Who Made the Scottish Enlightenment?: A Personal, Biographical and Analytical Enquiry

By Colin Russell

The Scottish Enlightenment is often portrayed as elitist and Edinburgh based with no universally agreed beginning or end. Additionally, the Philosophers and scholars (the great Scottish Enlightenment figures) sometimes obscure significant contributions from other disciplines so that the achievements of a wider conception of the Scottish Enlightenment are not universally known. Sir Walter Scott also recognised that his nation the peculiar features of whose manners and character are daily melting and dissolving into that of her sister and ally had an identity crisis.
Both issues are addressed in this enquiry which seeks to highlight the scale and breadth of the Scottish Enlightenment whilst posing the question as to how Scottish identity can be preserved.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Oct 29, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499091052

Colin Russell

Dr Colin Russell qualified in History, Geography and Primary Education at Moray House College, Edinburgh University, in 1979. A career as a primary headteacher culminated at Dean Park Primary School in Edinburgh in 2013. During his career he worked in various academic roles for the Open University and in 2011 became the Chair of the British Educational Leadership Management and Administration Society during which time he was instrumental in founding and chairing the International Congress of Educational Leadership Societies.

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Copyright © 2014 by Colin Russell.

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Rev. date: 10/21/2014

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Contents

Preface

Origins of the Scottish Enlightenment

Nation and State

Note On Using This Book

Introduction The Land o’ Cakes

Why 1688–1832?

The Beginnings of a Learned Nation

Some Clever Chiels

What Was Scottish about It?

Noctes Ambrosiane

The 708 Luminaries of the Scottish Enlightenment

Chapter 1 The Historians of Virtue

Philosophers and Scholars

Chapter 2 The Poets of Vice

The Beggars Benison

Printing, Publishing, and Journalism

Writers and Poets

Music, Dance, Theatre, and Sport

Artists, Sculptors and Photographers

Chapter 3 The Learned Ideal

Education

Medicine

Botany and Zoology

Scientists of Man and Matter

Mathematicians

Geologists, Geographers, and Archaeologists

Chapter 4 The End of an ‘Auld Sang’

The Fall of Caledonia

The Rise of North Britain

The Military

The Church

Chapter 5 Damn’ Rebels

Jacobites

Chapter 6 From an ‘Auld Sang to a ‘New Sang’

The Improvers and Clearers

Engineering and Invention

Commerce and Industry

Architecture, Building, and Planning

Chapter 7 The Work o’ the Weavers

Reformers and Radicals

Chapter 8 Scotus Viator – The Wandering Scot

A Muckle Leap for Mankind

Africa

The Americas

Asia

The Antipodes

Europe

Chapter 9 A Parcel of Rogues

Ossian

Chapter 10 There Shall Be a Scottish Parliament

The Making of the Scottish Mind

The National Identity

Bibliography

Endnotes

To Tricia

For her forbearance

(front cover by Brian Holton)

PREFACE

In 1707, England lost its independence. This is not the traditional way to look at the formation of Great Britain, but it is as formally true as the more familiar view that it was Scotland alone that surrendered national sovereignty. H. J. Paton, the author of The Claim of Scotland observed that a scholarly Englishman once stated to him:

It must be a wonderful thing to be a Scotsman – because you have a double loyalty. ¹

Scotsmen it appeared were loyal to Scotland and Great Britain, whereas Englishmen were loyal only to England, which evidently was the same thing as Great Britain. However, England suffered comparatively little disruption to its institutions and its historical legacy, whereas in Scotland, this was not necessarily the case despite provision made for law, church, and education.

We begin also with the observation that all history writing has three dimensions though, no doubt, some historians would care to disagree. The first is any facts that can be demonstrably established, the second is the context in which the facts arose, and the third is the perspective brought to the debate by the historian. In addition, historians have had particular difficulties in choosing the most important of the possible areas of Scottish study. The teaching of Scottish history in Scotland’s schools has repeatedly undersold the Scottish Enlightenment, but this serves only to posit two very intriguing questions. First, why is this, arguably, most accomplished era in Scottish history generally not deemed to be a historical epoch worthy of separate treatment? Second, why has the population of Scotland got only the sketchiest of ideas as to the importance and extent of the happenings therein?

In answering both questions, the analysis will rest on two contentions, the first described as Scotland’s passing from a nation state to a stateless nation and the second based on a consequent legacy of cultural fragments that have their origins in a process of soft colonisation which concerned Sir Walter Scott, albeit he never articulated it as a theory underlying his belief in a Scottish nation:

… the history of my native country; the peculiar features of whose manners and character are daily melting and dissolving into that of her sister and ally. ²

The loss of statehood and the dissolution of nation process are then related, though not caused by the failure of the Scottish Enlightenment to become imprinted on the hearts and minds of Scotsmen and Scotswomen.

It is easy to see the effects, as for example in Edinburgh’s diminishment as a capital as first the court and then the mechanisms of government departed, and there was potential for both a hard and a soft version of colonisation. The hard version involves the full rigours as exemplified by the suggestions of the Tunisian writer Albert Memmi such as occupation, subjugation, suppression of language, suppression of traditions, and establishment of settlements from which the native population is effectively banned. It would be hard to uphold an argument that England knowingly did all of the above. But in relationships between dominant and minor partners, the sheer scale of the dominant party is bound to impact upon the smaller entity, knowingly or otherwise. This can be seen as soft colonisation, but when much of what happened around the times of the Jacobite uprisings is examined, it is hard to ignore vestiges of the hard version. For example, there has been some occupation as Fort George testifies, and there has been harsh treatment such as forfeited estates and events in Glencoe. We can instance also the actions of the SPCK in relation to Gaelic language and the depiction of Lowland Scots as slang. Traditions have not been banned, with the exception of Highland dress for a time, but they have been caricatured and mocked.

To the degree that this is fair comment it is not unlikely that A Legacy of Cultural Fragments would be the outcome whereby the culture is not immediately overlaid but rather competes for space with the newcomer. A cultural fragment is then a surviving piece of knowledge, way of life, or tradition which has come down, sometimes subconsciously, to later generations. An example of this would be the rhotic speech of the most southerly New Zealanders, where the old Scots tongue has a residual presence. It is, though, much more than this when it comes to the search by Scots for their own identity, which many have tried to do and failed. Ian Rankin, undoubtedly a man with a feeling for his native land, used his famous character Rebus to explore his own Scottishness describing our:

… small proud and ancient country with a confused and fragile sense of its own identity. ³

There is also the nature of the Scottish people which is itself a product of experiences:

As a race, the Scots tend towards reticence, something outsiders find curious. They expect us to be as garrulous and outward-looking as the Irish …⁴

Complementing this is a reputation for being canny which served well until the banking crashes of the twenty-first century.

Fragmentation and colonising effects do however demand a different approach to research, which hitherto has not always been joined up. Scholarly works on architecture, philosophy, music, and a host of other subjects can be accessed from any number of sources, and they tell stories in fascinating detail. However, they often lack vertical connection with times past and future, and they often lack horizontal connection with events other than their own narrower fields of vision.

It is to this wider embracing contextualisation that this book aspires, and in so doing, it necessarily attracts both strengths and limitations. The strength is an attempt at an explanatory overview, but the limitation is that one author can never achieve the depth of knowledge of the specialist. Alternatively, many authors could have been employed, but this is notoriously difficult in terms of coherence and can be quite beyond even the most skilled editor. Forward then to the ‘dig’.

ORIGINS OF THE SCOTTISH ENLIGHTENMENT

Peasants have been armed with pitchforks, and the sans-culottes in full cry must have frightened every aristocratic heart. The Scots were however armed with a much more effective weapon in the shape of the alphabet! We know that Scotland was an uncommonly literate nation from an early time. In 1561, the First Book of Discipline had suggested a national education system based upon the principle of universality, although finance was not always forthcoming. In 1633, the Education Act of Scotland ordered a school in every parish based on taxation on landowners, but the ensuing results may have been patchy, especially in the Highlands, though there is little doubt that there is evidence that Scotland became a leader, possibly in the company of Sweden, in terms of mass literacy. John Knox and Andrew Melville may have wished that this be confined to biblical studies, but no such containment was likely to be possible.

Gradually, the intolerance shown in the unfortunate execution of the student Thomas Aikenhead (for an act of what would be seen nowadays as minor blasphemy) was replaced by a more benevolent kirk. The Moderate Party and the evangelicals may have disagreed on theology, but they did so reasonably amicably, and religious tolerance was the beneficiary, to the extent that even the theatre was eventually accepted. Heartening though it was that free thinking was escaping fundamentalist shackles, it was still against the background of a pauper nation compounded by the disaster of the Darien Scheme. However, first, in 1603, with the Union of the Crowns and then more so in 1707, with the Union of Parliaments, easier relations with England seemed to open possibilities. Setbacks there were many, but by the time of the demise of the Jacobites, the economy of Scotland was on a sounder footing. It must have been most encouraging for the luminaries as they increasingly worked within a growing economy that may well explain their beneficent attitude to the Union. The effective end of the Jacobite cause was a factor in itself in so far as relative political stability followed the years of turmoil. The Battle of Culloden was a watershed in the violent internecine struggles. Charles Edward Stuart’s sad dissolution was almost a metaphor for the end of an era.

A second wave of economic action and national transformation was gathering steam, both literally and metaphorically, as the industrial revolution altered the landscape of central and upland Scotland. David Dale at New Lanark built an organisation of some vision that would have been inconceivable in the recent memories of many. God may have owned the world, but MacBraynes owned the Hebrides!

Finally, it is not inconceivable that men of genius do not arise in equal measure in all time and all places.

All this is so little known, even on our native heath. Why would a Scot buy into heather, haggis, and kilts rather than this rich legacy? The answer can only be ignorance of the history of this rich period allied to a disposition called the Scottish cringe, which leads to a negative view on even the most outstanding successes which is applied unmercifully to anyone who makes good. Strictly correct or not, it is nevertheless surely true that many Scots have earned a reputation for reticence about their achievements. In part, this is claimed to have been contracted in dealings with the rich and powerful neighbour. In other measure, it was exhibited in the attitude to Scots language and accent. David Hume changed his name from ‘Home’ to make it more accessible to the English tongue although he may have said it was because they were glaekit! There was of course a cultural resistance to downplaying Scottish language from such as the writer John Galt, Allan Ramsay (the poet), Robert Fergusson, and Robert Burns, but this was in a limited application.

NATION AND STATE

At this point, we may legitimately ask what is so important about the distinction between a nation and a state anyway. Well, prior to 1603, Scotland was clearly both a nation and state. After 1707, it was clearly not a state, but this prompts the question of what it was if it was not. Crucial to this is whether the loss of statehood was accompanied by the negation of nationhood and the onset of cultural fragmentation. Of course, we know that the loss of statehood was not popular with the Edinburgh mob, and it was to remain contestable for the duration of the Jacobite unrest. However, from 1745 to 1812, the relatively good times came and subdued to a degree the feeling of loss. That loss was not the demise of a race of Scots because as Moffat and Wilson have demonstrated in their book on DNA, no such race existed, rather it was an amalgam of many groups of settlers.

There are the pessimists to deal with as well. Edwin Muir called Scott and Burns ‘the sham bards of a sham nation’, and Stuart Kelly (an authoritative writer on Scott) has given many examples of the unreality of Scotland as seen by writers and critics over many years. Crucially, however, Scotland the nation could not so easily be put to rest as Scotland the state, though there were powerful tensions. The term North Britain came into being and a measure of the demise of nationhood and the success of soft colonisation would have been the acceptance of the new nomenclature. In the event, this has left only residual memories such as the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh being called the North British Hotel. Yet, it is clear that some were inclined to bury nationhood by the strength of their unionist sympathies. Consequently, in the lives of the people in these pages, there were essentially three political positions. There were those such as Andrew Fletcher who stood passionately against the Union. There were those such as Sir Walter Scott who stood for nation but not for state, and there were those such as Mary Somerville who openly desired to be English.

In the case of Fletcher, it was not only union that he opposed as his wish to limit church and state was outlined in his twelve limitations intended to limit the power of the crown and English ministers in Scottish politics, and this was partly realised in the Act of Security. After the Union of 1707, Fletcher left politics, though to his dying day, he lamented the loss of the state and the weakened position of the nation. On his deathbed, he expressed this as ‘Lord have mercy on my poor country that is so barbarously oppressed.’

Sir Walter Scott sensed the dilemma; it was good riddance to the state as far as he was concerned, but he was not willing to see the nation he loved go with it. There is though a flaw at this point in the shape of Bertrand Russell’s view of romanticism, nationalism, and the state:

… each nation was felt to have a corporate soul, which could not be free so long as the boundaries of the states were different from that of nations. ⁵

In this view, Scott’s saving the nation without the state was bound to fail, but it did not deter him, even if he was aware of it. What to do? The main chance was forthcoming. George IV decided he would pop up north in 1822, and Scott tapped into the broad romantic aspect of the Scottish mind and practically reinvented Scotland in a pageant of the grandiose. Highlanders in allegedly traditional dress, portly George himself in a kilt and pink pantaloons, which were later airbrushed out by the artist David Wilkie, and crowds and banquets all contributed to a defining occasion. It was not down to Scott alone, though, that a romanticised Scotland increasingly shared the stage with the achievements of reason and invention. From Ramsay’s Gentle Shepherd, Home’s Douglas, and Porter’s The Scottish Chiefs, a land of hill and glen was depicted, as historian Andrew Hook has argued. Poets such as Burns added to a romantic picture that in Scott’s time began to be measured in the growth of Scottish tourism. Moreover, the effect of MacPherson’s Ossian had been extensive on the Continent and America adding a past from the mists of deep time. Thus, Scott and the others left a romanticised legacy that was fulfilled by the later Kailyard School whose sentimentality, as personified by Crockett, Maclaren, and Barrie, related to a rural land. Not surprisingly, there was some hostility to this as a distorted picture of rural reality and the more pressing problems of urban poverty and the likes of George Douglas Brown produced rather more dour pictures of rural Scotland. The feeling is inescapable, however, that some of the soft colonisation was self-inflicted in the interests of the maintenance of the Scottish nation.

Mary Somerville, in contrast, represents the lack of concern with either state or nation. Her father was English, and much of her life was spent there and later in Naples overlaying her heritage in Jedburgh and Burntisland. She was a doughty fighter for the place of the educated woman, as when she derided the United States for granting suffrage to emancipated slaves whilst denying it to educated women. Yet, this woman of principle seemed to become intoxicated with the high company she kept and longed to be seen as English, the obstacles to which she often discussed with her great friend, the playwright Joanna Baillie.

The three positions described differ in another way in that there is a long time gap between Fletcher and Scott and Scott and Somerville who were well acquainted with each other. This serves to point up that the effects of Union, not least the enrolment of the Highlander in his natural pursuit of warfare, were increasingly creating North Britain and that for many Scots, there were bigger events to now be party to. One of those was an emerging working class which leaves room for a second explanation for a changing Scotland in the form of the suppression of the working class. James D. Young, adopting the hard position, has contended that Scott and his ilk were engaged in a sycophancy concerning the superiority of English culture to the degree that they practised cultural colonialism on the Scottish lower orders. The Enlightenment fitted into nascent capitalism, but in Scotland, this required the fragmentation of the real native culture. Scots language had to go, for example, and speakers were made to feel inferior in school, and some, such as the Select Society, sought to re-educate the educated in this regard. Was this nation then a pyrrhic victory? Is the Scotland we have been left with worthy of preservation if it is indeed a sham? Perhaps not, if we sift through the fragments and find something worthy, but there is at least more interest now in Scottish history than ever before, despite the inadequate curricular arrangements, and many Scots such as those who have populated the Scottish History Society since its inception in 1886, labour to remove the soft barriers that have so obscured our vision. So, and in this spirit, let us uncover the achievements of the Scottish Enlightenment and a bonnie nation, warts and all.

NOTE ON USING THIS BOOK

The primary objective of this book is that it should be read, but it is also hoped that it will be accessible to revisits with the focus on particular sections or individuals. Sometimes, continuous narrative makes this difficult for the selective reader. To achieve this end, this book uses a threefold layout and a device to indicate cross fertilisation of ideas and people;

1. Each field of accomplishment has an introduction dealing with its origins and impact during, and contingent to, the time envelope of 1688 to 1832.

2. Each field has a chronological set of biographies that allows selective visits by the reader to an explicit person or persons.

3. Each field is examined for its cultural legacy in order to assess what we have in our contemporary consciousness to allow understanding of our relationship to the Scottish Enlightenment. At the end of each section, the device of cultural fragments is employed to assess what we think we know about the nation of Scotland and the lives that shaped it. How accurate has the legacy been, and what care do we take of it in the times since? As will be asked in conclusion: has there been a colonisation of the Scottish mind?

4. Bold print is used each time a ‘Luminary of the Enlightenment’ is mentioned, in order that the networks can be perceived.

5. Sometimes a major figure may have a comparatively brief biographical entry. What more could be said about Robert Burns, for example, and so it would be insulting to attempt to educate those with far greater knowledge than the present author.

6. Finally, to those I have missed, or used my fallible judgement to exclude, I apologise and trust that some other writer will right the wrongs.

INTRODUCTION

The Land o’ Cakes

Historical analysis is a fine and necessary precursor to an understanding of where Scotland stands today, but it must be complemented by expressions of feeling that only Scots themselves can access. For this reason, a recurrent theme is that of the cultural fragments by which we try to make sense of the nation. In pursuit of this, an early reference to our national diet is as good a starting point as any, coming here in the fourteenth century from Jean Froissart the medieval French Chronicler:

Under the flap of his saddle, each man carries a broad plate of metal; behind the saddle, a little bag of oatmeal … they place their plate over the fire, mix with water their oatmeal, and when the plate is heated they put a little of the paste upon it, and make a thin cake, like a crackenel or biscuit, which they eat to warm their stomachs; it is therefore no wonder that they perform a longer day’s march than other soldiers. ⁶

It also comes later from Robert Fergusson who stated,

Oh, soldiers! For your ain dear sakes, For Scotland’s, alias, Land o’ Cakes. ⁷

And from Robert Burns:

Hear, Land o’ Cakes and brither Scot. ⁸

There is then something in this which speaks of the bucolic simplicity that was a Scotland which became one of run rigs and burghs of wild Highlander and poverty-prone Lowlander in a country of very limited importance in a Renaissance Europe.

How different it was to become, and how long the intellectual candle of the Scottish Enlightenment was to last are questions that have drawn several theoretical responses and suggested time frames. Indeed, framing the Scottish Enlightenment at all is a difficult task. It certainly did not explode into immediate life, and it was as late as 1909, when W. R. Scott named Hutcheson as its father and the harbingers are many and varied. Similarly, it did not expire (if it can be said to have expired at all) overnight. Of course, much depends upon the matter of inclusion. If it is simply restricted to the philosophers, as some argue, then precision concerning the time frame is greatly enhanced, though not definitively settled. Conversely, if we are to take it that endeavours across a wider field of human accomplishments formed not just a backcloth to the philosophers but was rather integral to the formation of a pyramid of attainment and achievement, then the time frame is harder to pin down and more elastic in both start and duration. Additionally, overlapping of the time frame means many brought influences to it in their dotage and many took influences from it in their infancy. The broader view is taken here based upon two indicators. First, the degree to which the biographies demonstrate that men and women from different disciplines knew and corresponded with each other and, second, that they were often accomplished in each other’s disciplines.

WHY 1688–1832?

From ‘Clavers got a clankie o’ to mere artificers

Nation and state became disjointed then at the very time men and women of accomplishment were flourishing and, as stated, we find difficulty in determining when we think this began and when we think it became complete. Consequently, for our purposes, bearing in mind the general parameters just set out, the study of the Scottish Enlightenment and the learned men and women will begin with the Glorious Revolution of 1688. David Hume certainly believed that this was a critical date, and it was also a time from which kings and queens began to have a reasonable expectation of dying in their sleep. At the other end, there was the death and disillusionment of Sir Walter Scott, with the reform of the British constitution in 1832.

A modern world was dawning which would be one of wonder, but a chapter of some distinction was concluding. From the moment John Graham, Bonnie Dundee ‘got a clankie o’ that ultimately killed him, it was seeming destiny that a Jacobite victory would never come. The year of 1688 therefore set a path that would sometimes be perilous but, in the end, permanent. In the case of the second date, Scott’s disdain for the rule of artisans and extremist Covenanters, as for example in Old Mortality, gives us a sense of difference after 1832 (though Scott himself was certainly not a reformer), where achievements continued in a gradually less elitist society. Reform and politics, as we would understand them, were a long time coming, but ordinary Scots would not relinquish political influence once it had been partially wrested from reluctant classes in 1832.

To breathe life and humanity into the historical figures to be encountered below, we can take heed of John Galt who certainly had a go with an interesting view of our national character in these times as indicated in his postscript to the novel Ringan Gilhaizie:

The English are a justice-loving people, according to charter and statute; the Scotch are a wrong-resenting race, according to right and feeling: and the character of liberty among them takes its aspect from that peculiarity. ⁹

The Enlightenment Scots therefore lived in a time of social and political change with a national disposition that may have been different from their southern neighbours. At the same time, the highly influential Scottish moral philosophers Gersholm Carmichael and Francis Hutcheson were beginning their seminal work in the wake of the recent starkly less enlightened events (ultimately leading to moderation) surrounding the execution of the Edinburgh student Thomas Aikenhead. A martyr to reason gave a sense of what was to be.

European Theology, Science, Philosophy, and Romanticism

This time frame is not simply a historic but limited Scottish explanation, for what an arrogance it would be to imagine it as a Scottish phenomenon when much of Europe was ablaze with this new thinking. Our chosen start year 1688 is more than a monarchical and ecclesiastical date. The whole of Europe was ringing with a new freedom of thought that hitherto the likes of Holland had nurtured by harbouring its leading advocates. To the fore was John Locke, who criticised hereditary power and postulated a social contract that balanced government and individual rights. Property was sacrosanct, and this led to systems of checks and balances that have infused the systems of Western democracies and allowed a liberal polity that encouraged the discussion of ideas from all points of the intellectual landscape. Essentially, there are four elements to a wider context. Theology was critical on the European rather than simply Scottish scale, whereby dogma served a function by rendering seemingly unanswerable questions irrelevant when they cannot be accessed through the field of definite knowledge. Yet in Calvinism lies buried something which belies this in that it had itself been a revolutionary force before slumbering in power. There is no doubt then that 1688 and the Glorious Revolution is a time mark in Scotland that, without destroying theology or the Roman Catholic Church, certainly further opened the door to reason and rational explanation from Europe. Emboldened scientists sought to enlarge the sphere of definite knowledge, and growing confidence was placed in science. Together theology and science are almost bookends, but there is a great deal of ground between them which is hard to understand through either discipline. The philosopher Bertrand Russell has stated that the intervening space is the rightful place of philosophy, or third element, in its broadest definition. However, theology, philosophy, and science as a backcloth to the Enlightenment required the ingredient of life itself to become potent. That life was mirrored in Scotland by the twists and turns that eventually led to a qualification of reason as absolute, and through such movements as romanticism, dynamic influences were in time to foster diverse opinions in the land concerning national life and the mind-set of the Scot. Some events in a Scotland bobbing about on a wave of internal and external forces begin to make sense in this life perspective. For example, the struggle between the Tory Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine and the Whig leaning Edinburgh Review casts light on how these aspects of mind varied from one individual to another. It may seem odd, but the solid Tory credentials of Blackwood’s resulted in a liking for romanticism, such as Shelley and Coleridge, which could in no way be said to be conservative as understood in later times. The key to this is the concept of the sensibilities and their expression in art, literature, and politics and how this translates to admiration for the heroic over the mundane, for chaos over stability, and a journalistic world which was a fierce mixed-up literary battlefield.

By 1832, reform was also a massive disjunction between Tory and Whig and caused Scott to make his famous disparagement of artificer governance. It didn’t, of course, strictly begin with 1688 and end with 1832, but the times must have been right in many ways, not least the emerging changes in the political orders and the growing toleration of diverse viewpoints. The one-stop shop search for an explanation of the Scottish Enlightenment is therefore not credible. Despite this, some would still issue a list of philosophers as if in isolation they opened the seam of progress. More realistically we can view the period as having a wider genesis and multiple explanations, which in theory should be simple and internally consistent rather than grand and overextended. This means that there is unlikely to be only one overarching cause, and thus our search is for the elements that the Scottish Enlightenment is constituted from and central to these considerations is how Scotland came to be a learned nation.

THE BEGINNINGS OF A LEARNED NATION

A picture then of a Scotland from 1688 becoming increasingly sophisticated in a moderate theology, a sound footing in science, with a respect for philosophy and an engaging counterweight of romanticism begins to emerge. Argument and counter argument have been exchanged concerning the degree to which Scotland was a learned nation in advance of most other Western societies. Yet, even if there has been some romance in the claims, it is unquestionably true that the country was very well placed in this regard as the eighteenth century got underway. There are, then, a number of practical factors to be considered in relation to the emergence of this learned nation.

There is some merit too in the claims often advanced that it was a group of thinkers, mainly philosophers, historians, and some writers, who formed the intellectual elite and forged a little space between themselves and religious dogma, and as we relate the history of the church during this time, we will see how its more extreme Calvinistic aspects became less influential with the passage of time. Thus Hume, with his dubious stance on religion, could talk with a degree of security unavailable to Aikenhead. A long journey in tolerant attitudes towards a more secular society was accomplished in a short time, and the march of moderation will be charted in succeeding chapters, but it is fair to advance growing tolerance as a feature of the emergent Enlightenment and a necessary condition for a learned nation. Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Aberdeen clubs were often the meeting houses of such men as for example in the Select Society of Edinburgh which was overtly elitist, and indeed its offshoot, the Poker Club, failed even to invite James Boswell, which was a serious social blow to him. There was also, in contrast, some truth in the notion, again perhaps exaggerated at times, that any Scot could make good. There was the possibility that you might share a desk with the laird’s son at the parish school and that your ability and his intellectual slumber would lead to your prosperity as a lad o’ pairts. Examples abound of the privileged elite attaining great academic and artistic heights, but the number who did so from humbler backgrounds is also impressive. James Young Simpson was considered to be such, and a biography has been published by Scottish History Press entitled James Young Simpson: Lad o’ Pairts. These leading thinkers also knew that Scotland had been a poor country, with much to learn from closer relations with England, a situation made for soft colonisation, and since 1603, a growing band of make gooders had enabled much that was worth learning to be assimilated into Scottish life. The Anglo-Scot was one result, and in extreme cases, some would appear to be ashamed of Scotland in the face of English pre-eminence. David Hume, as stated earlier, dropped his original ‘o’ in favour of the easier pronunciation afforded by a ‘u’. This must not be exaggerated as the same Hume has been judged by Bertrand Russell as having, in his History of England, sought to establish the ‘Superiority of Scotchmen over Englishmen’. Beyond these shores lay Europe and North America, and Scots had often availed themselves of opportunities (sometimes not available at home) that saw them boarding for Leiden, Rome, and Paris for their advanced studies. Michael Scot and John Duns Scotus are early examples of studying in Paris, and Leiden, of course, became a Mecca for Scots medicine and law. John Mair and Hector Boece are later examples of Scots of the intellectual world. North America opened up, and Scots, such as the Earl of Selkirk, spread their countrymen and women far and wide, in a diaspora that far exceeded the limited numbers who had made their way in earlier times in Europe. Lastly, there developed a new radicalism that often carried latent or overt threats to property. The response is well exemplified by the American revolutionary James Madison in his Federalist Paper X where he argues that a faction can be a majority where it threatens the natural law basis of property. In this atmosphere, it was clear that freedom of speech based upon liberal philosophy should now proceed without the accompanying danger of anarchy. In this vein, 1688 is very much a year of new horizons from which point increasing freedom to speak, opportunities in education, and access to a wider world began to become apparent.

In the case of the second date, the Reform Act of 1832 was an Act of Parliament that introduced relatively wide-ranging changes to the election laws of Scotland, and confirmed in an extended franchise, the changes that had been taking place in the national mind-set. The act was championed by Francis Jeffrey and Henry Cockburn under the title of the Representation of the People (Scotland) Act 1832, and henceforth, a process of enfranchisement would begin that would lead to modern democratic politics. In this atmosphere these learned Scots were almost unique in their magnanimity, as there was none of the exclusiveness of the French philosophical thinkers or the ruthlessness of their German counterparts. Certainly, the Scots had their disagreements, but the atmosphere had nothing of the cult figure or the high drama of the existentialists in Paris. In fact, they were generally mutually supportive of each other’s work, which they were fond of debating in their tavern-based clubs. All of this laid a foundation for the valuing of education in what the Scots would come to see as the learned ideal, itself a critical condition for Enlightenment. Being a learned Scot was more than just acquiring knowledge, and in examining later the concept of the learned ideal, it will become apparent that it was often an aspiration to be a polymath. A learned nation then demanded freedom from religious extremes, a broadening of opportunity, aspirational citizens, radical thinkers, and an eclectic set of interests.

SOME CLEVER CHIELS

What then was reflected on the ground from all of this? In the words of Mr Amyat, king’s chemist:

Here I stand at what is called the cross of Edinburgh, and can, in a few minutes, take fifty men of genius and learning by the hand.¹⁰

Of course, the learned chemist made a hopeless underestimate, as, at the very least, if he had been patient and lived long enough, he would have been astonished to find that 708 men and women are acknowledged here for their impact upon society during the years we broadly see as the Scottish Enlightenment. It is an astonishing roll call of achievement and sometimes calamity that became divided into many areas of endeavour but never lost the ideal of a breadth of interests. However, the Scots were not always the best self-publicists. If John Logie Baird had been Irish, the statue to his name would have injured necks trying to see its summit, but in Scotland, a forlorn bust sits on a sea wall in Helensburgh as if to apologise! Patrick Matthew, for example, was acknowledged by Darwin himself as already having understood natural selection over a quarter of a century before his own work, but Matthew only sought any kind of recognition once Darwin began to publish.

Some of the most important, if not nowadays necessarily the best known, of these men and women were certainly the philosophers who are often, perhaps too exclusively as we have argued, been thought of as the sole component of the Enlightenment. In respect of what it really was, we have advanced reasons to reject here the narrow interpretation that it was first and last about philosophy. It is difficult to see that this is tenable by even the most passing acquaintance with the roll call below of countless major figures in a particular field. The arts and the sciences, to mention but two other disciplines, were equally influential in their day. From education to invention, or from medicine to the man-made environment, you would find a Scot of distinction. Against such a background, there was a nation which itself had undergone a metamorphosis from backwater to urban and industrial eminence, and whether by the Act of Union or destiny, its body politic, its religious struggles, its radical reformers, or its outward reach to the world, it helped produce ideas that strongly influenced Europe and the New World.

WHAT WAS SCOTTISH ABOUT IT?

Yet, it could be asked what the real level of impact was and, additionally, what was distinctly Scottish is a valid enquiry. The first question is the one that will be addressed in some depth in the subsequent chapters of this book, whereas the second one needs to be cleared at this point. Remember, Scotland, we are contending, was to a degree meaningfully different from the relatively illiterate state of majorities elsewhere in these islands prior to and after the union of 1707, not just in the cities but also in rural and provincial Scotland. The urban geography of the nation was, in fact, undergoing rapid change and from Hawick to Dumfries, from Ayr to Dundee, from Perth to Wick impressive townscapes were emerging, and educated dominies, ministers, and lawyers were to be found along with the landholders. But also involved were other groups new to intellectual discourse, such as farmers, merchants, mill owners, and tradesmen. Booksellers like William Creech gladly serviced such a growing market along with the libraries, and when you look beyond the great figures of the Enlightenment, you see other men and women of thinking and action. This at once democratises and enfranchises other disciplines, but equally dilutes the argument for something definitively Scottish. A map to the Enlightenment must include science, virtue, reason, toleration, cosmopolitanism, polite learning, critical methods, freedom of the press, and fundamental human rights as a necessary condition, and these were not unique to Scotland. There was nevertheless a celebration of national identity through such as Burns, Fergusson, and Ramsay.

Metropolitan and provincial Enlightenment may also have had some differences of emphasis. In this view, the smart salons of Edinburgh projected an elegant Enlightenment, and the provincial towns another more practical perspective. Farmers might be expected to read texts on agricultural improvement, tempting us to see two movements: one of Enlightenment and the other of Improvement. In essence, if we follow this argument, the literati formed a Scottish Enlightenment wedded to the great city institutions, whilst the improvers were part of a broader movement.

This may well be true to some extent, but it does raise the question of how much it matters. At most, we have two groups, the one we could call an urban literati and the other, rural improvers. This would have it that rural Scotland was very different, but this can become a very Edinburgh centric explanation which ignores the rich contribution of rural Scotland.

NOCTES AMBROSIANE

One way in to the fabric is through the famous Clever Chiels discourse run by John Wilson who was the principal writer of the tales of Christopher North (Wilson), Timothy Tickler, and the Ettrick Shepherd (James Hogg). Set in Ambrose’s tavern in Edinburgh, events, issues, books, publications, and conversations were the meat of these fictional social gatherings that illustrate the intellectual life of the city. Some of the representations of Hogg did, however, seem to point to the Enlightenment as that narrow Edinburgh based elitism.

Another place to understand this social world would have been by dropping in on the Edinburgh home of Alison Cockburn, the poet and songwriter who wrote one version of The Flowers of the Forest. A relative of Sir Walter Scott, she was the hostess of the Enlightenment known to all as the Queen of Edinburgh Society. She saw her home, first on Castle Hill and later at Crichton Street, as a literary salon that echoed to the men and, sometimes, women of prominence, including Adam Smith, Scott himself, David Hume, Robert Burns, Anne Barnard, and many more. Cockburn had long auburn hair and was, by all accounts, a striking beauty, as recorded by a Mr Fairbairn in L’Eloge d’Ecosse, et des Dames Ecossoises, in which she features as a lady of charm. She proudly refused to wear the customary black bonnet of a widow when her husband died, and debate and informality abounded as the hostess seemed quite the merry widow, to the dismay of some, as she enjoyed a parade of men not all of whom were single. Respectability in the strict Presbyterian sense was left at her door, and she was a staunch advocate of the equality of women on all fronts. She was an object of some affection, and not least in holding this view was the boyhood Scott who regarded her as ‘a virtuoso like myself’. Other forces, personified by her father-in-law’s opposition to dancing, theatre, card playing, and attendance at balls did not deter her, and at times, she was reckless. She was against the Jacobite cause, and when caught with a song parodying Bonnie Prince Charlie during the occupation of Edinburgh, she was lucky to escape with a warning. As her friend and relative Sir Walter Scott put it:

She maintained the rank in the society of Edinburgh which Frenchwomen of talents usually do in that of Paris. ¹¹

In her own words:

At the Archers’ Ball all merry, and men, maidens and matrons danced. I love to hear of it. It is like the days of my youth and health. ¹²

Unconventional, and unmoved by opposition, she was an integral part of the new atmosphere which was not always dry and dusty. Yet, she never lost sight of her own youthful impoverishment, and aristocratic Scots were always cheek by jowl to their social inferiors on a scale less common in England.

In rural Scotland, a lady of quite a different standing was Tibbie Shiel, the wife of a mole catcher who obtained a lease on a cottage from Lord Napier and was well capable of dealing with the greatest in the land. When Tibbie’s husband died, she took in lodgers to make ends meet. Thus was born the Tibbieshiels Inn standing on the shore of St Mary’s Loch in Selkirkshire. Tibbie lived to the brink of 100 years, and the affection and awe in which she was held was indicated by the 2,000 attendees at her funeral. At her hostelry, the greats of the literati would gather, such as Hogg and Scott, who were locals to a degree, and Carlyle, Wilson, Stoddart and Wordsworth, who were not. Tibbie was not always impressed and was sometimes scathing towards her childhood friend Hogg. As an example of how powerful her forum was, we can again refer to Wilson’s Noctes Ambrosianae in Blackwood’s Magazine. The Ambrosian nights, though set in an Edinburgh Tavern and including his stylisation of Hogg as the Ettrick Shepherd, were greatly influenced by meetings at Tibbieshiels. It is then possible to again point out that the separatist notion that an aristocratic Edinburgh elite existed may be less valid than a viewpoint centring upon elites who were also interwoven with many constituencies.

Yet another way to take in the atmosphere of the times would be to walk in Edinburgh, perhaps to the Playfair Library, to the Royal Society or down Niddrie Street to the Oyster Club vaults, which would certainly bring alive the aura of the Scottish Enlightenment. In Auld Reekie (Edinburgh), the senses are bombarded by it, but it was alive and well throughout the country. Consequently, in these pages, it must be contended that in breadth and spirit, the Scottish Enlightenment was more than philosophy. The traditional recognised elite figures may have been at the apex, but they were supported by almost countless other men and women of substance in all disciplines from all around the country.

THE 708 LUMINARIES OF THE SCOTTISH ENLIGHTENMENT

Now comes the difficult bit, the list of the luminaries could be enlarged, or indeed restricted, depending on the criteria used. One aspect of this is deciding who will count as a Scot in the pages below, and another is, who belongs to another age, both past and present. A Scot then is someone who was born here or lived here for the greater part of his or her life and made a significant contribution to the Enlightenment years as defined. Francis Hutcheson was not born in Scotland but lived here for some time and could have played rugby for Scotland (but for the fact the game was not at that time in existence) through his Scottish-born grandfather! Nevertheless, his birthplace, and the time he also spent in Dublin, doesn’t rule out his biographical inclusion because of his contributory presence. He and some others can be seen as so influential, they have to be included as if they were Scots born. A second aspect is the admission that they were not all of the same standing. The life of Tibbie Pagan cannot be bracketed with that of David Hume. Consequently, the luminaries will be of many ranks. We have then a time envelope producing a group that was subject to not having died before 1688 and being born before 1832 and having made a substantial impact on one, or more, of the identified fields.

Ladies of the Scottish Enlightenment

Jean Adam, Lady Grisell Baillie, Joanna Baillie, Anne Barnard, Alison Bowers, Mary Brunton, Elspeth Buchan, Jane Welsh Carlyle, Elizabeth Crichton, Mary Erskine, Susan Ferrier, Marjory Fleming, Anne Forbes, Helen Gloag, Anne MacVicar Grant, Janet Hamilton, Letitia Hargrave, Janet Keiller, Flora MacDonald, Betsy Miller, Carolina Oliphant, Margaret Oliphant, Tibbie Pagan, Jane Porter, Catherine Read, Alison Rutherford, Catherine Sinclair, Mary Somerville, Catherine Spence, Clementina Walkinshaw, Elizabeth Wardlaw and Frances Wright

Gentlemen of the Scottish Enlightenment

John Abercrombie, Patrick Abercromby, Ralph Abercromby, James Adam, John Adam, Robert Adam, William Adam, Alexander Adie, Thomas Aikenhead, William Aikman, John Ainslie, Thomas Aird, Robert Aitken, William Aiton, Cosmo Alexander, Archibald Alison, Archibald Alison, William Alison, David Allan, Hugh Allan, Robert Allan, William Allan, Charles Alston, Arthur Anderson, James Anderson, John Anderson, John Anderson, Thomas Annan, John Arbuthnot, Neil Arnott, William Edmonstoune Aytoun, William Balfour Baikie, Alexander Bain, Alexander Bain, Andrew Bain, Matthew Baillie, Charles Baird, David Baird, George Baird, Hugh Baird, John Baird, Nicol Baird, Alexander Bald, Robert Bald, William Bald, Andrew Balfour, John Hutton Balfour, Robert Ballantyne, George Ballingall, John Barclay, John Bartholomew, John Bartholomew, James Beattie, Andrew Bell, Andrew Bell, Benjamin Bell, Charles Bell, Henry Bell, Henry Glassford Bell, John Bell, John Bell, Patrick Bell, James Gordon Bennett, Alexander Berry, Adam Black, Joseph Black, John Stuart Blackie, Thomas Blacklock, Thomas Blackwell, William Blackwood, Thomas Blaikie, Hugh Blair, James Blair, Robert Blair, Gilbert Blane, David Bogue, Andrew Bonar, Horatius Bonar, Thomas Boston, James Boswell, Hugh Brackenridge, William Brackenridge, James Braid, James Braidwood, Edward Braddock, James Bremner, David Brewster, Patrick Brewster, Thomas Brisbane, John Broadwood, James Brodie, Henry Brougham, James Broun-Ramsay, George Brown, John Brown, John Brown, John Brown, John Brown, Robert Brown, Thomas Brown, William Browne, James Bruce, Michael Bruce, William Bruce, James Brunlees, David Bryce, William Buchan, Claudius Buchanan, Francis Buchanan, Robert Burn, William Burn, Alexander Burnes, John Burnet, Gilbert Burnett, James Burnett, Robert Burns, George Burns, Thomas Burns, William Chalmers Burns, James Byres, Robert Cadell, William Cadell, David Calder, Donald Cameron, Archibald Campbell, Colen Campbell, Colin Campbell, Colin Campbell, George Campbell, John Campbell, John Logan Campbell, Thomas Campbell, Robert Candlish, William Cargill, Alexander Carlyle, Thomas Carlyle, Gershom Carmichael, William Carstares, James Chalmers, Thomas Chalmers, Robert Chambers, William Chambers, William Chambers, George Cheyne, Robert Christison, Hugh Clapperton, George Cleghorn, John Clerk, John Clerk, Archibald Cochrane, Thomas Cochrane, John Cockburn, Henry Cockburn, Samuel Cockburn, William Collins, Patrick Colquhoun, George Combe, Archibald Constable, Robert Cowan, James Croll, James Craig, James Craik, William Creech, Alexander Crichton, James Crow, William Cumberland Cruikshank, William Cullen, Alexander Cummings, William Cunningham, David Dale, Alexander Dalrymple, Hew Dalrymple, James Dalrymple, Robert Davidson, William Davidson, James Denham – Steuart, Peter Denny, James Dick, Robert Dick, Thomas Dick, William Dick, James Dickson, Thomas Dickson, William Dickson, Robert Dinwiddie, Charles Douglas, David Douglas, James Douglas, Thomas Douglas, Alexander Dow, George Drummond, George Drummond, Thomas Drummond, Alexander Duff, Adam Duncan, Andrew Duncan, Henry Duncan, John Duncan, Thomas Duncan, Henry Dundas, Robert Dundas, Lawrence Dundas, James Dunlop, William Dyce, John Elder, Gilbert Elliott, David Erskine, Ebenezer Erskine, Henry Erskine, John Erskine, John Erskine, Ralph Erskine, Thomas Erskine, Thomas Erskine, James Esdaile, Charles Ewart, Greville Ewing, John Fairbairn, William Fairbairn, Hugh Falconer, Adam Ferguson, James Ferguson, Patrick Ferguson, Robert Fergusson, James Frederick Ferrier, James Fillans, John Finlaison, Kirkman Finlay, James Finlayson, George Finlayson, Sandford Fleming, Andrew Fletcher, Andrew Fletcher, David Forbes, Duncan Forbes, John Forbes, David Fordyce, Alexander Forsyth, Wlliam Forsyth, Robert Fortune, Andrew Foulis, Robert Foulis, Alexander Campbell Fraser, Charles Fraser, Hugh Fraser, James Baillie Fraser, John Fraser, John Galt, Andrew Geddes, Alexander Gerard, Adam Gib, James Gibbs, John Gilchrist, George Gilfillan, William Gilkison, Thomas Gillespie, John Glas, John Glassford, Alexander Gordon, John Watson Gordon, Patrick Gordon, Robert Gordon, Thomas Gordon, Thomas Gordon, Nathaniel Gow, Niel Gow, James Gillespie Graham, John Graham, John Graham, Robert Graham, Thomas Graham, Thomas Graham, James Grahame, James Grahame, Alexander Grant, Archibald Grant, Robert Edmond Grant, John Grieve, David Gregory, James Gregory, John Gregory, Samuel Greig, Thomas Guthrie, James Hadow, James Alexander Haldane, James Hall, Gavin Hamilton, George Hamilton-Gordon, John Hamilton, Thomas Hamilton, William Hamilton, Andrew Handyside, William Handyside, Andrew Hardie, James Hargrave, James Harrison, William Hay, Matthew Forster Heddle, Ebenezer Henderson, Thomas Henderson, William Henderson, David Octavius Hill, James Hogg, Isaac Holden, John Home, Henry Home, John Hope, John Hope, Thomas Charles Hope, Thomas Hopkirk, Francis Horner, David Hume, Joseph Hume, John Kelso Hunter, John Hunter, John Hunter, William Hunter, David Hutcheson, Francis Hutcheson, James Hutton, James Irvine, Edward Irving, James Ivory, Robert Jameson, John Jamieson, George Jardine, James Jardine, William Jardine, Alexander Jeffrey, Francis Jeffrey, James Johnson, George Johnston, John Johnston, George Johnstone, John Paul Jones, John Kay, James Keir, Alexander Keith, Alexander Keith, George Meikle Kemp, John Ker, John Kerr, David Kirkaldy, Robert Kyd, Alexander Laing, Macgregor Laird, William Laird, John Lang, Robert Scott Lauder, Thomas Dick Lauder, Simon Somerville Laurie, John Law, James Paris Lee, James Legge, Thomas Leiper, John Leslie, John Lessels, John Leyden, James Lind, James Bowman Lindsay, Robert Liston, Henry Littlejohn, David Livingstone, William Home Lizars, David Loch, George Lockhart, John Gibson Lockhart, Patrick Logan, John Claudius Loudon, James Lumsden, Charles Lyell, Abram Lyle, John MacAdam, Arthur MacArthur, David MacBrayne, George MacDonald, John MacDonald, Lawrence MacDonald, Miles MacDonnell, Charles Macintosh, Duncan Ban MacIntyre, Alexander MacKenzie, Alexander MacKenzie, Colin Mackenzie, Donald MacKenzie, George Mackenzie, Henry MacKenzie, James Stuart-Mackenzie, Murdoch MacKenzie, James Mackintosh, William Mackintosh, Colin MacLaurin, William Maclure, Alasdair MacMhaighstir, Kirkpatrick Macmillan, John MacPherson, Lachlan Macquarrie, John Malcolm, David Mallett, William Marshall, David Martin, James Marwick, Francis Masson, James Matheson, Alexander Mathieson, Patrick Matthew, James Clerk Maxwell, Wiliam McCombie, James McCosh, Thomas McCrie, Horatio McCulloch, John McCulloch, Alexander McDougall, William McEwan, James McGill, William McGillivray, William Topaz McGonagall, James McGrigor, Robert Ronald McIan, Thomas McKay, Alexander McLachlan, Donald McLean, Norman McLeod, Robert Murray M’Cheyne, Simon McTavish, George Mealmaker, Andrew Meikle, Robert Melville, Archibald Menzies, Hugh Mercer, William Julius Mickle, James Mill, John Millar, Hugh Miller, Patrick Miller, William Miller, William Miller, William Milne, Arthur Mitchell, Thomas Mitchell, Robert Moffat, David Macbeth Moir, John Monro, Alexander Monro (primus), Alexander Monro (secundus), Archibald Montgomerie, Dugald Moore, Graham Moore, John Moore, John Moore, William Motherwell, Henry Moyes, Thomas Muir, William Muir, Alexander Munro, Hector Munro, Thomas Munro, Roderick Impey Murcheson, William Murdoch, Alexander Murray, George Murray, George Murray, John Murray, William Mure, David Mushet, Robert Mylne, William Mylne, Charles John Napier, David Napier, Robert Napier, David Nasmith, Alexander Nasmyth, James Nasmyth, Patrick Neill, James Beaumont Neilson, Thomas Nelson, Robert Stirling Newall, John Pringle Nichol, William Nicol, James Ogilvie, William Ogilvie, James Oliver, James Oswald, Walter Oudney, George Outram, Robert Owen, Robert Dale Owen, Richard Dale Owen, Mungo Park, John Paterson, John Paton, Joseph Paton, Francis Peacock, Andrew Petrie, John Petrie, John Philip, John Phillip, Duncan Phyfe, James Pillans, Allan Pinkerton, John Pinkerton, Archibald Pitcairne, James Playfair, John Playfair, William Playfair, William Henry Playfair, Thomas Pringle, William Pulteney, William Quarrier, John Rae, Henry Raeburn, Allan Ramsay Senior, Allan Ramsay, George Ramsay, James Ramsay, William Rankine, John Redpath, Robert Reid, Thomas Reid, John Rennie, John Richardson, Robert Rintoul, Alexander Handyside Ritchie, William Ritchie, David Roberts, Andrew Robertson, John Roberton, William Robertson, John Robison, John Rogerson, Hercules Ross, John Ross, John Ross, John Lockhart-Ross, William Ross, William Roxburgh, William Roy, Thomas Ruddiman, Walter Ruddiman, Alexander Runciman, John Scott Russell, Patrick Russell, Daniel Rutherford, John Rutherford, Arthur St Clair, Robert Sandeman, William Sandeman, Walter Scott, J. B. Selkirk, Alexander Shanks, James Shaw, David Shaw, Robert Sibbald, Archibald Simpson, George Simpson, James Young Simpson, John Simson, Robert Simson, John Sinclair, David Skene, William Skirving, James Small, William Smellie, William Smellie, Samuel Smiles, Adam Smith, Andrew Smith, James Smith, James Smith, John Smith, John Smith, Thomas Smith, Tobias Smollett, John Smybert, John Steell, Alan Stevenson, David Stevenson, Robert Stevenson, Thomas Stevenson, Dugald Stewart, Matthew Stewart, James Stirling, James Stirling, Robert Stirling, Thomas Tod Stoddart, David Stow, William Strahan, Robert Strange, John Struthers, Charles Edward Stuart, John McDouall Stuart, John Stuart, James Syme, William Symington, Archibald Tait, Robert Tannahill, James Tassie, George Taylor, Thomas Telford, Charles Tennant, Robert Thom, Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson, Charles Wyville Thomson, George Thomson, James Thomson, John Thomson, John Thomson, Robert William Thomson, Thomas Thomson, William Thomson, William Thomson, Thomas Trotter, Robert Tullis, Hector Turnbull, George Turnbull, George Turnbull, Alexander Fraser Tytler, James Tytler, Patrick Fraser Tytler, Andrew Ure, David Ure, John Veitch, David Waldie, John Walker, John Walker, Robert Wallace, William Wallace, William Walls, Ralph Wardlaw, James Watson, James Watt, Alexander Webster, John West, Adam White, Robert Whytt, Robert Wight, Andrew Wighton, David Wilkie, William Wilkie, Peter Williamson, Alexander Wilson, Alexander Wilson, Daniel Wilson, James