James Reid

James Reid was appointed Public Professor of Metaphysics at Edinburgh University in 1620.

Biography

Reid studied under John Adamson at Edinburgh University and graduated MA in July 1600. He returned to the University as a regent on 21 December 1603, and became one of the fledgling University longest-serving teachers. He tutored no fewer than six classes through to graduation in 1606, 1610, 1614, 1618, 1622, and 1626. According to Thomas Craufurd, this was a 'flourishing time of the Universitie’, as Reid and his fellow regents were 'both able and painful [i.e. conscientious]'. They acquired ‘much authority’ through the combination of 'long experience' and 'knowledge'. As the country itself was enjoying 'a deep calme of peace', the 'followers of learning' were offered 'many great occasions of encouragement'. On 19 July 1617, Young was one of the regents commanded by King James to participate in a disputation before him at Stirling Castle. Craufurd writes that Young disputed 'anent the Original of Fountains', prompting the King to pun that 'Mr. Reid needs not be red with blushing for his acting to-day'. In 1620, Reid was appointed Public Professor of Metaphysics, which required him to give two public lectures a week, in addition to his duties as Regent of Philosophy. This was a small but significant step towards specialization and the creation of a faculty system.

Reid was forced to resign in controversial circumstances. One of the Ministers of Edinburgh, William Struthers, had refeerred disparagingly to Philosophy in a public address as 'the dish-clout of Divinity'. Reid responded in a thesis propounded at a graduation ceremony in which he notes that 'Aristippus said he would rather be a Christian philosopher, than an unphilosophical divine'. Struthers was highly offended and persuades his fellow Ministers to support him in a complaint to the Town Council. Although Reid was well-liked by the Council, and obtained a mandate from the Privy Council ordering them to retain him in office, he was forced to resign. Craufurd writes that he was still living in his seventy-fifth year, and opines that 'if he had been painful [conscientious] in study, he had proved an eminent philosopher; and was beyond few in oeconomical and civil abilities'.

Sources

• Thomas Craufurd, History of the University of Edinburgh, from 1580 to 1646: To Which is Prefixed the Charter Granted to the College by James VI of Scotland, in 1582 (Edinburgh: Printed by A. Neill & Co., 1808)
• Sir Alexander Grant, The Story of the University of Edinburgh during its First Three Hundred Years, 2 vols (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1884)