BEATTIE, JAMES (17351803)

This article appears in Volume V03, Page 584 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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BEATTIE, JAMES (17351803) , Scottish poet and writer on philosophy, was born at Laurencekirk, Kincardine, Scotland, on the 25th of October 1735. His father, a small farmer and shopkeeper, died when he was very

young

; but an elder brother sent him to Marischal College, Aberdeen, where he gained a bursary. In 1753 he was appointed schoolmaster of Fordoun in his native county. Here he had .as neighbours the eccentric Francis Garden (afterwards Lord Gardenstone, judge of the supreme court of Scotland), and Lord Monboddo. In 1758 he became an usher in the grammar school of Aberdeen, and two years later he was made professor of moral philosophy at Marischal College. Here he became closely acquainted with Dr

Thomas

Reid, Dr George Campbell, Dr Alexander Gerard and others, who formed a kind of literary or philosophic society known as the " Wise Club." They met once a fortnight to discuss speculative questions, David Hume's philosophy being an especial object of criticism. In 1761 Beattie published a small volume of

Original

ORIGINAL

Poems and Translations, which contained little

work

WORK

of any value. Its author in later days destroyed all the copies he found. In 1770 Beattie published his Essay on the Nature and Immutability of Truth in opposition to sophistry and scepticism, the object of which, as explained by its author, was to " prove the universality and immutability of moral sentiment " (

letter

LETTER (through Fr. lettre from Lat. littera or litera, letter of the alphabet; the origin of the Latin word is obscure; it has probably no connexion with the root of linere, to smear, i.e. with wax, for an inscription with a stilus)

to Sir W. Forbes, 17th January 1765). It was in fact a direct attack on Hume, and part of its

great

GREAT

popularity was due to the fact. Hume is said to have justly complained that Beattie " had not'used him like a

gentleman

GENTLEMAN (from Lat. gentilis, " belonging to a race or gens," and " man "; Fr. gentilhomme, Span. gentil hombre, Ital. gentil huomo, in its
original
- ORIGINAL
and strict signification, a term denoting a man of good family, the Lat. generosus (its invariable transl

," but made no answer to the book, which has no philosophical value. Beattie's portrait, by Sir Joshua Reynolds, hangs at Marischal College, Aberdeen. The philosopher is painted with the Essay on Truth in his hand, while a figure of Truth thrusts down three figures representing, according to Sir W. Forbes, sophistry, scepticism and infidelity. Reynolds in a

letter

LETTER (through Fr. lettre from Lat. littera or litera, letter of the alphabet; the origin of the Latin word is obscure; it has probably no connexion with the root of linere, to smear, i.e. with wax, for an inscription with a stilus)

to Beattie (February 1774) intimates that he is well enough pleased that one of the figures is identified with Hume, and that he intended Voltaire to be one of the group. Beattie visited London in 1773, and was received with the greatest honour by George III., who conferred on him a pension of L20o a year. In 1771 and 1774 he published the first and second parts of The Minstrel, a poem which met with

great

GREAT

and immediate success. The Spenserian stanza in which it is written is managed with smoothness and skill, and there are many fine descriptions of natural scenery. It is entirely on his poetry that Beattie's reputation rests. The best known of his

minor

poems are " The Hermit " and " Retirement."
In 1773 he was offered the chair of moral philosophy at Edinburgh University, but did not accept it. Beattie made many friends, and lost none. " We all love Beattie," said Dr Johnson. " Mrs Thrale says, if ever she has another husband she will have him." He was in high favour too with Mrs Montagu and the other bas bleus. Beattie was unfortunate in his domestic life. Mary Dunn, whom he married in 1767, became insane, and his two sons died just as they were attaining manhood. The elder, James Hay Beattie, a

young

man of great promise, who at the age of nineteen had been associated with his father in his professorship, died in 1790. In 1794 the father published Essays and Fragments in

Prose

PROSE

and Verse by James Hay Beattie with a
touching memoir. The younger brother died in 1796. Beattie never recovered from this second bereavement. His mind was seriously affected, and, although he continued to lecture occasionally, he neither wrote nor studied. In April 1799 he had a stroke of paralysis, and died on the 18th of August 1803.
Beattie's other poetical works include The Judgment of Paris (1765), and "Verses on the death of [Charles] Churchill," a bitter attack which the poet afterwards suppressed. The best edition is the Poetical Works (1831, new ed. 1866) in the Aldine Edition of the British Poets, with an admirable memoir by Alexander Dyce.
See also An Account of the Life of James Beattie (1804), by A. Bower; and An Account of the Life and Writings of James Beattie (1807), by Sir William Forbes; a quantity of new material is to be found in Beattie and his Friends(19o4),by the poet's great-grand-niece, Margaret Forbes; and James Beattie, the Minstrel. Some Unpublished Letters, edited by A. Mackie (Aberdeen, 1908).

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