# Thomas Reid/Chapter II

Layout 2
CHAPTER II
AT MARISCHAL COLLEGE
1722—1737
At the age of twelve Reid emerges out of the obscurity in which his boyhood lies concealed from us. In one of his letters to his cousin, Dr. James Gregory, written in his old age, he mentions ‘April 1722’ as the date of his first visit to Aberdeen, then a town of some eight thousand inhabitants, and twenty miles distant from the moorland valley in which he was born. He tells how he was taken to see his grandmother, who was living in Aberdeen, the second wife and widow of David Gregory of Kinairdy. 'I found her,' he says, 'old and bedridden, but I never saw a more ladylike woman. I was now and then called into her room, when she sat upon her bed, or entertained me with sweetmeats and grave advices. Her daughters that assisted her often, as well as one who lived with her, treated her as if she had been of a superior rank; and indeed her appearance and manner commanded respect. She and all her children were zealous Presbyterians: the first wife’s children were Tories and Episcopalians.' This picture of the boy in Aberdeen we owe to his movement from the country school in the valley of the Dee to the higher sphere of the Aberdeen Grammar School, which he seems to have entered in that April, encouraged perhaps by the prognostic of the ​Kincardine schoolmaster. The Grammar School Register tells that in 'October 1722' Thomas Reid left it to enter Marischal College, where his name appears in the list of those matriculated that autumn. It was an early age for University life according to later ideas, but not at variance with the custom of Scotland in those days. Burnet, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury, another eminent Aberdonian, entered Marischal College when he was only nine, and graduated when he was thirteen; and Burnet’s contemporary, Reid’s granduncle, James Gregory, graduated when he was not older than Burnet.
The uncouth and dilapidated structure in which the University of the Earls Marischal was housed when young Reid was spending his undergraduate years in it, bore no resemblance to the stately College on the same site which now adorns the prosperous city of Bon Accord. The process of decay was so rapid, and the case was so urgent, that a few years later the regents suspended their official claim to a part of the scanty funds of the College, and also asked help from the community, 'to preserve from ruin an university from whence so many accomplished men have gone forth as ornaments of their country in every age since its foundation.' The troubles of 1715 had further reduced its resources. Its Chancellor, the tenth Earl Marischal, concerned in the rising of Mar, then forfeited his title and the official connection of his family with the academical foundation of his ancestor. The Principal and most of the authorities had been removed or suspended by a commission of visitation in 1717. During the two years which followed the adventure of Mar the doors of Marischal College were closed, so that, when public instruction was resumed in 1717, a new race ​of teachers was in possession, and, as it happened, an era of intellectual activity was inaugurated.
Notwithstanding the humble accommodation which it offered, and the social revolution through which it had lately passed, Marischal College could then boast of at least three eminent teachers, imbued with the spirit of the 'new philosophy,' and of the reviving literary taste in Scotland. The Professor of Mathematics was Colin M'Laurin, brother of the eloquent Presbyterian preacher, himself among the foremost of British mathematicians, a friend and correspondent of the aged Newton, who, along with Reid's inherited disposition, attracted the young student to the study in which the teacher was a master. And about the time when Reid entered College, Thomas Blackwell, a critic of Homer, and author of Memoirs of the Court of Augustus, prominent among his countrymen who were anxious to write good English, became Professor of Greek, and for a generation encouraged classical taste and love of literature in the north of Scotland. But the teacher who chiefly influenced Reid's undergraduate life was George Turnbull, a copious author, though his books are little remembered now. He was Reid's guide for three years; for the College was then under a system of 'regents' which intrusted the student to the same teacher in all the three years given to 'philosophy'—natural as well as moral.
Reid was fortunate in entering Marischal College when it was inspired by M'Laurin, Blackwell, and Turnbull, each a leader in the scientific and literary awakening of the time. The Aberdeen of 1725 was no longer the Aberdeen of the ministers of whom Gordon in his Scots Affairs tells that they shrieked, 'downe with learning and up with Christ.' Their religion was in alliance with culture and progressive ​intelligence, anticipating in the North the intellectual enlargement associated in the West with the University of Glasgow under Hutcheson, Leechman, and Adam Smith.
George Turnbull is little known now, but he is too important a factor in the making of Thomas Reid to be lightly passed over. He was an Edinburgh graduate, born in 1698, and like Reid a son of the manse. He became a regent of philosophy in Marischal College at the age of twenty-three. The College record informs us that on the 14th of April 1726 he presented for graduation a band of thirty-nine students: the name of Thomas Reid appears last in the list. Turnbull’s lectures when he was regent were in 1740 embodied in his Principles of Moral Philosophy. His leading arguments are illustrated and vindicated by quotations from Berkeley's Theory of Vision and Principles of Human Knowledge, also by the Inquiry of Francis Hutcheson and the Sermons of Bishop Butler. The influence of Berkeley is evident.
The mottoes on the title-page of Turnbull’s book express his method of inquiry. One of them is the precept of Pope—'Account for moral as for natural things'; the other expresses in the words of Newton the consequence which may be expected to follow—'If Natural Philosophy, in all its parts, by pursuing this method, shall at length be perfected, the bounds of Moral Philosophy will also be enlarged.' Turnbull was among the first in Scotland to substitute, in mental philosophy, tentative study of the facts of human nature for logical deduction from abstract dogmas. 'If a fact be actually found, either in the outer world of sensible things, or in the inner and invisible world of mind, there is no room for reasoning against it. Every reasoning, however subtle, if it be repugnant in its ​conclusion to the actual fact of the case, must be sophistical.' Turnbull is fond of repeating that facts presented to the senses are not the only, nor yet the most important, facts which the universe contains. The invisible facts which take the form of beliefs and feelings and volitions are the deepest facts of all: spirit and not matter at last regulates life. Then he refers to what he calls 'common sense' as the final arbiter in all questions. 'Common sense is sufficient to teach those who think of the matter with seriousness and attention all the duties of common life; all our obligations to God and our fellow-men; all that is morally fit and binding.' In a word, spiritual facts of mind are not to be crushed out of existence by tangible and visible facts of matter. That mind in the form of will is the only known active power is another prominent lesson in Turnbull’s teaching. 'It is will alone that manifests power or productive energy. To speak of any other active power in the universe is to speak without meaning; because experience, the source of all the materials of our knowledge, does not lead us to any other conception of power.' Turnbull’s conception of the material world is very like Berkeley’s. Matter is the established or natural order in which sense ideas present themselves. 'Properly speaking, what we call matter and space are only sensible ideas, produced in us, according to an established or natural order, by some external cause; for when we speak of material things, we can only mean certain sensible perceptions that arise in our minds, according to a fixed order, but which are experienced to be absolutely inert or passive, having in themselves no productive force.’ It was in this philosophy that Turnbull's most famous pupil was educated at Marischal College.
​Turnbull’s official connection with the College lasted only six years. After inaugurating moral philosophy in the modern spirit in Scotland, he resigned in the spring of 1727, and, after some residence abroad, lived in London, producing books in excess of the demand for them. He ended by taking orders in the Irish branch of the Anglican Church, finding the communion of Jeremy Taylor and Berkeley more suited to his temper than the fervid Presbyterianism to which he was accustomed in his youth. In search of health, he died at the Hague in 1749.
I have enlarged on Turnbull, because by him Reid was first attracted to the study of the human mind. But Blackwell, the Professor of Greek, must not be forgotten. Blackwell, as well as Turnbull, was connected with Berkeley. It was when Reid was at Marischal College that Berkeley was engaged in the most romantic missionary enterprise of that age, for spreading Christian civilisation in America by a College in the Bermudas. Curiously, Blackwell was one of those whom he asked to join the little party of missionaries who embarked with him at Gravesend in September 1728, after he had surrendered high preferment in Ireland in order to devote his life to a more cosmopolitan philanthropy. The Aberdeen regent was not prepared for the sacrifice. He refers thus to Berkeley’s adventure:—
'In this respect I would with pleasure do justice to the memory of a very great though singular sort of man, known as a philosopher, and intended founder of a University in the Bermudas or Summer Islands. An inclination to carry me out with him on that expedition, as one of the young professors on his new foundation, having brought us often together, I scarce remember to have conversed with him on that art, liberal or mechanic, of which he knew not more than the ordinary ​practitioners. With the widest views, he descended to the most minute detail, and begrudged neither pains nor expense for the means of information. I enter not into his peculiarities, either religious or personal, but admire the extensive genius of the man, and think it a loss to the Western world that his noble and exalted plan of an American University was not carried into execution.’—Memoirs of the Court of Augustus.
The fact that Berkeley was so much in evidence at Marischal College in those days, through Turnbull and Blackwell, is significant of much in the life of Reid.
If Reid recorded his thoughts when he was a student at Marischal College, the record has been lost. A commonplace book like Berkeley’s, when Berkeley was an undergraduate in Dublin, would have cast welcome light on this part of his mental history. The only extant revelation of his inner life in these years is contained in a letter written half a century after to his kinsman William Gregory at Oxford. It relates to the period when his year was divided between town and country—the winters at Aberdeen and the long summer days at the manse of Strachan:—
'About the age of fourteen I was,' he says, 'almost every night unhappy in my sleep from frightful dreams: sometimes hanging over a dreadful precipice, and just ready to drop down; sometimes pursued for my life and stopped by a wall, or by a sudden loss of strength; sometimes ready to be devoured by a wild beast. How long I was plagued with such dreams I do not recollect. I believe it was for a year or two at least; and I think they had left me before I was fifteen. In those days I was much given to what Mr. Addison in one of his “Spectators” calls castle-building; and in my evening solitary walk (which was generally all the exercise I took), my thoughts would hurry me into some active scene, where I generally acquitted myself much to my own satisfaction, and in those scenes of imagination I performed many a gallant exploit. At the same time, in my dreams I found myself the ​most arrant coward. Not only my courage but my strength failed me in every danger; and I often rose from my bed in the morning in such a panic that it took some time to get the better of it. I wished much to get free of these uneasy dreams, which not only made me unhappy in sleep, but left a disagreeable impression on my mind for some part of the following day. I thought it was worth trying whether it was possible to recollect while I was dreaming that it was all a dream, and that I was in no danger. Accordingly, I often went to sleep with my mind as strongly impressed as I could with this thought—that I never in my lifetime had been in any real danger, and that every fright I had was a dream. After many fruitless endeavours to recollect this when the danger appeared, I effected it at last, and have often, when I was sliding down a precipice into the abyss, recollected that it was all a dream, and boldly jumped down. The effect of this commonly was that I immediately awoke; but I awoke calm and intrepid, which I thought a great acquisition. After this my dreams were never very uneasy; and in a short time I dreamed not at all. During all this time I was in perfect health; but whether my ceasing to dream was the effect of the recollection above mentioned, or of any change in the habit of my body, which is usual about that period of life, I cannot tell. I think it may more probably be imputed to the last. However, the fact was that for at least forty years after I dreamt none, to the best of my remembrance; and finding from the testimony of others that this is somewhat uncommon, I have often as I awoke endeavoured to recollect, without being able to recollect anything that passed in my sleep. The only distinct dream I ever had since I was about sixteen, as far as I remember, was about two years ago (1777). I had got my head blistered for a fall. A plaster which was put upon it after the blister pained me excessively for a whole night. In the morning I slept a little, and dreamed very distinctly that I had fallen into the hands of a party of Indians and was scalped. I am apt to think that, as there is a state of sleep and a state wherein we are awake, so there is an intermediate state which partakes of the other two. I have slept on horseback, but so as to preserve my balance; and if the horse stumbled, I could make the exertion necessary to save me from a fall, as if I was awake.’
​In all this one detects the disposition to sober introspection, which ripened as life advanced.
During the ten years that followed the graduation in April 1726 we have only faint traces of Reid. In the following winter he began to study theology, and in 1731 he had completed the course required by the Church, under the direction of Professor James Chalmers, father of the founder of the Aberdeen Journal. This is another parallel between Reid and Kant: both, it seems, were theologically trained.
Reid’s name first appears in the books of the Presbytery of Kincardine O'Neil when he was in his nineteenth year. Extracts from the minutes with which I have been favoured record his progress with a quaint simplicity not without interest, as part of the history of a philosopher:—
'On the 17th of July, 1728, James Lumsden, John Beaton, Thomas Reid, and David Ross, students in divinity, residing within the bounds of the presbytery, being now present, the presbytery thought fit to appoint each of them to be in readiness to deliver a homily against the next meeting, and accordingly appointed Mr. Reid to deliver a homily on John i. 29.—18 September 1728. This day Mr. Thomas Reid delivered his homily, with which the presbytery being satisfied, the moderator encouraged him to go on with his studies.—8th June 1731. The presbytery considering that Mr. Thomas Reid had been allowed by the Synod to enter upon tryal, and he, being upon the place, did undergo questioning tryal, wherein he was approved, and the presbytery appointed him to be in readyness to deliver a lecture on Ps. ii., and an exegesis on that common head. Num detur peccatum originale inherens.—22nd September 1731. This day Mr. Thomas Reid underwent a questioning tryal and was approved. And the presbytery taking into consideration that he, having passed his course in Arts at the College, and thereafter having studied Divinity for the space of years, as also having resided for the whole of this ​time within the bounds of this presbytery; and they looking upon him as a person fit to be entered upon tryals, and also having had sufficient testimonials from the professors of divinity with whom he studied as to his proficiency in his studys and good behavour, he was admitted to the usual tryals appointed by the Acts of the General Assembly of this Church, and having passed through all the parts thereof, he was licensed by the said presbytery to preach the Gospel of Christ, and exercise his gifts as a probationer for the holy ministry.'
On the 2nd of August 1732, 'the Presbytery chose Mr. Thomas Reid to be their Clerk.' On the 5th of October in the same year, 'the Presbytery appointed Mr. Thomas Reid to supply at Lumphanan the second Sabbath after Mr. Gordon’s removal.' On the 8th of November, 'Mr. Thomas Reid was continued Clerk till the next meeting of the provincial Synod,' in April 1733.
In July 1733 Reid re-appears, this time not engaged in ecclesiastical ministration, but as the librarian of Marischal College. It was an office with which he had a family connection. 'The most outstanding name in the history of Marischal College Library,' says Mr. Rait, 'is that of Thomas Reid, Latin secretary to James vi., son of James Reid, minister of Banchory-Ternan. In 1624 he left to Marischal College his own library, 6000 merks to be invested in land, and a sum of money to provide a salary for a librarian.' The secretary’s brother, Alexander, also bequeathed books of philosophy and divinity. And David Gregory of Kinairdy was for some time librarian. It was an acceptable retreat for research, and a mark of esteem from the College. Mr. Rose, Reid's brother-in-law, says that he then studied Newton’s Principia and Locke’s Essay. Again a parallel between Reid and Kant. Some ​time after Kant had taken his degree he was made librarian in the Schloss Library, with a yearly stipend of about £10. This was nominally in excess of Reid’s modest honorarium of £9 at Aberdeen, a pittance which was for a time suspended by threatened litigation. He was in active service as librarian till 1736, and for two years more in possession, 'on leave of absence, with a substitute.'
The need for a 'substitute' in 1736 can be explained. In that year, for the first time, Reid is found outside Scotland. He is making a tour in England, with Stewart, the friend of his undergraduate years, and now Professor of Mathematics in Marischal College. The record of their movements in the South is scanty. Reid's uncle, Dr. George Reid, then a physician in London, provided a home for them in the metropolis; and as David Gregory, Reid's cousin, was Professor of History at Oxford, they found another home on the Isis, with an easy introduction to the colleges and social life of the great English University. The Gregory connection also opened the way to interesting things and persons at Cambridge as well as at Oxford and London. Reid, it seems, saw Bentley at Cambridge, 'who delighted him with his learning and amused him with his vanity': here, too, he enjoyed the conversation of the blind mathematician Saunderson, whose experience he afterwards turned to good account in his inquiries regarding the sense of seeing. One would like to have had Reid's first impressions of England, its metropolis, its social and church life, and its ancient colleges. It does not appear that the scenes through which he moved awakened in him much historic sentiment; that, like his contemporary Berkeley, Oxford would be the ideal home of his old age; or that he was greatly ​moved by its academic splendour, associated with what is noblest in English history, and by the soft repose of the surrounding rural scenes. In one of his letters to Dr. James Gregory, he speaks of the first time he was in 'Dean Gregory’s house at Oxford,' when the Dean told 'the story of the watch very well to a large company of Oxonians'; so we may infer that other visits followed in later life. And the Oxford of his first visit was the degenerate Oxford described by Adam Smith and Gibbon, who were in residence a few years after. Reid is seldom again found out of Scotland. There is no sign that he ever visited Ireland or the Continent in his retired, sedate, and methodical life. In this, too, he was like Kant, who in all his eighty years is said never to have travelled more than forty miles from his native Königsberg. The stay-at-home disposition common to both is not unlike the character reflected in their books.
* ↑ The number is, unfortunately, unrecorded.
* ↑ Birkwood MSS.