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                         THE ACADEMIC GREGORIES

                                   BY
                        AGNES GRAINGER STEWART:

                                 FAMOUS
                                ·SCOTS·
                                ·SERIES·

                           PUBLISHED BY    ●
                           OLIPHANT ANDERSON
                          & FERRIER·EDINBVRGH
                           AND LONDON   ◯  ◯

                  The designs and ornaments of this
                  volume are by Mr Joseph Brown, and
                  the printing is from the press of
                  Messrs Turnbull & Spears, Edinburgh.

 _April 1901_

                                PREFACE

As far back as I can remember there hung in my father’s study two
prints, the one a mezzotint of Professor James Gregory, and the other,
inferior as a picture, but most beautiful in its subject, an engraving
of William Pulteney Alison.

In answer to nursery enquiries as to the stories belonging to these two
pictures, there had always perforce to be some dark facts related in
connection with Dr James Gregory, but these were kept rather in the
background, and the impression we got of him came nearer to the
incidental portrait which Robert Louis Stevenson draws of him in ‘Weir
of Hermiston.’ With William Pulteney Alison we could, as it were, shake
hands, for the story teller could here insert a piece of real history,
of how, long ago, this man had sat beside his crib watching over him,
holding him back from the arms of Death. We watched with him as he sat
there ministering to this sick child, keeping alive the little flicker
of life, keeping the little restless body still. ‘If he moves, he will
faint,’ Professor Alison had said. ‘If he faints, he will die.’ Across
the gap of years other children held their breath till the little
patient fell asleep.

But the most interesting fact about Gregory and Alison to us as children
was that they had both been professors of the Practice of Physic in
Edinburgh University, and the little boy who had so nearly died now
lectured in the place of the physician who had saved his life.

This early acquaintance gave me a love for these professors, and when I
came to be asked to write a book upon the Academic members of the old
Scottish family of Gregory, two of them at least were familiar as
friends.

In the preparation of my book I have received much kindness, and I
should especially like to thank Mr Philip Spencer Gregory, of Lincoln’s
Inn, Barrister-at-Law, late Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge, for the
help which he as a representative of the family was able to give me, and
also for his very interesting ‘Records of the Family of Gregory.’ My
thanks are also due to Professor Campbell Fraser for personal
introduction to sources of information, to Mr Turner, Savilian Professor
of Astronomy in the University of Oxford, and to Mr Henry Johnstone of
the Edinburgh Academy and Mr R. S. Rait, Fellow of New College, Oxford,
who have read my proofs. I must also record my debt of gratitude to the
Editors for the great kindness and courtesy they have shown to me.

                                                 AGNES GRAINGER STEWART.

                                CONTENTS

                                                                    PAGE

                                CHAPTER I

 THE GREGORIES                                                         9

                               CHAPTER II

 DAVID GREGORIE OF KINAIRDY, 1625–1720                                19

 JAMES GREGORIE, 1638–1675                                            27

                               CHAPTER IV

 DAVID GREGORY, 1661–1708                                             52

                                CHAPTER V

 DAVID GREGORY, 1696–1767                                             77

                               CHAPTER VI

 (1) JAMES GREGORIE, 1666–1742; (2) CHARLES GREGORIE, 1681–1739;      84
   (3) DAVID GREGORIE, 1712–1765

                               CHAPTER VII

 (1) JAMES GREGORIE, 1674–1733; (2) JAMES GREGORIE, 1701–1755         92

                              CHAPTER VIII

 JOHN GREGORY, 1724–1773                                             100

                               CHAPTER IX

 JAMES GREGORY, 1753–1821                                            125

                                CHAPTER X

 WILLIAM GREGORY, 1803–1858                                          141

                               CHAPTER XI

 RETROSPECT                                                          152

                Rev. John Gregorie of Drumoak = Janet Anderson
                +---------------------+--------------------------+
                |                                                |
     David of Kinnairdie, d. 1730     James, St And., Mathematics, 1669–74
                |                         Edinburgh, Mathematics, 1674–75
                |                                                |
       +--------+-------+------------+-----------+--------+      |
       |                |            |           |        |      |
 David, Edin.,          |    Charles, St And.,   |        |      |
   Math., 1683–91       |          Math.,      Isobel  Margaret  |
   Oxford, Astronomy,   |         1707–39        =        =      |
   1692–1708            |            |  Patrick Innes Lewis Reid |
       |         James, St Andrews,  |           |        |      |
       |         Phil., 1685–91      |     Alex. Innes,   |      |
       |         Edinburgh, Math.,   |     Mar. Coll.,    |      |
       |         1691–1725           |     Philosophy,    |      |
       |                             |      1739–42       | James, King’s
 David, Oxford,                    David,                 | Coll., Medicine,
 Modern History,               St Andrews, Math.,         | 1725–32
 1724–67                           1739–65                |
                                             +------------+
                                             |            |
                             Thomas Reid, King’s Coll.,   |
                               Phil., 1751–64             |
                               Glas., Phil., 1764–96      |
                             +----------------------------+--+
                             |                               |
                 James, King’s Coll.,                       John,
                     Med., 1732–55      King’s Coll., Phil., 1746–49
                                        King’s Coll., Med., 1755–66
                                        Edinb., Practice of Physic, 1766–73
                            +--------------------------------+
                            |                                |
 James, Edinb., Inst. of Med., 1776–89          Dorothea = Rev. Arch. Alison
          "     Practice of Physic, 1790–1821                |
                            |                                |
            +---------------+----------+ William Pulteney Alison
            |                          | Edinb., Med. Juris., 1820–21
 William, King’s Coll., Chem., 1839–44 |   "     Inst. of Med., 1821–42
          Edinb., Chem., 1844–58       |   "     Practice of Physic, 1842–55
                 Duncan Farquharson, Fellow of Trin. Coll., Camb.

                         THE ACADEMIC GREGORIES

                               CHAPTER I

                             THE GREGORIES

         ‘The moon’s on the lake, and the mist’s on the brae,
         And the clan has a name that is nameless by day.
             Then gather, gather, gather Grigalach!’

                             _The Macgregor’s Gathering_—SCOTT.

The able Scots family of Gregorie can trace its descent from the
Macgregors of Roro, the younger branch of the Glenlyon family. The name
Gregorie,—which is the Saxon form of M’Gregor—had, most fortunately for
its owners, been assumed before 1603, the darkest time in the annals of
that clan. The proscription which then fell upon everyone bearing the
name of M’Gregor could not touch the Gregories; but the change of name,
which saved them from the penalties that fell so heavily upon their
Highland cousins could not and did not alter their natures, and all the
Gregories, with perhaps the single exception of the Dean of Christ
Church, were at heart M’Gregors. Nothing that civilisation, education,
wealth and society could do to modify their disposition was able
entirely to obliterate in them the warlike character of their Highland
forefathers. We remember this, and when in the nineteenth century we see
a learned professor of the Practice of Physic beating his
fellow-professor in Edinburgh University quadrangle, we know that he was
not really James Gregory but James M’Gregor.

The claim of the Gregories to recognition in Scottish biography does not
rest on the outstanding genius of any individual member of the family,
so much as on the number of great and brilliant men belonging to it, who
have, in their day, formed and educated generations of the youth of
Scotland. From the middle of the seventeenth century to the middle of
the nineteenth century, with a gap of only a few years, some of the
Gregorie connection were professing either mathematics or medicine in
one or other of the Scottish universities. They were great teachers,
lucid, clear-sighted and advanced in their views, and naturally leaders
of men. Galton, in his book on _Hereditary Genius_, in which he
‘endeavoured to speak of none but the most illustrious names,’ cites the
Gregories as a striking example of hereditary scientific gifts. He
considers that the mathematical power came into the family with Janet
Anderson, who married the Rev. John Gregorie, parish minister of Drumoak
in the year 1621. From these two are descended no less than fourteen
professors, and as there is no record of special power in the Gregorie
family till we come to the sons of John Gregorie, it may be taken for
granted that the ability came from the Andersons, who were distinguished
in the foregoing generations.

Janet Anderson was the daughter of David Anderson of Finzeach, in
Aberdeenshire; a man who was possessed of such universal talent that he
was popularly called ‘Davie do a’ thing.’ Two of his deeds come down to
posterity; the one, the building of St Nicholas steeple in Aberdeen,
upon which he himself is said to have placed the weather-cock; and the
other, the removal of a great boulder, called Knock Maitland, which lay
in the entrance to Aberdeen harbour and endangered the passage of every
ship sailing in or out. This he removed by placing chains under it at
low tide, and fastening them to a huge raft, which at high tide lifted
up the rock and carried it out to the open sea.

Janet Anderson’s near kinsman was the Professor of Mathematics in the
University of Paris, and she herself was a great mathematician and is
said to have taught her sons. If that was the case, one at least of her
pupils did her great credit, for her younger son, James, lived to take a
foremost place among the mathematicians of his day, and to be the
inventor of the Gregorian Telescope.

In 1621, when the Rev. John Gregorie married Janet Anderson, he was the
minister of Drumoak, a remote parish on the Dee, where in peaceful times
he might have fulfilled his quiet duties with little to disturb him.
Towards the end of the first half of the seventeenth century, however,
Scotland was in a ferment, and in a state of civil and religious turmoil
which made itself felt throughout the land. In Aberdeenshire, both the
clergy and the laity were in sympathy rather with Laud and Prelacy than
with Henderson and Presbytery. This brought them into violent collision
with the party in power, and among the rural clergy there were few names
more distasteful to the Covenanters than the name of John Gregorie. When
therefore in 1639, the government sent an army to coerce refractory
Aberdeenshire, he knew that he would receive no toleration and fled,
meaning to join the king at Newcastle. The ship in which he tried to
escape was boarded, and the fugitives were made to return, and in the
following year Gregorie’s fears were realised, for General Monro, who
was then stationed near Aberdeen on the outlook for rebels from the
Covenant—especially rich ones—remembered the minister of Drumoak.
Spalding tells us the pitiful story.

‘Upone the second day of Junij, Mr Johne Gregorie, minister at Dalmoak,
wes brocht in to Munro be ane pairtie of soldiouris. He wes takin out of
his naikit bed upone the nicht, and his hous pitifullie plunderit. He
wes cloislie keepit in Skipper Andersonis hous haveing fyve muskiteris
watching him day and nicht, sustenit upone his awin expensis. None, no
nocht his awin wyfe could have privie conference of him, so straitlie
wes he watchit. At last he is fynit to pay generall Major Munro 1000
merkis for his outstanding agains the covenant and syne gat libertie to
go. Bot in the Generall Assemblie holdin in July, he wes nevertheless
simpliciter deprivit, becaus he wold not subscryve the covenant; and
when all wes done he is forst to yield, cum in and subscryve, as ye have
hierafter.’

It was not till 1641 that, at St Andrews, the Laird of Drum’s petition
for his restoration had effect; when in token of his reinstatement,
Gregorie along with his rival, Mr Andrew Cant, was chosen to preach at
the visitation of the Presbytery of Aberdeen. This fellowship with a
man, whose qualities have been embalmed in his name, very nearly cost
him the favour of the party to which he now belonged. Here again is
Spalding’s account, naïve and full of the spirit of the time.

‘Upone Tuysday 6^{th} September, Mr Johne Gregorie, minister at Dulmoak
at the visitatioun of the Kirk of New Abirdene teichit most lernidlie
upone the 4^{th} verss of the 2^{nd} chapdour to the Collosians, and
reprehendit the order of our Kirk and new brocht in poyntes. Mr Andrew
Cant, sitting besyde the reidar, as his use was, offendit at this
doctrein, quicklie cloissit the reidaris buke, and laid down the glass
befoir it wes run, thinking the minister sould the sooner mak an end;
bot he beheld and preichit half ane hour longer nor the tyme. Sermon
endit the bretheren convenis to their visitatioun, quhair Mr Andrew Cant
impugnit this doctrein, desyring the said Mr Johne to put the samen in
wreit, who answerit, he wold not only wreit bot print his preiching, if
neid so requirit, and baid be all what he had teichit as orthodox
doctrien. The bretheren hard all and had their owne opiniouns, and but
ony more censure they disolvit, sumwhat perturbit with Cantis
curiositie. Upone Thuirsday, he raillit out in his sermon aganes the
said Mr Johne Gregorie’s doctrein, and on Sunday likwais. At last, be
mediatioun of the toune’s balleis at a coup of wyne, they twa war satled
with small credet to Cantis bussines.’

Though Gregorie was not censured by the whole body of the clergy in
1642, as there seems little doubt Mr Cant had intended, he was not
absolutely free from anxiety. No doubt life went smoothly enough with
him at times, for he amassed quite a large fortune. The estates of
Kinairdy and Netherdale were given to him on the insolvency of the
Crichtons in satisfaction of £3,800 which he had lent to them; and his
wife on her part had succeeded on her father’s death to a portion of the
estates of Finzeach. The land brought its sorrow with it, and passed out
of the hands of the family again, but that was afterwards.

In 1649 John Gregorie was once more deposed, and for the last time. The
Synod recommended that he should be reinstated, but he did not long
survive this recommendation. He died in 1650, and was buried at Drumoak.

Among the slaty monuments in the churchyard there is none that bears the
name of John Gregorie. Two hundred and fifty years have obliterated what
must once have been written, and the Dee is gaining ground from the
graveyard at every time of spate. The old church stands and the manse,
which has been turned into a farmhouse, but that is all.

There is a memorial of John Gregorie and his wife in a mortification for
the education and maintenance of ten poor orphans ‘within the said
Burgh’ of Aberdeen.

John Gregory left three sons, Alexander, who was served heir to his
father’s very considerable property in 1651, David, known as David of
Kinairdy, and James, the great professor of astronomy. His two
daughters, Margaret and Janet, were both married, the latter to Thomas
Thomson of Faichfield.

Loving and generous, as no one who reads about Alexander Gregorie can
doubt that he was, he would yet barely have been included in this book,
if it had not been for his terrible death, which made the family estates
fall into the hands of his younger brother. Kinairdy and Netherdale,
which had been allotted by law to his father on the bankruptcy of the
Crichtons, were too much favoured by their former possessors to be
relinquished without disturbance into the hands of their rightful
owners. The Crichtons harried Alexander Gregorie, and that so
frequently, that he was obliged at last in 1660 to seek the shelter of
the law. James, second Viscount Frendraught, took no notice of the
summons to appear at court, and so was outlawed, but this sentence was
remitted upon his giving security (in a bond of £40,000 Scots or £3,333,
6s. 8d. sterling) to keep the peace and to appear before the Privy
Council to answer the charges made against him. Bonds such as this
succeeded each other, till the final outbreak which occurred on the 7th
of March 1664. Then with the shed blood of Alexander Gregorie came
peace, but at what a cost. In the records of the Justiciary Court there
is a description of the murder, which somehow belies its dusty origin,
and sounds as if some old Aberdeenshire gossip were telling the tale
with real enjoyment over her peat fire.

‘It is of veritie that the said James, Viscount of Frendraught and the
said James Crichtoun of Kinairdy, and Frances Crichtoun his sone, having
unjustlie conceaved ane deidlie hatred and cruell malice against
umq^{le} Mr Alex^r Gregorie of Netherdeall and the said Frances
Crichtoun having upon the sevent day of March last by-past rancountered
with the said Mr Alex^r Gregorie at the hous of Mr Alex^r Gairdine
minister at Forge, the said Frances treacherouslie inveited and desyred
the said Mr Alex^r to goe alongs with him from the said hous, which he
fearing no harme did, and as they went alongs the said Frances Crichtone
without any provocatione (of) foirthought, felony and precogitat malice
drew his sword and rane at the said umq^{le} Mr Alex^r Gregorie thinking
to have killed him at one thrust; but the said umq^{le} Mr Alex^r,
everting the stroak and closing with him, not offering to doe him any
prejudice at all, the said James Duffus drew his sword and stroke at the
said umq^{le} Mr Alex^r whereat his horse running away and the said
Frances mounting on his horse, he divers times ran upon the said
umq^{le} Mr Alex^r and wounded him in his arme, whereupon the said
umq^{le} Mr Alex^r yielded himself prisoner to the said Frances and
delivered to him his sword being requyred be him sua to doe, hoping that
his honour would therrupon have obliged him to have desisted from all
furder trubling and assalting him, but upon the contrair the said
Frances baislie and treacherouslie with the assistance of the said James
Duffus his servant persewed him more eagerlie than befoir, fyred
pistolls at him, gave him several wounds in his breast and head to the
effusione of his blood in great quantitie and then caused him to mount
up behind the said James Duffus and caryed him to the hous of George
Morisone of Boignie, and putt him in ane chamber wherein the said James
Viscount of Frendraught was lodged and then the said Frances Crichtone
left him and upon the morne, being the last day of March last by past,
about thrie hours in the morning, the said Frances Crichtone accompanied
with Walter Henry, gairdiner at Frendraught, William Innes yr., George
Mearns yr., Rob Tarres yr., James Howie, sone to Georg Howie in
Tounslie, and the said James Duffus all in armes cam to the said hous of
Boignie, where the said umq^{le} Mr Alex^r Gregorie was lying bleeding
in his wounds, they and the said James Viscount of Frendraught and
George Forbes his servant efter many baise and opprobious threatenings
uttered be them against the said umq^{le} Mr Alex^r did most inhumanly
and barbarouslie dragg him out of his bed as he was lying bleiding in
his wounds, and that without cloak, hat, or shoves, or bootts, and did
cast him overthwart ane hors, upon his breast, his head and armes
hanging on the ane syd and his leggs on the other syd and so caryed him
away in ane cold and stormy morneing to George Yong’s hous in Coanloch
being ane obscure place and myles distant from the said hous of Boignie
where they keiped him prisoner ... in his wounds be the space of threi
days, _tanquam in privato carcere_; and then, deserting and leaving him,
he was upon the threttein day of the said month by the help of some
friends caryed to the burgh of Aberdeine, where he lay languishing of
the said wounds and the bad usage which he had receaved of the
foir-named persons, and then dyed of the samyne and sua was cruelly and
unnaturally killed and murdered be them; of which murder under trust, at
least slaughter committed upone precogitat malice and forethought
felony, as also of the said usurpatione of His Majestie’s authority in
takeing and apprehending unwarrantably ane frie leidge, the foirsaids
persons and ilk ane of them, as also the said James Crichtoune of
Kinairdie by whose instigation and hunding out the foirsaids crymes of
slaughter upon foirthought felony and precogitat malice and usurpation
of His Majestie’s authoritie were committed and are actors airt and
pairt, and the samyne being found be ane assize they aught to be
punyshed theirfor in their persons and goods to the terour and example
of utheris to commit the lyk heirafter.’

Surely this was not a case for the King’s leniency; yet because Francis
Crichtone was a Roman Catholic, and favoured by the Duke of York, a
warrant came from His Majesty for the suspension of the trial of Francis
Crichtone.

‘Compeired Mr George Mackenzie advocate, and produced ane letter from
His Majestie directed to the Justice General and Justice depute whereof
the tenor follows, Superscribed Charles R. Whereas we are informed that
Alexander Gregorie did not die of the wounds alleged to have been given
him by Frances Crichtone now prisoner at Edinburgh, these are to require
you to suspend that criminal process against Frances Crichtone until we
shall hear further concerning that business from our Privy Council at
their next meeting in June, for which this shall be your warrand. Given
at our Court at Whitehall the 13^{th} day of May 1664 and of our reign
the 16^{th} year by His Majestie’s command.

                                               ‘Sic subitur Lauderdaill.

‘To our right trustie and right well-beloved cousin and counselloure and
to our trusty and well-beloved our Justice General or Justice Depute.’

James Crichtone of Kinairdy and Viscount Frendraught were acquitted at
the trial, the assistants at the murder were ‘put to His Majestie’s
horn, and all their goods forfeit.’ As for Francis Crichtone, the
principal in this affair, having procured the postponement of his trial,
he escaped from the Tolbooth Prison; and after another futile attempt on
the part of the Gregories to secure a trial, he obtained a pardon under
the Great Seal in 1682.

                               CHAPTER II

                 DAVID GREGORIE OF KINAIRDY, 1625–1720

         ‘Not skill alone of ear and eye
         Was yours, but something more—a heart.’

                                 —_Echoes and After-thoughts._

David Gregorie, the second son of the Reverend John Gregorie, was
destined by his father for a commercial career. Alexander, his elder
brother, as we have seen, was heir to the estates of Kinairdy and
Netherdale, and to a good deal of money: the young brother James was so
remarkable a mathematician that he was allowed to follow his own bent
and devote himself purely to mathematics. But David, poor David, most
unwilling to go, was sent to Holland to learn to be a merchant, probably
to Campvere, the happy haven to which so many Scots traders turned.
Herrings and stockings—the great Aberdeen exports of the day—how we can
imagine David Gregorie seeing to the unlading of such cargo as this,
with his heart and very likely his head far away in Scotland! Anyhow he
did not stay a day longer in Holland than was necessary, for after his
father’s death he returned home and settled in Aberdeen in 1655. In the
same year he married Jean, daughter of Patrick Walker of Orchiston, a
great Episcopalian, and also a great Tory.

David Gregorie was only thirty, and the best of life was still before
him. He spent his time in just such a way as attracted him. He studied
medicine, mechanics, mathematics and physics, read every interesting
book within his reach, and corresponded with scientific contemporaries
both in Scotland and out of it. His letters, full of thoughts about the
atmospheric laws, went to Edmé Mariotte in his cell. He may have got
some help from them—certainly Gregorie was immensely interested in the
Frenchman’s discoveries.

His life was enriched by many delightful friendships, but more than all
by the affection shewn to him by his brothers and expressed in so many
practical ways. In 1660 Alexander settled the property of Over
Aschalache on David and his family, subject to the life-rent of old Mrs
Gregorie. It was a most kind arrangement, and must have been a great
help in providing for the growing family. Three years later he was made
librarian of King’s College, and there he spent his time, reading and
searching and arranging in the dreamy way of an old world librarian. But
life, which is so fearfully unknown, held in it for David Gregorie in
1664 that which was to alter his whole career. By the tragic death of
his brother, who left no children, all the family estates passed to him,
and he became suddenly a rich man. He left Aberdeen, and went to live in
the mansion-house of Kinairdy, with which his name is now always
associated.

Few people pass through the remote parish of Marnoch, which lies on the
borders of Banffshire and Aberdeenshire, but those who do are most
certainly rewarded. The Deveron, not so well known as the Dee, still
keeps a charm of loneliness for those who love her, and the burns are
browner than in the southland. By such a burn was Kinairdy built, on a
little promontory where the stream joins the Deveron. When I asked to
see Kinairdy, I was told ‘There’s nothing to see there, only the old
tower down by the river,’ but the old tower was enough for me, and
packed full of memories. To this old house it was that David Gregorie
took his wife and children in 1664. We get occasional glimpses of him as
he passes about the country, at one time laughed at by his neighbours
for his total ignorance of farming, while at another, in a case of
illness, they would eagerly wait for his coming, with a feeling as if
life and death were in his hands. Sometimes no doubt it was so, and to
rich and poor alike he would go, giving his advice gratuitously for the
love of doctoring, and because he was benevolent.

This medical skill of his stood him in good stead on one occasion, when
a deputation of ministers called upon him to answer for himself on the
charge of being a wizard. There were dread stories abroad concerning
him, how, by having sold his soul to the Devil, he was able to foretell
the weather (what a thing to sell your soul for in Scotland!) how, after
days of sunshine, he could predict rain and sure enough the rain would
come, and he might make it go on raining for weeks through his
intercourse with the powers of darkness. Poor Gregorie, face to face
with his accusers, went through the little crowd of his children, and
brought in the familiar spirit, which was only a barometer, tried to
explain how it worked, asked them to examine it (which I do not believe
any of them would do), and won them over to his side by his sheer
lovableness. After all, who was to doctor them with the skill of David
Gregorie if he were burned for a wizard? So the kind doctor was left to
his home and his work. The ministers did not understand his defence, but
there was not one of them who could not remember how, with some
well-chosen simple, he had healed one of their dear ones in the hour of
need.

As his sons and daughters grew up, Gregorie found it more and more
impossible to get the quiet which he so much wanted for his work. His
patients and his children between them were taking up all his leisure.
In these circumstances he determined to rearrange his hours. He retired
early to bed, and rising about two in the morning, worked for a few
hours in the stillness of the night. When that was over, he went to
sleep till he felt rested. If these nocturnal habits were known to the
deputation that waited upon him, there was some excuse for their fears.
What more alarming than the shadows in the room! The midnight crucible
and the sulphurous smell were not there, but it must be admitted that
the Laird of Kinairdy loved the hours of darkness better than the day.

David Gregorie had twenty-nine children. Fifteen of them were the
children of his first wife, and fourteen the children of his second.
Nine of them died as quite little babies, but twenty grew to be older;
and so, though everyone says, that it was remarkable for Kinairdy to
have three sons professors of mathematics, it must be allowed that he
had a most unusual number of children to choose from!

In the pedigree of the family of Gregorie in Mr Philip Spencer Gregory’s
book, from which the table of the professors is for the most part taken,
it is seen that David, Professor of Mathematics in Edinburgh, and later
of Astronomy in Oxford, Isabel, the grandmother of Professor Innes of
Aberdeen, and James, Professor of Mathematics at St Andrews and
Edinburgh, were the children of the first marriage; while Margaret, the
mother of Thomas Reid, and Charles, Professor of Mathematics in St
Andrews, were of the second marriage.

Jean Walker was probably a cleverer woman than Isabel Gordon, Gregorie’s
second wife. In the first place she converted her husband to Episcopacy
and Toryism, and secondly, her son David was much the most brilliant of
the Kinairdy children. To him it was, when he was working as Savilian
professor at Oxford, that old Kinairdy confided a model of an improved
cannon, which in his enthusiasm to improve the munitions of war, he had
designed in his peaceful home by the Deveron. His son, who thought it
most ingenious, showed it to Sir Isaac Newton, and the great philosopher
evidently agreed with him; but to invent an instrument, the only object
of which was to kill better than any cannon in use, seemed to him a
fearful abuse of ingenuity. The horrors of Marlborough’s wars, where men
were slaughtered by the thousand, were they not enough as it was? Who
could deserve mercy from his Maker if he were to bid god-speed to such a
terrible machine? Sir Isaac asked the professor to destroy the model,
which he did, and the little toy which may have been a gatling gun, for
aught we know, was broken in pieces.

Old David Gregorie, who had been preparing to join the allies in
Flanders, to see his cannon in use, bore his disappointment most
sweetly. Perhaps Newton was right, he thought, for although he had meant
to help his fellow-countrymen, the invention would soon be known to the
enemy, and the Gregorie gun be levelled against his compatriots.

There seems to be something almost pitiful about the end of David
Gregorie’s life. Kinairdy was made over to his son, the Savilian
professor at Oxford, the sweet old house forsaken, the rooms in which
such merry life had been lived, deserted, and the flowers from which the
gentle herbalist had drawn so many healing virtues, left to die. It
would be best to think that he returned to Aberdeen at the call of
King’s College, which ‘Beautified with bells within, without decked with
a diadem,’ is said to ring her sons back to her before they die. But
there were probably other reasons, and more potent ones. His children
had to be provided for, and his wife, shrewd and not poetical (or else
how could she have been a Hanoverian?) thought of all that her brother,
the Provost of Aberdeen, had in his power, and she knew he could do much
and would do much for her children, so they set up house once more in
the old town of Aberdeen.

In 1715 comes another turmoil, a flitting, almost a flight across the
North Sea to Holland, to be out of the difficulties of conflicting hopes
and fears, to be out of the country, to take at least no part against
the Stuarts, whom we suspect Kinairdy of loving in his secret heart.
Likely enough they may have offered him bribes, and a title in the
coming kingdom, but there was another counsellor nearer and dearer to
him, and with her and his children he sought the shelter of a foreign
land. Two or three years passed before they returned to Scotland. They
were content to wait till the storm was past. When they came back
Gregorie’s life was nearly over. He died in 1720, an old man of
ninety-five.

               ‘And in his story still remains
               A distant memory of life’s loss and gains,
               A starlit picture of his joy and pains.’

A visit to his widow, who was Thomas Reid’s grandmother was described by
her grandson in after years in a letter to James Gregory, Professor of
Medicine in Edinburgh. ‘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 to sweetmeats and
grave advices. Her daughters, who visited her, as well as one who lived
with her, treated her as if she had been of 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.’

But to return to what interests us about David Gregorie of Kinairdy, in
connection with his many professorial sons and other kindred, he was a
great lover of science, and a worker to whom all scientific matter came
home to stay. His mathematical and mechanical gifts, great as they
were—and we know he was far advanced in meteorological studies—were not
to be compared with the power which he had, and which now appears for
the first time in the Gregorie family—the inborn gift of doctoring. He
had no training except what he gave himself, but he could no more help
being a physician, than his brother Professor James could help his
incessant work at mathematics. David and James Gregorie were the
children of their mother far more than of their father; who, good as he
probably was, is, we must confess, just a little dull. Yes, Janet
Anderson, you have lived again for us in your sons!

                       JAMES GREGORIE, 1638–1675

              ‘He learned the art
              In Padua far beyond the sea.’

                                      —SCOTT, _Lay_ 1, xi.

James Gregorie, the third son of the minister of Drumoak, was certainly
the cleverest member of that family. He was so clever that no one had
any time to tell anything about him, except his achievements in pure
mathematics and in the science of optics; and indeed from his earliest
days his love for mathematics was such, that his pretty mother unwilling
to wait till her boy was able to go to school taught him herself all she
knew of geometry, sending him away when the time came to the Grammar
School of Aberdeen already far ahead of his class. He studied at
Marischal College, and took his degree (laureated is the pleasant
Scottish word) along with Gilbert Burnet, the readable if imaginative
historian, with whom likely enough he did not find much in common,
representing as they almost did fact and fancy. Now their portraits hang
side by side in the Picture Gallery—Gregorie’s grey and grave and stern,
with an indication of what he was in the mathematical globe by his
side—Burnet’s less severe, satisfied with himself, and a most prosperous
portrait.

After the graduation James Gregorie gave himself up to his studies, and
before he was twenty-four made his great discovery of the Reflecting
Telescope. It was not a chance discovery, for indeed he only described,
and never saw put together, the telescope which bears his name. Anyone
can see them nowadays, for they are still used, and the beautiful one
set up by James Short in Edinburgh, is as clear as the day it was made,
and is not used now, only because a commoner one can do the work which
it did for so many years in the Royal Observatory. To the uninitiated it
has a great merit, for things present themselves through it as they
appear to the naked eye, and not upside down as is the case with most of
the great telescopes.

In 1663, his book entitled _Optica Promota_, which contained a
description of his telescope, was published in London, and thither
Gregorie went, hoping that by the assistance of a practical workman he
might realise his ideal.

His book had been much read by mathematicians, and amongst others by
John Collins, the Secretary to the Royal Society. We can picture then
the mutual pleasure with which these two men met. It was in an alehouse,
where possibly the jolly tavern keeper took the Aberdonian through the
fumes of his stuffy parlour, and presented him to Master Collins as a
likely friend for him; anyway, this was the beginning of a life-long
friendship, and Collins, who had realised at once what a possibility lay
in the proposed reflecting telescope, determined to have a glass made on
the principles which Gregorie had suggested in his book. With this
object in view, he took his new Scottish friend to the most skilled
glass-grinder in London, but, alas! in vain. Mr Reeves could not
overcome the difficulty of obtaining conoidal reflectors, but to the
great mathematicians of that day, and it was a day of giants, the
discovery was magnificent, and from the hands of astronomy’s master
craftsman, the reflecting telescope emerged in 1668 in a more beautiful
form, as Newton’s telescope.

Before Gregorie’s time, the telescopes in England were many of them
immensely long, going up even to three hundred feet, and at this length
they were hardly available for scanning the heavens. The new reflector
brought the size down to six or nine feet, and the idea was so
ingenious, that it made Gregorie famous, and what was more, opened the
door for him to friendship with Newton and Collins, to acknowledgment as
an original worker by Huygens, and awakened in the Father of the
Catholic Church an apprehension that one Gregorie, a Scot and a heretic,
might come to deserve the spiritual blight which he is empowered to give
in placing a book on the Index! It was not so very long before, that
Galileo—an earlier maker of telescopes—had been accused by the learned
scribes and pharisees of his day, of magic. ‘Oh, my dear Kepler,’ says
Galileo to his brother astronomer in one of his most amusing letters,
‘how I wish that we could have one hearty laugh together! Here at Padua
is the principal professor of philosophy, whom I have repeatedly and
earnestly requested to look at the moon and planets through my glass,
which he pertinaciously refuses to do. Why are you not here? What shouts
of laughter we should have at this glorious folly, and to hear the
professor of philosophy in Pisa labouring before the Grand Duke with
logical arguments, as with magical incantations, to charm the new
planets out of the sky!’ It is well that Galileo laughed at this stage
of his life; when he fell into the hands of the Inquisition it became no
laughing matter, and even after he had renounced his views, he was
subjected to many griefs, and to a long incarceration in an Italian
prison.

In the fifty years which intervened between Galileo and James Gregorie,
Louis, the great monarch of France, had taken science under his care, so
the Inquisition was no longer available as a means of preventing the
spread of original thought, and Gregorie, unsuspecting of the pope’s
attitude towards him, went to very Padua itself, and stayed there for
three years.

Padua, with its still colonnades and drowsy population, is visited now,
not in the eager search for learning, but because of the pale frescoes
with which Giotto had gifted it long before Gregorie was there, but in
the seventeenth century, what other attractions drew men thither! Then
such men as Riccioli, Manfredi and De Angelis were drawing the erudite
from far and near to sit at their feet. Such men as Manfredi and De
Angelis, who were they? Alas! they, the great mathematical champions of
their day, have passed into oblivion, and are only remembered now, even
in Padua, by the work of the masons who carved their names on the walls
of the University.

                 ‘In thine halls the lamp of learning
                 Padua, now no more is burning;
                 Like a meteor, whose wild way
                 Is lost over the grave of day,
                 It gleams betrayed and to betray:
                 Once remotest nations came
                 To adore that sacred flame,
                 When it lit not many a hearth
                 On this cold and gloomy earth;
                 Now new fires from Antique light
                 Spring beneath the wide world’s might:
                 But their spark lies dead in thee,
                 Trampled out by tyranny.’

As for Gregorie, he was at variance with Riccioli, De Angelis and
Manfredi, and though we have only negative evidence, we hope that he was
at one with the other great teachers of his time in Italy. _Optica
Promota_ had been much read on the Continent, and there the suggestion
which he made that the solar parallax might be determined by the transit
of Venus and Mercury had been accepted, and till a few years ago it was
the method employed in finding out the distance of the sun. But after
all, the most beautiful piece of Gregorie’s work was his telescope. ‘It
consists of a parabolic concave speculum with a hole in its centre,
having near its focus a small elliptic concave speculum. The image
formed by the large parabolic speculum is received by the small
elliptical one, and reflected through the aperture in the former upon a
lens which magnifies it.’

In Padua his work took a more purely mathematical turn, and resulted in
a book ‘pursuing a hint suggested by his own thoughts,’ of which he had
only a few copies printed. It was entitled _Vera Circuli et Hyperboles
Quadratura_, and Montucla in writing of it says that the title is
misleading, and that the author does not claim, except approximately,
through his infinite converging series to find the square of a circle or
hyperbola. Collins, to whom a copy was sent, read part of it before the
Royal Society. Lord Brouncker and Dr Wallis were enthusiastic in its
praise, and under such encouragement Gregorie published it along with
some fresh matter under the title of _Geometriae Pars Universalis
inservieus Quantitatum Curvarum Transmutationi et Mensurae_. The book
came out in Padua with the permission of the State of Venice, and was a
great success. Before its publication the Royal Society showed their
appreciation of it by making Gregorie a Fellow.

This was in January 1668; in March he was still in Padua, but in all the
confusion of departure, and not long after he returned to Scotland, and
back to his much loved Aberdeenshire, where happiness was awaiting him
on all sides. There was Kinairdy to visit with its many charms, and
there was Aberdeen, and at Elrick there was a cousin who was after all,
it is easy to guess, the end of his journey. This was Mary Burnet, the
widow of John Burnet, who to his great joy consented to become his wife,
and was married to him in 1669.

The astronomer found love-making dreadfully time-consuming, and vaguely
regretted it. You see, it was apt to interrupt his correspondence with
Huygens and Halley, with Newton and Collins, with Dr Wallis and Lord
Brouncker. Here is a pathetic letter from him written in the early part
of the year to one of his mathematical correspondents—‘I have several
things in my head as yet only committed to memory, neither can I dispose
of myself to write them in order and method till I have my mind free
from other cares.’

His wife was only twenty-three, although this was her second marriage,
and even when after Mr Gregorie’s death she married Mr Ædis, she was
still young and very beautiful. A rare piece of her work remains in the
tapestries which adorn the Magistrates’ Gallery in St Nicholas Church in
Aberdeen. Susannah and Jephtha’s daughter were her subjects, and there
they are still, looking out of their panels, from the midst of their
beautiful blue and green landscapes, with the rigid uncertainty of
tapestry portraits. Bailie Burnet would have been proud if he could have
foreseen what a combination of ecclesiastical and civic honour was to
fall to his wife’s needlework.

Mrs Gregorie’s father, George Jameson the artist, drew the pictures for
her. Walpole called him the ‘Van Dyck of Scotland,’ though it is
difficult to know why, as there is really no resemblance in their work,
but at least Jameson and Van Dyck were friends in Rubens’ studio, and
the kindly appreciation of his fellow-citizens has remembered and
repeated the phrase.

In 1670, James Gregorie was appointed to the Chair of Mathematics in St
Andrews, where he had a successful if sometimes vexed life. His duties
were to deliver two lectures a week, and to answer any mathematical
questions that might be set before him. ‘I am now much taken up,’ he
writes in May, 1671, ‘and have been so all this winter by-past, both
with my public lectures, which I have twice a week, and resolving
doubts, which some gentlemen and scholars propose to me. This I must
comply with, nevertheless that I am often troubled with great
impertinences, all persons here being ignorant of these things to
admiration. These things do so hinder me, that I have but little time to
spend on these studies my genius leads me to.’

He lived near the beautiful cathedral and almost under the shadow of St
Regulus, and there his name is still remembered in Gregorie’s Lane and
Gregorie’s Place. He worked in the long, many-windowed library, where
the clock which he used is still at work, and where it has been keeping
time these two hundred years, since Huygens, who invented the use of the
pendulum in clocks, and Gregorie himself were laid at rest.

Huygens and Gregorie had a long feud about his Paduan book. Its faults
as the Dutchman thought were lack of ‘distinguished perspicuity’ and
intricacy in its invention. But Huygens must have lived to regret his
criticisms, however well founded they were, for with a sudden burst of
the M’Gregor spirit, Professor James sent forth a volley of answers, his
official statements through the medium of the Philosophical
Transactions, and his unofficial through his many letters. Neither his
great opponent, nor his great opponent’s allies were spared. ‘I am not
yet so much a Christian as to help those who hurt me. I do not know
(neither do I desire to know) who calleth in that preface, Hugenius his
animadversions of November 12th 1668, judicious, but I would earnestly
desire that he would particularize (if he be not an ignorant) in what my
answer, which is contradictory to Hugenius his animadversions is faulty;
for in geometrical matters, if anything be judicious its contradictory
must be nonsense. I do not know what need there was for an apology for
inserting my answer, but to compliment Hugenius, and violently (if it be
possible) to bear down the truth. I imagined such actions below the
meanest member of the Royal Society, however, I hope I may have
permission to call to an account in print the penners of that Preface.’
The account was never called for, because Newton in the meantime, gave
the simpler solution, which Gregorie had been declaring an
impossibility, but it must be remembered that Gregorie’s method although
almost impossible to any but the most clear mathematical mind, was easy
to him and was correct as far as it went. Can anyone help loving
Huygens, even though they know no more of him than what is seen in his
intercourse with Gregorie? What graciousness and kindness was returned
in exchange for the thunderous treatment he received! Sick, as he
thought he was unto death, he suggested Gregorie as a fit successor to
him in the favour of Louis XIV., and we find his father, who was
secretary to the Prince of Orange and a poet—the poet of the
garden—similarly occupied, trying to influence the great folk with whom
he came in contact to further Gregorie’s interests. But in spite of the
recommendation of the Académie des Sciences, the Royal Society, and such
friends as he had at court, Gregorie never received any Royal patronage;
the want of which he took very calmly and with a great deal of broad
good sense, never having expected any other result. ‘I have had
sufficient experience in the uncertainty of things of that nature before
now, which maketh me since I came to Scotland, how mean and despicable
so ever my condition be, to rest contented and satisfy myself with that,
that I am at home in a settled condition by which I can live. I have
known many learned men far above me upon every account with whom I would
not change my condition.’

In 1669 Gregorie’s books were suppressed in Italy, which came as a shock
to him, and was all the more grievous because it deprived him of many of
his most interested readers—and controversialists! Scotland, however,
supplied the deficiency wonderfully well. There was a professor in
Glasgow called George Sinclair, a mathematician, and a demonologist of
great repute, who wrote a book on Hydrostatics. It was quite clever, and
may have been more interesting to the general reader than books on
Hydrostatics usually are, because of an appendix in which some strange
things were included, amongst others, A Short History of Coal and the
Story of the Devil of Glenluce. The humour of the combination was too
much for Gregorie, and under the name of Patrick Mathers, Arch-Bedal to
the University of St. Andrews, he wrote an answer to the scientific part
of the Hydrostatics, which he called ‘The Great and New Art of Weighing
Vanity.’ Witty, scurrilous, easily written and easily read, the book was
a great source of merriment both to Gregorie and his colleagues at St.
Andrews, and it raised a perfect hurricane in Glasgow. The very name was
an impertinent play on the title of his antagonist’s former book _Ars
nova et Magna_ and the fact that Professor Sinclair was no mean
adversary added zest to the battle, which continued many days. But
Professor Sinclair had prepared an ill reception for his work by the
edict which he had had printed and sent abroad to persuade people to
order copies of it:—

‘Forasmuch as there is a Book of Natural and Experimental Philosophy in
English, to be printed within these four months, or thereabouts; wherein
are contained many excellent and new purposes: As first, Thirty
Theorems, the most part whereof were never so much as heard of before:’
(Alas! poor professor what a beginning! And is the ending any better!)
‘and an excellent way for knowing, by the eye, the Sun or Moon’s motion
in a second of time, which is the 3600 part of an hour, and many others
of different kinds, useful and pleasant. These are therefore to give
notice to all ingenious persons, who are lovers of Learning, that if
they shall be pleased to advance Gedeon Shaw, Stationer at the foot of
the Ladies Steps, three pounds Scots, for defraying the present charges
of the said Book, they shall have from him, betwixt the date hereof and
April next to come, one of the Copies: And for their further security in
the interim the Author’s obligation for performing the same.’

‘Which so exposed to my masters the vanity of that confident man, that
they were forced plainly to let him know their mind,’ wrote the
Arch-Bedal, and some of his own sentiments were expressed in a letter
which he afterwards quoted in the Preface to his book _The Great and New
Art_ ‘Sir,—I admire exceedingly the forwardness of your humor (I will
call it no worse) in your last to ——: he is a person not concerned in
you or in your books, neither will he ignorantly commend anything, as it
seems ye expected he should have done, when ye sent him these papers. Ye
might have known long ago that he had no veneration for what ye had
formerly published, for he made no secret of his mind, when he was put
to it. Ye may mistake him, if ye think that any by-end will cause him
speak what he thinks not: nevertheless he delivered your commission, and
was willing to be unconcerned, expecting their answer. They pressed him
to know his judgment of your last piece: he told ingenuously the truth,
that there was none of them had less esteem for it than himself. He
hopes you are so much a Christian, that ye will not be offended with him
for speaking what he thought when he had a call to it; and yet albeit ye
seem to favour him more than others, he hath ground to look upon himself
as one of the sophistical rabble, for they only are such who condemn
anything ye do, the rest of the University continuing always learned
persons. It is to no purpose to apologize for themselves, ye take all
for granted, which ye have heard: I shall not put you to the pains of
proving it; yet it seems ye would hardly have believed it so easily, had
not your conscience told you, that they had some reason for their
judgement, which really was this following: That they see nothing in
your last piece, new and great (albeit it be _Ars nova et Magna_) save
errors and nonsense; as your demonstrations of the pendulum, your _Nihil
spatiale_, your _Gravitas circularis_, and _horizontalis_, your question
“Whether or no a body may be condensed in a point?” etc., too many to
fill several letters: for ye must not call experiments new inventions,
otherwise ye are making new inventions every day, neither must ye call
different explications new inventions, else the same thing might be
invented by almost every Writer. I admire how ye question the R.
Society; for I desire to know one point of doctrine, which ye or they
either pretend to, concerning the weight of the air, the spring of it,
or anything else in your book, save mistakes, which was not received by
all mathematicians, and the most learned of Philosophers many years
before any of you put pen to paper. Ye have been at much pains to prove
that by experiment, which all the learned already grant, and some have
demonstrat _à priori_ from the principles of Geometry and Staticks, and
many _à posteriori_ from experience if sense may be called a
demonstration: yet ye are the only man who produceth the _Ars Nova et
Magna_ when all others are out of fashion. But more to your
commendation, it seems ye do all these wonders by Magick; for ye have
the ordinair principles of none of these Sciences: Euclid is as much a
stranger as reason in all your Books: and for this _Perque Mathematicos
semper celebrabere fastus_! At last ye come to prove a new doctrine,
which before now was near 2000 years old, with thirty new Theorems which
must not be named because they are of such a tender and delicat
complexion that the very naming of them will make them old. There are
also many other excellent things, which will be all new when they were
but printed yesterday. It is like some of these dayes, we may have an
_Ars Nova et Magna_, to prove that a piece of lead is heavier than so
much cork. I know not wherefore ye undervalue any man, because he hath
not as great esteem for your notions as yourself: Have not we as much
freedom to speak our mind of you, as ye have to write yours of the R.
Society and the University of Glasgow? The greatest hurt ye can do us,
is to make Dromo famulus one of our Principals. I think it not strange
that ye using only demonstrations of sense, should admire the force of
our imagination, in affirming no method of Dyving so good as that of
Melgin. I am sure that the man Dyving for a continual time, if he be not
also of your invention, must breath of the air; and this air must either
be kept close by itself, as in Melgin’s way, or communicat with the air
above. If the latter be your invention, I doubt ye must also have some
Chirurgical invention to apply to your Dyver at his return, if he go to
any great deepness: If the former, it is the same with Melgin’s; and you
cannot neither any man else help it, but in circumstances (which alters
not the method) and perchance to little purpose. As for Archimedes, I am
sure he wanted no necessary requisit to prove the weight of water in its
own Element. I know not what else ye intend to prove: Always I am as
sure that he had two great requisits, which ye want; to wit, Geometry
and a sound head. As to what ye write concerning the imperfection of
Sciences; the scientifical part of Geography is so perfected, that there
is nothing required for the projection, description and situation of a
place, which cannot be done and demonstrat. The scientifical part of
opticks is so perfected, that nothing can be required for the perfection
of sight, which is not demonstrat, albeit men’s hands cannot reach it;
and these being the objects of the fore-said Sciences, your authority
shall not persuade me that it is altogether improper to call them
perfect. In the Hydrostaticks, it were no hard matter to branch out all
the experiments that can be made into several Classes, of which the
event and reason might perfectly be deduced, as consectaries (I speak
not here of long deductions, as ye seem to rant) to something already
published: if it be noticed but rudely (as ye, not understanding what
niceties of proportion means, must do) only considering Motion and Rest:
And I believe there is none ignorant of this who understands what is
written in this Science. Upon this account writing to you, I might call
it perfect, albeit I know there are many things relating to the
proportion and acceleration of the motions of fluids, which are yet
unknown, and may perchance still be. Ye shal not think that I speak of
you without ground; (for in your _Ars Magna et Nova_, ye bring in your
great attempts for a perpetual motion; all which a novice of eight days
standing in Hydrostaticks would laugh at). I do not question that this
age hath many advantages beyond former ages; but I know not any of them,
it is beholden to you for: only I admire your simplicity in this.
Astronomers seek always to have the greatest intervals betwixt
Observations, and ye talk that ye will give an excellent way for
observing the Sun or Moon’s motion for a second of time; that is to say,
as if it were a great matter that there is but a second of time betwixt
your Observations. I wonder ye tell me the eye should be added; for the
invention had been much greater had that been away. I do confess that a
good History of Nature is absolutely the most requisite thing for
learning; but it is not like that you are fit for that purpose, who so
surely believe the miracles of the West, as to put them in print; and
record the simple meridian altitudes of Comets, and that only to halfs
of degrees or little more as worth noticing. However, if ye do this last
part concerning Coal-sinks well, and all the rest be but an _Ars Magna
et Nova_, ye may come to have the repute of being more fit to be a
Collier than a Scholar. Ye might have let alone the precarious
principles and imaginary worldes of Des Cartes, until your new
inventions had made them so: For I must tell you Des Cartes valued the
History of Nature, as much as any experimental Philosopher ever did, and
perfected it more with judicious experiments, than ye will by all
appearance do in ten ages. Ye are exceedingly misinformed, if ye have
heard that any here have prejudice or envy against you; for there is
none here speaks of you but with pity and commiseration: neither heard I
ever of any man who commended you for what he understood. As for your
Latin Sentences, if they be not applied to yourself, I understand them
not; for here we are printing no books, we are not sending tickets
throughout the country to tell the wonders we can do: We are going about
the imployments we are called to, and strive to give a reason for what
we say. Where then are our _Doli et fallaciae, tabulae et testes,
sapientia ad quam putamus nos pervenisse_? etc. In these things ye
publish, ye know there is no Sophistry but clear evidence: If ye had
done such great matters in _Universale et ens rationis_, ye might have
had a shift; but here ye must either particularize your inventions, or
otherwise demonstrat yourself derogatory to the credit of the Nation:
For what else is it to confound R. Societies and Universities with _Ars
Magna et Nova_; and yet when ye were put to it in print, to show your
inventions, all ye could say was, that the publisher should have
reflected upon the wisdom of the Creator, etc., so that the Poet said
well of Democritus, etc., of which I understand not the sense, except ye
make yourself the summus vir, and us all the Verveces. I suppose this
may be the great credit that ye say ye have labored to gain to your
nation; to wit to get us all the honrable title of Wedders. No more at
present, but hoping this free and ingenuous Letter shal have a good
effect upon you (for I am half perswaded, that the flattery of scorners
and ignorants, hath brought you to this height of imaginary learning)
and that when ye come to yourself ye will thank me for my pains.

                                            I rest your humble servant.’

To this letter Professor Sinclair in his turn very pertinently remarked,
that they should not criticise his book till they had seen it, and the
St Andrews’ teachers were convinced. But unfortunately in the address to
the reader with which Professor Sinclair’s _Hydrostaticks_ commences, he
gave expression to his wounded feelings.

‘When this Book was first committed to the press, I sent an intimation
thereof to some of my friends, for their encouragement to it, a practice
now common, and commendable which hath not wanted a considerable
success, as witness the respect of many worthy persons, to whom I am
oblidged. But there is a generation, that rather than they will
encourage any new invention, set themselves by all means to detract from
it and the authors of it; so grieved are they, that ought of this kind
should fall into the hands of any, but their own. And therefore if the
Author shall give but the title of New to his invention, though never so
deservedly, they fly presently in his throat, like so many Wild-Catts,
studying either to ridicule his work altogether—a trade that usually,
the person of weakest abilities, and most empty heads, are better at,
than learned men; like those schollars, who being nimble in putting
tricks, and impostures upon their Condisciples, were dolts, as to their
lesson, or else fall upon it with such snarling and carping as discover
neither ingenuity, nor ingeniousness, but a sore sickness called,
_Envy_.’

Now, indeed, now was the Arch-Bedal justified, and so in hot haste he
wrote that stinging book, which purported to be by Patrick Mathers (the
Arch-Bedal to the University of St Andrews), but was really by Gregorie,
a fact which its erudition must have made clear to Sinclair, even before
that kind person, the mutual friend, had confided the fact to him.

The curious thing was that with all his desire to heap ridicule upon his
adversary, Gregorie only touched upon what would naturally now appear
the most vulnerable point, the passage about the Devil of Glenluce.

In the meantime the clear air of St Andrews was daily suggesting to him
how desirable a place it was in which to teach Astronomy. At night, when
he walked over the links, the stars were so clear above him, and the
hills so inconsiderable on the horizon, that he felt that nowhere in
Scotland was there a site more suitable for an observatory. His idea was
cordially agreed to by the University, and sufficient money had been
collected by 1673 to admit of the authorities commencing their
arrangements. Accordingly Gregorie was commissioned to proceed to the
selection of the instruments needed for the carrying out of his plan.

‘Commission, University of St Andrews, to Mr James Gregorie, Professor
of Mathematics.

                                                      ‘_10th June 1673._

‘Be it knowen to all men be these presents, Us, Rector, Principals,
Doctors, and Professors of the University of St Andrews, under
subscribing: For as much as we have formerly taken to our serious
consideration the great detriment and losse this ancient seminary hath
been at in times past, and doeth yet sustain by the want of such proper
and necessary instruments and utensils as may serve and conduce for the
better, more solemn and famous profession, teaching and improving of
Naturall Philosophy and the mathematical sciences, and especially for
making such observation on the Heavens and other bodys of this Universe
(as easily may be by such helps, with the great advantage of the pure
air and other accommodation of this place) whereby we may be enabled to
keep correspondence with learned and inquisitive persones in solide
philosophy everywhere, for the forsaid effect: And having purposed (to
be forthcoming to our duty and the encouragement of others) to set as
effectually as may be about this laudable and necessary work, for
providing the forsaids instruments of all kynds, ane observatory, and
all other accoutrements requisite for the improvement of the forsaid
sciences, the benefite, advantage and delight of youth to be trained up
here, the honour of the Kingdom, the reputation of our benefactors, and
the lustre and splendour of the University: Did therefore commissionat
some of our number to make application unto all persons, whom they knew
to be encouragers of learning, and patrons to the professors thereof,
representing unto them that we were instantly upon the effectuating of
the forsaid designe, And to that end to crave their affections and such
other encouragements for the said work as they please to bestow; And to
report to us their diligence therein, with the names of our benefactors,
to the effect this University may record them, and endeavour to make
such respectfull resentments to them and their posterity, as becomes:
giving them power to do every other thing proper and requisit in the
said affair; They being always answerable and accountable to us anent
the premises. And whereas this our laudable designe hath already met
with such considerable encouragement from persons of all ranks, that we
have ordered Mr James Gregorie, professor of the Mathematical Sciences
here to goe to London, and there to provide so far as the money already
received from our Benefactors will reach, such instruments and utensils
as he with advice of other skilful persons shall judge most necessary
and usefull for the above mentioned design: Like as be these presents we
the under subscribers all with one consent constitute the said Mr James
our factor for the effect forsaid, Giving and granting him our full
power and ample commission for transacting and buying the forsaid
instruments in so far as the money forsaid will extend, or as he shall
be further furnished by us upon what is to come upon our letters and
precepts for that effect: Obliging ourselves to ratifye and approve what
the said Mr James should doe in this our commission directed to him by
us during his residence there, and to acquit and relieve him of all
prejudice he may incur and sustain in execution of this our commission,
or any other commission sent by us to him during his residence there:
And to take notice of the fabric and form of the most competent
observatorye that ours here intended may be builded with all its
advantages: And also considering the intended work to be of such moment
and expenss, that we ar not able to accomplish it with the contributions
of these only who have already listed themselves encouragers of it;
Therefore we also by these presents do nominat and constitute the said
Mr James Gregorie our factor and special mandator for making application
unto all whom he knows to be favourers of learning for their concurrence
unto the advancement of the forsd work with full power to do everything
proper and requisit in this affair, as others formerly employed therein
have been impowered by us to do, He being in like manner accountable to
us anent the premisses. As witness these presents, written by William
Sanders, one of our number, clerk for the time, and subscrived with our
hands in the University Hall, on the 10th day of June J. m. vjc. seventy
three years.

         D. Will Comrie, _Provost of St Marie’s Colledge_
         Ja. Rymer
         Edw. Thomson
         Ja. Strachane
         Jo. Comrie
         And. Bruce, _Rector_.
         D. Geo. Weemss, _Provost of the Old Colledge_.
         D. James Weemss, _Principal of St Leonard’s Colledge_.
         Jo. Hay.
         Alex^r. Grant.
         Alex^r. Skene.
         W. Sanders.’

Professor James Gregorie in his search for funds went to Aberdeen, and
there he achieved what was quite the most wonderful success of his
life—he got a church-door collection in all the churches in Aberdeen to
provide for astronomical instruments at St Andrews. Rob Roy need never
have taken to the high hand, if he had a tongue at all as persuasive as
his great cousin!

Here are the Burgh Records for 15th October 1673.[1]

Footnote 1:

  Ane collection to be at the Kirk Dores for the Observatorie at Saint
  Andrews.

                                                      ‘_15th Oct. 1673._

‘The said day, Master Alexander Skene, ane of the regents of Saint
Andrewes signifying to the councell that Master James Gregorie,
professor of Mathematics ther, that ther was ane considerable work
intendit in that airt, which before being brought to ane perfectione
woulde stand considerable moneyes and that severall incorporations and
Universities hade contribuit therto, and seeing the said professor was
ane town’s man heir, it was expectit by all concernit, and humblie
desyrit be him, that this burgh wold contribute to the furtherance of
the said work: All which the councell considering, finds it incumbent
upon them not to be wanting for advancement of the said effair in so far
as they are lyable, and therfor appoynts ane collectione to be at the
Kirk dores ... the nixt or subsequent Lord’s day for the forsaid
effect....’

Things were going very smoothly—success was absolutely fawning upon
Gregorie—he was getting money as he wanted it, and the instruments he
had bought were entirely to his mind; but on his return from London,
where he had gone to fulfil his commission, he found everything changed,
and his colleagues, who had once been so kindly to him, had ceased to
regard him as their friend. He was in the curious situation of being
paid by all three colleges, and that in itself would make his position
somewhat difficult, but this difficulty had always existed. The real
cause of dissension was that in his absence the students had been making
popular demonstrations against some of the other teachers, and citing
his lectures as opposed to the theories propounded by them. It was most
uncomfortable for everybody, and everyone in authority determined to
make it most uncomfortable of all for Gregorie. His salary was
suspended, the university servants were told to take no notice of his
orders, and the students were commanded not to attend his lectures, for
certainly the mathematics as taught by him had turned their heads, they
had shown distinct signs of madness. The attitude of the professors was
not unlike that taken up by the country doctor, who when asked to fill
in a form, certifying one of his patients to be insane, put as evidence
observed by himself, ‘he called me a fool!’

In the midst of all the turmoil came a flattering invitation to James
Gregorie to become Professor of Mathematics in Edinburgh University.
After the treatment he had received this was a most blessed chance and
with great joy he left St Andrews, and came to Edinburgh.

The whole story was written to James Fraser, then at Paris:—

‘MUCH HONOURED SIR,—I received some days ago your very obliging letter,
and not long after your arrival at Paris I had another from you, to
which the truth is I was ashamed to answer, the affairs of the St
Andrews Observatory were in such a bad condition, the reason of which
was the prejudice the masters of the University did take at the
mathematics, because some of their scholars finding their courses and
dictates opposed by what they had studied in the mathematics, did mock
at their masters, and deride some of them publicly. After this the
servants of the college got orders not to wait on me or my observations,
my salary was also kept back from me, and scholars of most eminent rank
were violently kept from me, contrary to their own and their parents’
wills, the masters persuading them that their brains were not able to
endure it. These and many other discouragements oblige me to accept of a
call here to the College of Edinburgh, where my salary is here double,
and my encouragements much greater.’

Gregorie left St Andrews somewhat under a cloud, because, as we have
good reason to suppose, he had been teaching Newton’s Philosophy before
the Kingdom of Fife was quite ready for it, and because, too, his
students had more ardour than wisdom in their minds. But in Edinburgh he
had a great reception. The hall where he gave his inaugural address, in
November 1674, was crowded, and he was given perfect freedom in what he
taught. In his observatory he passed many happy hours, and often at
nights he would take his students to look through the telescope at the
stars, to find out belted Saturn and Jupiter with his satellites, which
was not such a nursery affair then as it is now. These phenomena had
only been discovered fifty years before, for let us remember James
Gregorie lived in the days of Charles the Second, and just missed by a
few years being Samuel Rutherfurd’s fellow-citizen in St Andrews.

The last scene in his life comes all too soon, and before he had been a
year in Edinburgh his place was vacant. On an October evening while he
was showing his students the satellites of Jupiter, a sudden blindness
came on, and within a few days everything was over. He probably died of
Bright’s disease.

It seems to us on looking back, as if the active mind had worked too
quickly. Gregorie was only thirty-six, but he had already done a full
life’s work in science. Mengoli, Newton, Huygens, and even Leibnitz (who
for some time claimed Gregorie’s series for his own) have borne witness
to his power. In truth there was something in him that inclined great
men to love him, and his mathematics are so deep that it is only the
master minds who appreciate him. He was a mathematician for
mathematicians.

There are many of Gregorie’s letters still extant, and for the pure
pleasure of reading one just as he wrote it, this letter written to the
Rev. Coline Campbell is inserted.

                                            ‘ST ANDREWS, _1. Jan. 1673_.

‘SIR,—I received your of the 23rd of December last, and am glad to have
the occasion to keep a correspondence with such a knowing person as ye
ar. I have not had leasur at this time to satisfie you in your probleme,
being drawn away all this afternoon with necessarie affairs: but with
the nixt I shall doe my endeavour for I expect not to mak the
calculation considerablie short, seing the nature of the question doeth
not suffice it. Our bedal his book against Mr Sinclair is come out
several weeks ago. No more at present, but being in hast and hoping that
ye will be pleased to continue this new correspondence, I rest,

                          ‘Your humble servant,
                                          ‘JAMES GREGORIE.
              ‘for Mr COLINE CAMPBELL.’

His widow and orphans were granted a pension by Charles II. of £40 a
year Scots in recognition of what Gregorie had done in Scotland. No one
could be found suitable to succeed him in the Chair of Mathematics at
Edinburgh. The authorities waited eight years before they made another
appointment; and when the new professor came, he was also a Gregorie, a
nephew of the late professor. His own son, too, held a chair, but that
was in Aberdeen, and he was a professor of medicine.

                               CHAPTER IV

                        DAVID GREGORY, 1661–1708

    ‘Tycho Brahe was also one who used the sword, not to cut into
    flesh and bone, but to build up a plainer way among all the stars
    of heaven.’—HANS ANDERSEN.

David Gregorie was the third son of his father and name-father, the
Laird of Kinairdy. He was born in a house without the port in the Upper
Kirkgate of Aberdeen, where the tradition of his birth lingered, and was
indeed cherished many a year after the boy had grown to manhood, and had
left his grey birthplace for the richer lands of the South.

The boy’s mother was, it may be remembered, Jean Walker, one of the
Orchiston family, and the child was taught from his babyhood loyalty to
the Stuarts and a passionate adherence to the episcopal form of church
government and teaching, which he carried with him to the grave.

His education he began at the Grammar School, of which Robert Skene was
the rector, and afterwards he studied either at Marischal College or
King’s College. It was at the University of Edinburgh, however, where
his uncle had had such a brilliant if short career, that he took his
degree as Master of Arts in 1683. He was even as a student a man whose
life was commented upon. People talked of his studiousness, of his
joyful temper, and still more of his friendship with Dr Archibald
Pitcairne, whose time was coming to make the tongues of Edinburgh wag.
They really were wonderful friends. Pitcairne studied everything from
sheer love of learning. He was educated in turn for the church, the law,
and for medicine, and besides this he made a great excursion into the
higher mathematics at the instigation of his friend. David Gregorie, on
the other hand, was a pure mathematician, all else in his studies giving
way to his love for his dear ‘Celestial Physicks.’ From his uncle,
James, he had inherited a great number of mathematical manuscripts, and
this inheritance was regarded by him with the deepest veneration. Some
day he would edit all these papers, but meantime many happy hours were
spent by these two friends going over the manuscripts. For David
Gregorie there was moreover much to delight in, in every fresh discovery
that came from the hands of Sir Isaac Newton. Soon he was as ardent an
admirer of the philosopher as ever his uncle had been. If he were made a
professor, Gregorie thought, he would admit none of the Cartesian
fallacies, and already his appointment to the Chair of Mathematics was
being discussed. At the age of twenty-two, then, and actually before
David Gregorie had got his A.M. degree, he was appointed to this Chair
in the Edinburgh University, an office which had not been filled up
since his uncle’s death. Lectures had been given by a student called
John Young, but he was only acting as mathematical tutor, filling the
place temporarily, whereas when Gregory was appointed it was as
professor, with a salary of £1000 (Scots).

In December he gave his inaugural address in Latin, on an Analysis of
Geometrical Progress. The lecture has been lost, but a volume of notes
of his usual course of teaching is preserved in the University Library,
and its range is very large. As has already been said, what chiefly
distinguished David Gregorie was his appreciation of Newton’s ideas. It
was his object to bring down the _Principia_ to the average level of
mathematical minds, and both he and his brother James, who held the
corresponding chair at St Andrews, were teaching Newton’s philosophy
before it was taught at Cambridge. ‘It was not long,’ says Whiston,
‘before I with immense pains, but no assistance, set myself with the
utmost zeal to the study of Sir Isaac Newton’s wonderful discoveries in
his _Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica_, one or two of which
lectures I had heard him read in the publick schools, though I
understood them not at all at that time, being indeed greatly excited
thereto by a paper of Dr Gregory’s when he was professor in Scotland;
wherein he had given the most prodigious commendations to that work, as
not only right in all things, but in a manner the effect of a plainly
divine genius, and had already caused several of his scholars to keep
acts, as we call them, upon several branches of the Newtonian
Philosophy, while we at Cambridge, poor wretches, were ignominiously
studying the fictitious hypothesis of the Cartesian.’

Voltaire wrote of Sir Isaac Newton, that when he died he had not more
than twenty followers in his own country; and, even making allowance for
the unfriendly eyes with which the Frenchman regarded his
contemporaries, there was probably some truth in the statement. Whiston
was professor of mathematics at Cambridge, and writing from that
University, where of all places in the world Newton’s doctrines should
have been earliest taught, it is curious that he should have to
acknowledge that he got his inspiration from Scotland.

In 1684 Professor Gregorie produced his first work, which was entitled
_Exercitatio Geometrica de Dimensione Figurarum, sive Specimen Methodi
Generalis [dimetiendi] Quasvis Figuras_. In it he makes much reference
to the speculations of his uncle, to whom he was at least partially
indebted for his materials, and there is little, if any, original work.
The book was not widely read, but it was said to have given ‘a public
proof of his competency to discharge the duties of the important office
to which he had been appointed.’

David Gregorie was appointed in 1683 in the reign of Charles II., but
during his six years in the professoriate many changes had come about.
William and Mary were on the throne, and not unnaturally it was
considered necessary by the new Government that steps should be taken to
ascertain the political opinion of those men to whom was entrusted the
instruction of the youth of the land.

                                        At Edinburgh,

                                                        July iv., MDCXC.

‘The Rolls of Parliament called Act for Visitation of Universities,
Colledges & Schoolls.

‘Our Soveraigne Lord and Lady, the King and Queen’s Majesties and the
three Estates of Parliament considering how necessarie it is for the
advancement of Religion and Learning and for the good of the Church and
peace of the Kingdom that the universities, colledges, and schoolls be
provided and served with pious, able and qualified professors,
principalls, regents, masters, and others bearing office therein well
affected to their Majesties and the established government of Church and
State. Therefore their Majesties with advyce of the said three Estates
of Parliament, doe statute, ordaine, and enact, that from this time
forth, no Professors, Principalls, Regents, Masters, or others bearing
office in any university, colledge, or schooll within this Kingdome be
either admitted or allowed to continue in the exercise of their saids
functions but such as doe acknowledge and profess, and shall subscryve
to the confession of faith ratified and approven by this present
Parliament, and alsoe sweare and subscryve the oath of allegiance to
their Majesties; And withall shall be found to bee of a pious, loyal and
peaceable conversation, and of good and sufficient literature and
abilities for their rexive Imployments, and submitting to the government
of the Church now settled by Law, and albeit it be their Majesties
undoubted right and prerogative to name visitors and cause visite the
forsaid universities, colledges and schoolls, yet at this tyme their
Majesties are pleased to nominate and appoint with advyce and consent
forsaid the persons under named, viz., The Duke of Hamilton, Earle of
Argyle et alii To meet and visite all universities, colledges and
schoolls within this Kingdom, and to take tryall of the present
Professors, Principalls, Regents, Masters and others bearing office
therein according to the qualifications and rules above mentioned, and
such as shall be found to be erroneous, scandalous, negligent,
insufficient, or disaffected to their Majestie’s Government, or who
shall not subscryve the Confession of faith, sweare and subscryve the
oath of allegiance and submitt to the government of the Church now
settled by Law to purge out and remove. As alsoe to consider the
foundations of the saids Universities colledges and schoolls, with the
rents and revenues thereof, and how the same have been administred and
manadged and to sett down such rules and methods for the good
manadgement thereof for hereafter. As likewise for ordering the saids
universities, colledges and schoolls, and the professions and manner of
teaching therein and all things else relateng thereto as they shall
thinke most meet and convenient according to the foundations thereof,
and consistent with the present established government of Church and
State. And to the effect that these presents may be more surely execute.
Their Majesties with advyce forsaid, doe farther Impower the forsaids
persons visitors or their quorum to appoint Committees of such numbers
of their own members as they shall thinke fitt to visite the severall
Universities and Colledges within this Kingdom, with the Schoolls within
the bounds to be designed to them, and that according to such
instructions and injunctions as they shall thinke fitt to give them; And
to the effect that upon report made be the said Committee to the
aforsaid visitors or their quorum they may proceede and conclude
thereupon as they shall see cause; And their Majesties appoints the
forsaids visitors to meet at Edinburgh upon the twenty third day of July
instant for the first dyet of their meeting with power to them to
adjourne and appoint their own meetings to such dayes and places as for
thereafter they shall judge convenient; And this Commission to endure ay
and while their Majesties recall and discharge the same.’

This large commission therefore which was appointed to deal with the
universities and schools in Scotland, met in Edinburgh in the Common
Hall under the presidency of the Lord Provost in July 1690.

The Principal, Alexander Monro, was tried first, and a sentence of
deprivation was passed upon him, as also upon Dr Strachan, Professor of
Divinity. When Gregorie’s turn came, he like those who had gone before
was accused by men of whose names he was kept in ignorance, whose
statements he could but feel were libellous, malicious and false. The
lay portion of the commission were inclined to favour him, and when they
enquired into his conduct as a teacher, he was able to present an
admirable report of his public lessons for three years. At the same time
he would not subscribe to the Confession of Faith, and so it came about
that when he recommenced his lectures in the ensuing month of December,
he did not know whether he was to continue in the possession of his
chair, neither were Dr Archibald Pitcairne nor Lord Tarbat, his constant
supporters in all this time of trial, able absolutely to reassure him on
the point. John Hill Burton, in his chapter on the ecclesiastical
settlements says that ‘Dr Gregorie, the only truly great man among the
Episcopalian professors, was wisely spared.’ But for him the suspense
and anxiety were very tedious, and he was glad when a prospect opened
out before him of quitting the university in which he had been subjected
to so much annoyance.

The opening occurred through the resignation of Dr Bernard, Savilian
Professor of Astronomy in the University of Oxford, to whose chair Dr
Gregorie thought he might aspire. It was of the first importance that he
should receive the support of Sir Isaac Newton in his application, so he
went at once to London to be introduced to him. Sir Isaac was much
pleased with him, and wrote him a testimonial, dated London, July 1691.

‘Being desired by Mr David Gregorie, Mathematics Professor of the
Colledge in Edinburgh to testifie my knowledge of him, and having known
him by his printed Mathematical performances, and by discoursing with
travellers from Scotland, and of late by conversing with him, I do
account him one of the most able and judicious Mathematicians of his age
now living. He is very well skilled in analysis and geometry, both new
and old. He has been conversant in the best writers about astronomy, and
understands that science very well. He is not only acquainted with
books, but his invention in Mathematical things is also good. He has
performed his duty at Edinburgh with credit, as I hear, and advanced the
Mathematicks. He is reputed the greatest Mathematician in Scotland, and
that deservedly, so far as my knowledge reaches, for I esteem him an
ornament to his country, and upon these accounts do recommend him to the
duties of the Astronomy Professor into the place in Oxford now
vacant.—_sic subscribitur_.

                                     IS. NEWTON, _Math. Prof., Cantab._’

Nor did Sir Isaac’s kindness end here, for he wrote a letter to
Flamsteed, the Astronomer Royal, asking for his influence in the
appointment. Flamsteed responded with great kindness, only mentioning
the fact that if his old friend Mr Caswell insisted on standing for the
vacant chair, he would be obliged to support him. In the end of his
letter, Sir Isaac, while mentioning his anxiety to have Flamsteed’s
observations on Jupiter and Saturn for the next twelve or fifteen years,
adds: ‘If you and I live not long enough, Mr Gregorie and Mr Halley are
young men,’ thus indicating that he thought them fit to carry on his
work.

Edmund Halley, who was the other candidate for the professorship of
astronomy, had from a scientific point of view stronger claims to the
appointment. To him the world is indebted for the publication of
Newton’s _Principia_, which Halley undertook at his own expense, seeing
that the Royal Society made difficulties about the money, and that
Newton himself was too poor, and possibly too much engrossed in his
study, to take the burden of it on his own shoulders. But Halley was an
infidel, and this disqualified him in the eyes of the patrons of the
chair. Sir Henry Savile had left his professorships open to candidates
of any Christian Nation ‘if they were of good report and correct
demeanour, eminently skilled in mathematics, possessed of at least a
moderate knowledge of the Greek language, and if they had attained the
age of twenty-six years.’ He had left the election in the hands of the
Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lord Chancellor, the Chancellor of the
University, the Bishop of London, the Principal Secretary of State, the
two Chief Justices, the Chief Baron of the Exchequer and the Dean of
Arches. With an electorate composed of such men, Edmund Halley, holding
the views which he acknowledged at that time, had no chance of election.

Whiston in his _Memoir_ says that ‘Bishop Stillingfleet was desired to
recommend him at court, but hearing that he was a sceptick, and a
banterer of religion, he scrupled to be concerned, till his chaplain Mr
Bentley should talk with him about it, which he did. But Mr Halley was
so sincere in his infidelity, that he would not so much as pretend to
believe the Christian religion, though he thereby was likely to lose a
professorship.’

David Gregorie then (or Gregory, as he now began to call himself), with
the support of Sir Isaac Newton, and because of Halley’s religious
views, was appointed professor.

He had entered at Balliol, was incorporated A.M. on the 6th of February
1692, took the degree of M.D., and was subsequently admitted to the
chair.

In the previous year he had been made a Fellow of the Royal Society, and
it was not long before he began to contribute to their volumes. He sent
in a beautiful solution of the Florentine problem, which Viviani had
sent as a challenge to British Mathematicians. His work was masterly,
and delighted geometers, and in Oxford he found time to write much more
than he had in Scotland, where teaching had always had to come first. He
next wrote a defence of his uncle against the Abbé Gallois, who accused
him of plagiarising from Roberval, and then followed his work on the
properties of the Catenaria or the curve made by a chain fixed at both
ends. In the course of this he was the first to observe that, by
inverting this curve, the legitimate form of an arch is arrived at.

In 1695 David Gregory married Elizabeth, a daughter of Mr Oliphant of
Langton. His marriage is commemorated in a Latin ode written by his
friend Anthony Alsop, a student of Christ Church, and published in his
works.

Shortly after his marriage he brought out his great book, _Catoptricae
et Dioptricae Sphericae Elementa_, which turns out for the comfort of
the ignorant to be a great work on looking-glasses and lenses.

The book came as a revelation to many men in that day, for in it Gregory
tried to simplify his subject, and to make it clear to the many instead
of to the few. He was rewarded with praise, and his book was promised
immortality. How changed are things in the present day, when to none of
our writers will criticism promise celebrity exceeding at the outside
two generations. _Keill_ blossomed out into poetry: ‘It will last as
long as the sun and moon endure,’ and it is just possible that it may—in
the Bodleian Library!—only that was not what Keill meant.[2]

Footnote 2:

  John Keill, 1671–1721, was born in Edinburgh. Was Professor of
  Astronomy at Oxford and an active member of the Royal Society. He died
  of a ‘violent fever’ at Oxford on Thursday, August 31st 1721, a few
  days after entertaining ‘the Vice Chancellor and other academic
  dignitaries at his house in Holywell Street with wine and punch.’ He
  is buried in St Mary’s Church.

Comparatively unnoticed at the time was a suggestion made in this book
about mirrors and lenses with regard to following Nature in the
construction of a telescope. It was almost certainly Pitcairne who had
explained to Gregory the strange mechanism of the human eye, and how in
Nature objects before they fall on the retina pass through both the
vitreous humour and the crystalline lens. Gregory pointed out that
Nature does nothing in vain, and suggested that, in imitation of Nature,
the object glasses of telescopes might be composed of media of different
density, and that an instrument made on this principle would probably
produce much clearer vision than any then in use. After Dollond had
brought out his beautiful achromatic glasses the meaning of Gregory’s
suggestion became clear, but it is a curious fact that neither James
Gregorie, who invented the reflecting telescope, nor David Gregory, who
suggested the achromatic telescope, should ever have seen the practical
result of their imaginations.

Life in Oxford for Gregory turned out, as is often the case, to be
rather different from his anticipations. He had looked forward to years
of studious peace; but the reality, while it answered his expectation in
giving him much time for study, had surrounded him with men prepared to
be unfriendly towards him. ‘The Scotchman’ received much contumely in
Oxford, possibly more than would otherwise have been the case, because
he was so well known to the outside world. Some of Hearne’s Collections
have the full flavour of the sort of annoyance to which he must have
been subjected, an annoyance none the less irritating to Gregory because
the facts so generally disagreed with the views expressed about him.
Compare the two following passages, which are evidently meant to
describe the same circumstance.

‘In 1702, David Gregory produced at Oxford his most important treatise,
_Astronomiae Physicae et Geometricae Elementa_. In this were included
several propositions communicated by Newton, being results which their
author had not obtained at the time of the publication of the first
edition of the _Principia_, but was anxious to bring before the public
at once without waiting for the second edition of his own work.’ * * *

‘It may here likewise be observed that men well skilled in Mathematics
scruple not to say that David Gregory has stole most of his astronomy
from Isaac Newton, whom he has mentioned with some little acknowledgment
but not so often as he should have done, which, as ‘tis said, has put
Sir Isaac on a new edition of his _Principia_.’

How different these two stories are it is easy to see, and although Sir
Isaac never expressed the sentiments assigned to him by Hearne, nor, it
is likely enough, would Gregory ever have this charge made directly to
him, yet it is impossible but that the Savilian professor occasionally
felt the sting of such mischief-making.

Gregory’s great ally was Dr Charlett, the Master of University College,
but besides him, he numbered amongst his friends, Halley, who obtained
the Savilian Chair of Geometry, Dr Hudson, Dr Smalridge, Dr Wallis and
Dr Aldrich, between each of whom and Gregory, Hearne seemed determined
to make bad feeling. As was quite natural, these men, working along the
same lines, had often to use each other’s materials, but Hearne always
represented Gregory as pirating the results of their labour without
acknowledgment. The statement of his indebtedness, only given once, was
petulantly regarded as insufficient, and even inverted commas did not
mollify his wrath. In fact, Gregory committed the only sin which Dickens
says is unpardonable—he was successful—and the commoner men in Oxford,
who could not regard anything Scottish without disapprobation, would not
forgive him. When Hearne took exception to ‘the Scotchman’s Greek’ he
was on safe ground and no one regretted this more than did Professor
Gregory himself, who was held up for ridicule by Hearne because ‘men
took him for an oracle.’ When he commenced the publication of his
edition of the ancient mathematicians, he arranged with Dr Hudson that,
while he himself would be responsible for the mathematics, Hudson should
see to the correctness of the Greek. In this series too, Gregory and
Halley undertook an edition of the Conics of Apollonius, but it was not
completed till after Gregory’s death.

If Gregory was not universally appreciated at Oxford, at the court he
was in great favour, probably through the influence of Bishop Burnet,
who had been at college with his uncle. He was appointed mathematical
preceptor to the Princess Anne’s son, the young Duke of Gloucester, and
here again, if we are to believe Hearne, the choice of the court was
received with universal disapprobation.

His honours, however, were only enjoyed in anticipation, for the boy
died before his duties as tutor had commenced.

Gregory was now busy trying to compass some reformations in the Oxford
curriculum. He drew up a new scheme for an under-graduate’s course of
study, which was sent by Dr Charlett for Mr Pepys’ approval. ‘I send you
enclosed a scheme of David Gregory’s not yet in any other hand, with a
desire that you would, with the freedom of a man of honour and a
scholar, examine, correct, alter and improve it, as may make the design
most beneficial to youth (especially of the Nobility and Gentry) and
redound most to the honour of the University and our Professors and the
promotion of learning.’

Gregory’s plan was that the teaching should be given in English, which
was certainly a sensible proposal, that the undergraduates should study
some Euclid, trigonometry, algebra, mechanics, catoptrics, and
dioptrics, astronomy, the theory of the planets and navigation. ‘The
teacher,’ he said, ‘should be always ready to gratify the request of
those who desire his instruction. If possible, the students should have
a printed book on the subject; if not, the lecturer will take care
timeously to give those of the class proper notes to be written by them.
And lastly, if any students were found hungering and thirsting, they
were to be given regular demonstrations of the operations of integers,
or fractions, vulgar or decimal—when they pleased.’ As to the proper
numbers for a class, Gregory said they should be not less than ten and
not more than twenty. The course here touched on was described very
fully in the paper sent to Mr Pepys, and Mr Pepys’ answer is rather
refreshing.

‘REVEREND SIR, ... As little qualified as I truly am, for offering aught
upon a scheme digested with the thoughtfulness and skill of its learned
author, legible in every line of it, the terms nevertheless wherein you
require my opinion and advice concerning it, joined with the dignity of
its subject and quality of the persons for whom it is calculated, are so
forcible, that I cannot omit observing to you my missing two things....
First—_Music_—a science peculiarly productive of a pleasure that no
state of life, public or private, secular or sacred, no difference of
age or season, no temper of mind, or condition of health exempt from
present anguish, nor, lastly, distinction of quality, render either
improper, untimely, or unentertaining.[3] My other want is what possibly
may be thought of less weight; but what nevertheless holds no lower a
place with me on this occasion (whether for ornament, delight, solid
use, or ease of carriage both at home and abroad), than any other
quality a gentleman can bear about him, though none less thought on, or
(which is more) of less difficulty in the attaining ... I mean
Perspective: not barely as falling within the explication of vision, or
serving only to the laying down of objects of sight, but with the
improvement of it, to the enabling our honourable student gracefully to
finish and embellish the same, with its just heightenings and
shadowings, as far as expressible in black and white; thereby when in
foreign travels to know how by his own skill to entertain himself in
taking the appearances of all he meets with, as remarkable, whether of
palaces or of other fabrics, ruins, fortifications, ports, moles, or
other public views.’

Footnote 3:

  Mr Pepys, who, as we know from his Diary as well as from Evelyn, was
  skilled in music, had thus an opportunity of expressing his views on
  that subject.

Mr Pepys was slightly distressed at the suggestion that English should
take the place of Latin as the language in which teaching was given, not
because he did not think it necessary, but he was afraid lest the honour
of the university should be affected by such a change. Whether these
proposals were carried into effect then is uncertain, but the Savilian
professor came into closer connection with Mr Pepys during the few years
that elapsed before his death, being especially upon one occasion, made
the bearer of tender thanks from the university to Mr Pepys, who had
commissioned Sir Godfrey Kneller to paint Dr Wallis’ portrait for the
university. The drawing was done in Dr Gregory’s house, where the
reverend old man was happy and at his ease, and the picture of him is
pleasant. In the list of the persons to whom rings and mourning were
presented on the occasion of Mr Pepys’ death and funeral, Dr Gregory, Dr
Wallis and Dr Charlett, are all inserted as recipients of the most
expensive rings. Others who received tokens of regard, though not such
costly ones, were Sir Cloudesly Shovel, and Sir George Rooke; Mr William
Penn was honoured with a 20s. ring.

In 1704 Sir Isaac Newton became President of the Royal Society, amidst
general content. Prince George of Denmark was interested in astronomy,
and only wanted to be shewn how he could most wisely help this science
forward; and now thought Sir Isaac, if the prince gave the money, there
was no reason why Flamsteed’s laborious and accurate observations of the
heavens should not be published, for the help of him and all like him,
who were studying what Gregory calls ‘the Celestial Physicks.’ He
approached the Astronomer Royal, and after considerable difficulty,
persuaded him to draw up an estimate of his observations, which was
shewn to the prince. Prince George’s decision was made very rapidly, for
though he was far from brilliant, (as Charles the Second wittily said,
‘I have tried Prince George sober and I have tried him drunk; and drunk
or sober there is nothing in him’), he had at least one great merit,
that he recognised his own limitations. Feeling that the papers before
him conveyed absolutely nothing to his uninstructed mind, he appointed
some members of the Royal Society to act as referees and see that the
publication of Flamsteed’s _Catalogue of the Constellations_ was carried
out correctly. As referees he nominated Sir Isaac, Dr Gregory, Sir
Christopher Wren, Dr Arbuthnot, and the Hon. F. Robarts. Their work
proved very laborious: Flamsteed was a delicate, irritable man, and
Greenwich in these old coach days was a long way from London; but the
referees had made up their minds to carry the business through, and, as
the dispensers of the prince’s bounty, and protectors of public
interest, they drew up articles binding themselves as well as Flamsteed
and the printer to perform their relative obligations. So slow and
fretful however was the course of this joint effort, that neither the
princely benefactor nor Gregory, whom he had appointed a referee, lived
to see the work completed.

Gregory had, in 1702, dedicated his _Book on the Elements of Astronomy_,
to the prince, drawing a comparison while he did it between Prince
George of Denmark, the patron of science, and that King of Denmark who
had so wisely given to the great Danish astronomer, Tycho Brahe, the
wonderful observatory of Uraniborg—the city of the heavens.

The Preface of this book begins quaintly with a delicious run of mixed
metaphors—‘My Design in publishing this Book, was, that the Celestial
Physicks, which the most sagacious Kepler had got the scent of, but the
Prince of Geometers, Sir Isaac Newton, brought to such a pitch as
surprises all the World, might by my Care and Pains in illustrating
them, become easier to such as are desirous of being acquainted with
Philosophy and Astronomy.’ In this book there is a most curious mixture
of history, imagination, ideas of Newton’s, which the philosopher had
communicated to him, and observations. It was of course, as was usual at
that time, written in Latin, but Edmund Stone translated it into English
in 1726, and this was the book which Samuel Johnson read with so much
acceptance in some of his dull days in the Island of Coll. Gregory
imagined the stars as they would appear to the inhabitants of the
satellites of Jupiter and Saturn, and gave to his book that
inexpressible charm of individuality, so often present in the Gregories’
writings, which makes them draw portraits of themselves as they write
their books. In this treatise he elucidated the principles of astronomy
with all the wonderful improvements made in his day, and Newton himself
considered it a masterly explanation in defence of his philosophy.

Every now and then Gregory would go to spend some weeks with his friend
at Cambridge. On one of these visits it was that Sir Isaac had occasion
to express his views upon the superstitions of the day. He passed a
house opposite St John’s College, which was supposed to be haunted, and
round the doors was collected a crowd not only of undergraduates but of
Fellows, and some of them Fellows of Trinity. Noticing that some of the
rabble were carrying arms, his anger burst out. ‘Oh, ye fools,’ he said,
‘will ye never have any wit? Know ye not that all such things are mere
cheats and impostures? Fie! fie! Go home, for shame.’

When Gregory arrived at Cambridge he was always full of messages for Sir
Isaac, and when he left, equally so with messages from him. In this way
he saw a good deal of all the important mathematicians and astronomers
then living in Great Britain, and very likely it added to his already
considerable reputation. In 1705 he was elected an Honorary Fellow of
the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, and on the 4th of October
he took his seat at the Board. This was no doubt an honour obtained for
him by his friend Pitcairne, who was then examiner, but Gregory could
not spend much time away from England.

When the negotiations for the Union between Scotland and England began,
Gregory was appointed along with Paterson, the founder of the Bank of
England, to decide what equivalent was to be paid to Scotland for
bearing her share of the debt of England, which was of course afterwards
to be considered as the debt of Great Britain. Amongst the many thorny
questions which emerged in the course of the deliberations about the
Union, there was none about which so many difficulties arose. Sir John
Clerk of Penicuik, who had so much to do with the affairs of Scotland at
that time, wrote his views upon the criticisms of the general public on
this matter.

‘Amongst all the articles of the Treaty of Union,’ he says, ‘there has
been none more talked of and less understood than the 15th, concerning
the Rise, Nature and Management of the Equivalents.

‘Upon this subject those who desired to be thought very wise, of deep
understanding, and Great reach of Thought, did vent themselves with a
certain Air, as if they pitied the Credulity and Ignorance of the
Contrivors, and so had Recourse to the ordinary Refuge of dull People,
who think they show their wit by laughing at what they do not
understand.’

Of such commentators Gregory no doubt had his share, and the question
was one which was of necessity unintelligible to the ordinary mind, but
those who were in authority were absolutely satisfied with the manner in
which the work was done. It was a long task, and involved many journeys,
including one to Scotland, to set things on a proper working basis. Of
this prospect he writes to Dr Charlett, the Master of University
College.

                                               ‘LONDON, _20 June, 1707_.

REVEREND SIR,—The occasion of giving you this present trouble is to
recommend to your civility My Lord Deskford and his Governour. He is son
to the Earle of Seafield, Lord Chancellor of Scotland. He is to stay two
or three months at Oxford. He has been regularly educated at the
University, and has past some time beyond sea. You will find him a sober
and grave young Nobleman. You may depend upon it, that he is what you
and I wish all such as him in Church affairs and all thereunto
belonging. I know I need say no more.

‘Though Dr Arbuthnot gott a promise of the N.T. from the Queen, He has
not yet gott the book it self. It was forgotten to be laid out before
the Queen went to Windsore.

‘Before I see you again, I am like to be sent by My Lord Treasurer into
Scotland, to see that the Mint there be regulated upon the same foot
with that of the Tower, as to the Standart of the Silver and Gold, the
Pieces of Moneys, the Weights, the Rateing and Standarding, and the
formes and manner of keeping the Books of the Mint, and I have been
somewhat taken up with seeing and informing myself of everything of this
nature in the Tower. I shall, I hope return before Michaelmass; but if I
should be 2 or 3 weeks after the beginning of the Term, I hope you will
excuse it, and every body concern’d.

‘As for what you propose to be done with the Mulctes, I am very clear
for it, Sir Henry Savile’s and Dr Wallis’s Armes will be very proper.

‘I hope to have an occasion to write to you again before I part. I am
with all respect and esteem,

                             ‘Reverend Sir,

             ‘Your most oblidged and most humble servant,

                                             ‘D. GREGORY.’

When the Union really came, it was very unpopular in Scotland and rather
unpopular in England. Dr Arbuthnot published in Edinburgh a pamphlet
with the title _A sermon preached to the people at the Mercat Cross of
Edinburgh; on the subject of the Union_. In it he forcibly argued
against the foolish prejudice of his own country. He pointed out the
intimate conjunction between Pride, Poverty and Idleness (’this is a
worse union a great deal than that which we are to discourse of at
present’). ‘Better is he that laboureth,’ he said in concluding, ‘and
aboundeth in all things than he that boasteth himself, and wanteth
bread.’ The populace, however, was by no means in the humour to be
cajoled by any man’s wit, and even Dr Arbuthnot, who, according to
Samuel Johnson, was the greatest writer of Queen Anne’s reign, found
himself unable to create anything but ungraciousness.

Dr Arbuthnot was a very constant friend towards Gregory, and the day was
fast drawing near when the professor should truly require his help.
Symptoms of serious illness appeared in 1708, and Dr Gregory was advised
to try the effect of the waters at Bath. He felt himself that his
journey would be in vain, and often tried to prepare his wife for his
being taken from her very suddenly. There was much to disturb the
quietness of his mind, his children were ill in London, and he was full
of anxiety for them and yet unable to go to them. After a wretched time
at Bath, it was decided that he should return to London, but at
Maidenhead he became so ill, that he could not be moved. Dr Arbuthnot,
who was sent for from Windsor, found him sinking, and on the 10th of
October 1708 he died.

The news was sent to Oxford by this kind physician in a letter to Dr
Charlett, Gregory’s best friend.

                                      ‘MAIDENHEAD, GREYHOUND INN,
                                              Tues. 3½ afternoon,
                                                        _Oct. 10, 1708_.

‘DEAR SIR,—This gives you the bad news of the death of our dear friend,
Dr Gregory, who dy’d about one a clock this afternoon, in this Inn on
his way to London from Bath. He sent to me last night to Windsor; I
found him in a resolution to go forward to London this morning, from
which I happily disswaded [him] finding him in a dying condition. He has
a child his only daughter dead at London of the small pox, of which
neither he nor his wife knew anything off, for I would not tell them;
the rest of his family lye sick of the same disease, so you may easily
guess what a disconsolate condition his poor widow must find herself in.
She would be glad to see you to advyce about his burying. My present
thought and advyce is to bury him at Oxford, where he is known, amongst
those who will shew a great deal of respect to his memory, and it is
allmost the same distance from this place as London. Mrs Gregory begs
the favour to see you here if possible, being one of his most intimate
friends, whom he allwayes confided in. I am in great grief and shall
stay here as long as I can in hopes of seeing you. If I am not here you
will find his brother-in-law, Dr Oliphant.

                                      ‘I am, Dear Sir,
                                              ‘Your most humble servant,
                                                    ‘JO. ARBUTHNOTT.’

Dr Smalridge also wrote to him.

                                                      ‘_Oct. 16th 1708._

‘REVEREND SIR,—You had sooner heard from me, but that my thoughts of
late have been very much discompos’d by Severall Melancholy Objects. On
Friday y^e last week I lost a dear child, of whom I was extremely fond,
and all that knew Him excused me for being so. I find all y^e Philosophy
I have, little enough to make me easie on this sad Occasion. The Images
do at present return thick upon Me, but I hope in a little time to find
y^m less afflictive. My wound would have been sooner heal’d had it not
been kept open by the Occasions I have had to give Others y^t comfort
which I have wanted myself. On Tuesday I went with Mrs Arbuthnot towards
Brentford to meet Dr Gregory and his Wife who were expected that day
from Maidenhead. My errand was to inform y^m of the death of their Girl,
of whom they were extremely fond, they left Her well when they went to
y^e Bath, and she died on Friday was sennight. We met not y^e coach We
expected, and when We returned, We found a letter was sent from Mrs
Gregory to her brother Dr Oliphant begging y^t he would come down to
Maidenhead to y^e Dr, who was very ill. She came to Town on Thursday
Night a very disconsolate Widow. The Doctor died on Tuesday-morning and
was buried on Wednesday-Night at Maidenhead. A messenger was despatched
to Hambledon to fetch you to Him, if you had been there. Mr Lesley came
from y^e Bath with Him and assisted Him in his sickness, and in
extremis. Dr Arbuthnot from Windsor came to Him. It seems He always told
his Wife that He should be but short-lived, and of late has often
desir’d Her to be prepared for his being taken from Her very quickly.
When his last Suit of Cloaths was made, He said He should not live to
wear them out. When He went out of Town, He did not expect to come home
again alive; and when He left y^e Bath to return He thought He should
not be able to reach y^e town. I am told that He has left his Family in
very good Circumstances. I am afraid his tender con[cern] for y^m was
prejudicial to his Health. He was an affectionate Husband, a tender
Father, an excellent Scholar, a man of great Experience and Prudence, of
good temper, of sober and religious principles, and One whom those who
had the happiness to be acquainted with Him will much miss. I visited
y^e Widow Yesterday, who bears her Affliction with as much patience and
resignation as can be expected. I hope her Husband’s Friends will do
what they can to make her loss less insupportable.

                                           ‘I am, Sir
                                                   ‘Your H. Servant
                                                                 ‘G. S.’

On her return to Oxford Mrs Gregory put up a monument to her husband’s
memory in the nave of St Mary’s Church. After Professor Gregory’s death,
Colin Maclaurin published of Gregory’s work _A Treatise on Practical
Geometry_. The first edition was sold out within a few years, and a
second was called for, as this book was in its day used as a text-book
in all the Scottish Universities.

Professor Gregory has been accused of spending too little of his time in
the observatory, and he was undoubtedly greater as a mathematician than
as an astronomer. It was as a pure mathematician that he held the high
place which was his in the eighteenth century.

                               CHAPTER V

                        DAVID GREGORY, 1696–1767

            ‘The picture of the ... Dean seems a true one.’

                                          —W. M. THACKERAY.

Of the four children who survived Professor David Gregory, there was
only one who inherited his taste for learning. This was his name son
David, the eldest of his children. The son’s gifts were not those of his
father; he was poetical, artistic, a student of history, who never wrote
upon the subject, a man in fact who had more of a woman’s cleverness
than a man’s; and looking back on him, his greatest power seems to have
been that faculty, which is not to be gained in any school—the
monarchial gift of leading. Everything which his hand touched was
blessed in his very touch, and through his life, as he passed along his
way, adorning different offices and positions of growing importance,
there was always some token left behind him that David Gregory’s
order-loving eye had rested there—the gardens had fresh flowers, halls
were beautified by statues, libraries became more spacious, and
hospitals were renewed in the same spirit of devotion which had long
before inspired the gracious givers.

David Gregory was born in Oxford on the 14th of July 1696. He was
educated at Westminster School, of which he was a scholar, and there
among the grey shadows of London this æsthetic little boy first learned
the fascination of history. There too he may have learned another thing,
his admiration for kings and queens, for he knew that the school owed
its foundation to the most picturesque queen that has ever reigned over
England, in whose day by the mercy of providence, more even than by the
queen’s wisdom, England became the mistress of the seas.

From Westminster he was elected to a studentship at Christ Church, and
in due course he took holy orders, and became the Rector of Semly in
Wiltshire. It was not long, however, before he was back again in Oxford,
for George I. upon his foundation in 1723 of the professorship of Modern
History (with which at that time the modern languages were associated)
appointed David Gregory to the chair. He was thus the first Professor of
Modern History at Oxford. Of his work as a lecturer there is no record,
but that he was thorough and painstaking no one can doubt; for realising
that the amount of work was too large for one man to accomplish, he
introduced several foreigners as teachers of their own language, and
until such time as they were self-supporting he provided for them out of
his own salary. Fortunately his chair was a lucrative one.

He took the degree of B.D. on March 13, 1731, and that of D.D. on the
7th of July of the following year, and four years later he was appointed
Canon of Christ Church. On undertaking this office he resigned his
professorship.

While he was canon, it was one of his most congenial tasks to
superintend the restoration of the Great Hall, and before it was
completed, he presented busts of his early patron George I. and of
George II., who was then on the throne. The new library was also
finished under his care, and the interior, with its graceful pillars,
its delicately moulded roof and wide windows, was executed entirely
according to his taste, and under his personal supervision. Little did
he think as he guided the placing of the volumes, how one day his own
beautiful collection of books would take its place there out of the
reach of his son’s creditors. If Dean Gregory had been alive in 1775,
the old library, which had been the monastic refectory, would never have
been mutilated, as it was, for the accommodation of the Westminster
students.

On the 18th of May, 1756, Dr Gregory succeeded Dr Conybeare as Dean of
Christ Church. He was in appearance, as in charm and dignity of manner,
well suited for such an office. Kind, courtly and genial, it was his
pleasure as well as his duty to attend the functions of the university,
and in his day he was unsurpassed in Oxford society. He was not very
learned, but he was a man of the world, and the Earl of Shelburne, who
thought it worth while to write some memories of the sleepy Oxford, in
which Dean Gregory took so important a part, describes the dean as the
kind soul that he was. ‘Dr Gregory succeeded Dr Conybeare and was very
kind to me, conversed familiarly and frequently with me, had kept good
company, was a gentleman though not a scholar, and gave me notions of
people and things, which were afterwards useful to me.’ Such a
characterisation might have astonished the dean himself, who would have
regretted with mild wrath his kindness to this young malapert, and would
no doubt also have gone for the assurance of his learning to those Latin
hexameters, which he as a self-made laureate had written at moments of
public interest. One set was upon the death of George I. and the
accession of George II., while another poem touched on the death of
George II. and the accession of his grandson; they were both considered
very scholarly, but, at the best, Oxford in Dean Gregory’s days was not
so very learned. Of all the heads of colleges, who are put into the
guide book to Oxford, used by the tourists of 1760, there is not one,
whose name is familiar, unless we count that of Dean Gregory, who also
might have passed into oblivion had it not been for his greater father.

The next honour that came to Gregory was his appointment as Prolocutor
of the Lower House of Convocation, and later, he became the Master of
Sherborne Hospital near Durham. ‘Christ’s Hospital in Sherburn,’ which
had originally been founded by Bishop Pudsey between 1181 and 1184, for
the benefit of lepers, and had by degrees, as leprosy died out, been
turned into an asylum for the aged poor. It had seen many changes, and
had from time to time been reformed as abuses came to light. In the
reign of Elizabeth, it was appointed that there should be thirty
brethren always living there, ‘except some there be sometimes absent, by
lack of chamber, the lodgings being few.’ When therefore Dr Gregory, who
was Master from 1760 to 1767, came into power and built a beautiful
stone edifice, in which these almsfolk lived, it was a cause of great
discontent that he only built rooms for twenty instead of thirty
brethren. The Chronicler, however, speaks of Master Gregory in high
terms as ‘the best of Masters,’ even if the conclusion be somewhat
equivocal. ‘His benevolence,’ says he, ‘was diffusive and general:
Whilst Master of this Hospital, he did not confine the poor old men, as
heretofore to the literal allowance, which, good as it might have been
when anciently settled on them by their founder, was now become a sad
and scanty pittance; but so far as it was in his power, made them enjoy
the sense and spirit of the benefaction. He demolished all the little
wretched huts in which they were huddled together before, and erected a
handsome commodious stone edifice, making it to consist of twenty
different apartments, that each of the old men might have one entirely
to himself, and also constructed a large room, in the centre of the
building, for their common reception, and comfortably provided it with
every necessary accommodation; but it must be remembered that all this
was not at his own cost or charge, for he cut down and sold a large wood
at Ebchester, belonging to the hospital, more than adequate to the
expense, and thereby put something into his own pocket.’ What a curious
conclusion to the praise of Master Gregory, who, it must be remembered,
is at the beginning of the narration called ‘the best of Masters!’—to
accuse him of putting public charity money into his pocket at the end!
If we had to believe it, there would once more be nothing for his
character except the extenuating circumstances of his connection with
that Highland worthy Rob Roy; but fortunately for the memory of Dean
Gregory, there is another biography of him, published not so long after
his death, in which it is explicitly said that the dean erected the new
buildings at Christ’s Hospital at his own expense, and not out of public
money, so—

                      ‘Let us never, never doubt,
                      What nobody is sure about.’

Dean Gregory married Lady Mary Grey, the youngest daughter of Henry
Grey, Duke of Kent (whose title died with him). She had much sorrow in
her married life, as all her sons turned out badly, and if the people of
her own day were as frank in their views about the dean and his wife, as
one writer was in the beginning of this century, she must have felt her
responsibility. ‘He had three sons,’ says this nameless chronicler, ‘who
being by their mother connected with the English aristocracy, took to
horses and dogs, and soon died out.’ Probably it was in his very
gentleness that the kind old dean failed towards his sons, for he had