord Cockburn's Memo rkds of his Life and Times,