“If it was altogether chance, it was a very fortunate accident, which placed in the midst of a society so worthy of commemoration a painter like George Jamiesone, the pupil of Rubens, the first, and, till Raeburn, the only great painter whom Scotland had produced. Though he was a native of Aberdeen, it is not likely that anything but the little court of the bishop could have induced such an artist to prosecute his art in a provincial town. An academic orator in 1630, while boasting of the crowd of distinguished men, natives and strangers, either produced by the University, or brought to Aberdeen by the bishop, was able to point to their pictures ornamenting the hall where his audience were assembled. Knowing by whom these portraits were painted, we cannot but regret that so few are preserved.”[[27]]
Keeping, however, to the matter of academic impugnment, we shall now turn to an instance of its incidental occurrence in that University, which, from its late origin, was least imbued with the spirit of the Continental system.
The visit of King James to his ancient kingdom in 1617, afforded the half-formed collegiate institution in Edinburgh an opportunity for a rhetorical display, which ended in substantial advantages. Tired with business at Holyrood, and in the enjoyment of full eating and drinking, and “driving our” at his quieter palace of Stirling, he bethought himself of a rhetorical pastime with the professors of the new University, wherein he could not fail to luxuriate in the scholastic quibbling with which his mind was so well crammed, and he was pretty certain of enjoying an ample banquet of success and applause. Hence, as Thomas Crawford the annalist of the institution informs us, “It pleased his majesty to appoint the maisters of the college to attend him at Sterling the 29th day of July, where, in the royal chapel, his majesty, with the flower of the nobility, and many of the most learned men of both nations, were present, a little before five of the clock, and continued with much chearfulness above three hours.”
The display was calculated to be rather appalling to any man who had much diffidence or reserve in his disposition, and hence Charteris, the principal, “being naturally averse from public show, and professor of divinity,” transferred the duty of leading the discussion to Professor Adamson. The form adopted was the good old method of the impugnment of theses, so many being appointed to defend, and so many to impugn; “but they insisted only upon such purposes as were conceived would be most acceptable to the king’s majesty and the auditory.”
The first thesis was better suited for the legislature than an academic body, and there must have been some peculiar reason for bringing it on. It was, “that sheriffs and other inferior magistrates should not be hereditary,” which was oppugned by Professor Lands “with many pretty arguments.” The king was so pleased with the oppugnation, that he turned to the Marquis of Hamilton, hereditary sheriff of Clydesdale, and said, “James, you see your cause lost—and all that can be said for it clearly satisfied and answered.” N.—B. It is just worth noticing that the College and the Marquis were then at feud. There was a question about the possession of the old lodging of the Hamilton family, then constituting a considerable portion of the University edifices. The “gud old nobleman,” his father, had been easily satisfied, but the young man was determined to stand upon his rights, and, though he could not recover possession, get something in the shape of rent or damages; nor would he take the judicious hint that “so honourable a personage would never admit into his thoughts to impoverish the patrimony of the young University, which had been so great an ornament, and so fruitful an instrument of so much good to the whole nation, but rather accept of some honourable acknowledgment of his munificence in bestowing upon the College an honest residence for the muses.” But to return to the impugnment. The next thesis was on local motion, “pressing many things by clear testimonies of Aristotle’s text;” and this passage of literary arms called out one of James’s sallies of pawky persiflage. “These men,” he said, “know Aristotle’s mind as well as himself did while he lived.” The next thesis was on the “Original of Fountains;” and the discussion, much to the purpose, no doubt, was so interesting that it was allowed to go on far beyond the prescribed period, “his majesty himself sometimes speaking for the impugner, and sometimes for the defender, in good Latin, and with much knowledge of the secrets of philosophy.”
Talking is, however, at the best, dry work. His majesty went at last to supper, and no doubt would have what is termed “a wet night.” When up to the proper mark, he sent for the professors, and delivered himself of the following brilliant address:—
“Methinks these gentlemen, by their very names, have been destined for the acts which they have had in hand to-day. Adam was father of all; and, very fitly, Adamson had the first part of this act. The defender is justly called Fairly—his thesis had some fair lies, and he defended them very fairly, and with many fair lies given to the oppugners. And why should not Mr Lands be the first to enter the lands? but now I clearly see that all lands are not barren, for certainly he hath shown a fertile wit. Mr Young is very old in Aristotle. Mr Reed needs not be red with blushing for his acting to-day. Mr King disputed very kingly, and of a kingly purpose, anent the royal supremacy of reason over anger and all passions.” And here his majesty was going to close the encomiums, when some one nudged his elbow, and hinted that he had omitted to notice the modest Charteris; but the royal wit was not abashed, and his concluding impromptu was by no means the least successful of his puns. “Well, his name agreeth very well to his nature; for charters contain much matter, yet say nothing, but put great purposes in men’s mouths.”
Few natures would be churlish enough to resist a genial glow of satisfaction on receiving such pearls of rhetoric scattered among them by a royal hand, and we may believe that the professors were greatly gratified. But, pleased more probably by his own success, the king gave a more substantial mark of his satisfaction, and said, “I am so well satisfied with this day’s exercise, that I will be godfather to the College of Edinburgh, and have it called the College of King James; for after the founding of it had been stopped for sundry years in my minority, so soon as I came to any knowledge, I zealously held hand to it, and caused it to be established; and although I see many look upon it with an evil eye, yet I will have them to know that, having given it this name, I have espoused its quarrel.” And further on in the night, he promised, “that as he had given the College a name, he would also, in time convenient, give it a royal godbairn gift for enlarging the patrimony thereof.”
In the course of the multifarious talk of the evening, a curious and delicate matter was opened up—the difference between the English pronunciation of Latin and the Scottish, which corresponds with that of Europe in general. An English doctor, who must have enjoyed exceptional opinions, or been a master of hypocrisy, praised the readiness and elegancy of his majesty’s Latinity; on which he said, “All the world knows that my maister, Mr George Buchanan, was a great maister in that faculty. I follow his pronunciation both of Latin and Greek, and am sorry that my people of England do not the like, for certainly their pronunciation utterly spoils the grace of these two learned languages; but you see all the university and learned men of Scotland express the true and native pronunciation of both.”[[28]]