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47.: From WILLIAM WILSON to THE MAGISTRATES OF THE BURGH OF LANARK - Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith

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47.: From WILLIAM WILSON to THE MAGISTRATES OF THE BURGH OF LANARK - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith [1740]

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Correspondence of Adam Smith, ed. E. C. Mossner and I. S. Ross, vol. VI of the Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987).

Part of: The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, 7 vols.

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47.

From WILLIAM WILSON to THE MAGISTRATES OF THE BURGH OF LANARK

MS., GUA 2750; unpubl.

Glasgow, 15 Mar. 1760

Gentlemen

Mr. Andrew Stuart1 desired me to send you a Copy of a Letter He has from Mr. Smith one of the Professors of the College of Glasgow in which you See the difficulty anent the Presentation2 to Mr. Watson3 to remove which He desires Mr. Watson may return to Him the Presentation and He will obtain a new one for Him whereby He will enter to the Logick Class next october and be received by the Colledge agreeable to the Statutes4 and Get a year more than He had before him

Gentlemen, Your most obedient Servt

Wm Wilson

Edinburgh, 15 March, 1760

Copy Letter by Professor Smith to Mr. Stuart [?13 March 1760]

Dear Sir

I give you the trouble of this Letter to acquaint you of the Distress which a very Small oversight of Duke Hamiltons Tutors is likely to bring upon two very worthy young Men. They have presented one Mr. Watson [and] in order to be entitled to this Bursary He must enter the Moral Philosophy class But by the Statutes of Last Visitation no Scotch Man can pass the Logick Class unless He has Studied Logic at Some other College. Besides in two years Mr. Watson must take a degree in order to be entitled to the Divinity Bursary But by the same Statutes no Scotch Man can take a degree who has not gone throâ€™ a compleat course of Philosophy. We dare not dispense with these Statutes which are the very Supports of the College. Mr. Watsonâ€™s presentation therefore so far as I can judge of the Opinion of my Collegues cannot be received.

Mr. Bruce5 I understand has the promise of the Vacancy which will occur next year in the Logic Class He is at present in the Moral Philosophy Class and it will be a great hardship upon Him to goe back as it will retard the course of his education.

The best way to make all easy is to give Mr. Bruce Mr. Watsons Presentation and to reserve for Mr. Watson that which is intended for Mr. Bruce. This will be equally for the benefite of both the Young Gentlemen and I am assured is agreeable to both their inclinations.

Signed / Adam Smith

[1 ]Andrew Stuart (1725–1801), W.S.; law agent to the Hamilton family; tutor to the children of the 6th Duke of Hamilton; resolved the Hamilton arguments in the Douglas Cause (see Letter 116 addressed to Lord Hailes, dated 5 Mar. 1769); fought a duel with Thurlow, counsel for Archibald Douglas: ‘eased his mind’ about the decision in the Douglas Cause in Letters to Lord Mansfield (1773); M.P. 1774–1801; appointed to the Board of Trade, 1779; member of the Select Society and close friend of Hume, George Dempster, Johnstone (Pulteney), and Wedderburn; wrote a Genealogical History of the Stewarts, (1798).

[2 ]Anne, Duchess of Hamilton, founded six bursaries in philosophy and divinity in 1694.

[3 ]? John Watson, Glasgow M.A. 1763.

[4 ]In 1758 an Act of Parliament was obtained altering the terms of the Hamilton bursaries so that three students would be provided for, apiece, in logic and metaphysics, ethics, and natural philosophy; and three other students, apiece, for one, two, and three years of theology (Deeds Instituting Scholarships . . . In the College . . . of Glasgow, 1850, 102–19).

[5 ]? Archibald Bruce (d. 1799), Glasgow M.A. 1762; Minister of Fintry and then Shotts.