RAMSAY, ANDREW MICHAEL ( ) . A Scotehman who became a Roman Catholic in France, where he was known as the Chevalier de Ramsay. He was born at Ayr. the on of a baker, studied at the University of Edinburgh. and became a tutor in a nobleman's family. Being preoccupied with religious questions, he sought the leading theologians of his own coun try and also those of Holland, whither he went attached to the English army during the War of the Spanish Succession. He became acquainted with the mystic I'oiret, and visited Fenelon in France in 1710. and by them was led to adopt the Roman Catholic faith. He remained with Fenelon until the latter's death in 1715, inherited the paper, of his distinguished mentor, and be came his biographer. After Fenelon's death Ramsay became tutor to the Due de Chfiteau Thierry, and later went to Rome to act as tutor to the two sons of the Pretender, •lames Francis Edward. In 1730 he visited England and was
made a member of the Royal society. After his return to Paris he became tutor to the Vicomte de Turenue. His works, composed in good French, won him considerable popularity, but are now al most wholly forgotten. Among them are: Discours de la pot'sie originally printed as preface of Taemague (17171: Essai philosophique sur le gouvernement civil (1721) ; Tie de Ft'nelon (1723), translated into English by N. Hooke; Le psychonu'tre, on rqlexions stn• les differents caractercs de l'esprit, par no milord anglais, an essay dealing with Lord Shaftesbury': Chtzrac trristics: Les voyages de Cyrus, avec un diseour•s sur la mythologic (les /miens (1727) : Poems (l728): Plan of Education for et Young Prince (1732): L'histoire du l'icomte de Turenne (1733).