MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE AND WRITINGS от GEORGE BUCHANAN. BUCHANAN was born in an age of little refine ment, and enjoyed none of the early advantages which result from hereditary wealth; but his intrinsic greatness of mind enabled him to emerge from original obscurity, and to earn a reputation which can only decay with literature itself. By the universal suffrage of the learned, he has been stationed near the summit of modern renown; but his moral qualities are sometimes considered as more equivocal. His character has however been subjected to a most rigid and inhuman scrutiny his genuine actions have been misrepresented, if not with all the powers, certainly with A all the propensities, of the vilest sophistry; and many fictitious actions have been industriously imputed to him, for the sake of completing the picture of his iniquities. He has a thousand times been upbraided with horrible ingratitude for favours which he never received. To prove the purest of mankind guilty of the most heinous crimes, will always be extremely easy, where passion and prejudice are permitted to supply every deficiency of evidence; where the witnesses are strangers to common veracity, and the judges utterly unable or unwilling to appretiate their testimony. The character of Buchanan excited the respect and even the veneration of cotemporaries highly distinguished for their moral virtues, and for their intellectual endowments; and it unquestionably suggests another strong presumption in his favour, that notwithstanding all the persevering anxiety of a regular succession of enemies, political and theological, his long and chequered life has actually been found to betray so few of the frailties inseparable from humanity. His stern integrity, his love of his country and of mankind, cannot fail of endearing his memory to those who possess congenial qualities; and such errors as he really committed, will not perhaps be deemed unpardonable by those who recollect that they are also men. George Buchanan was born about the beginning of February, in the year 1506. His father was Thomas, the second son of Thomas Buchanan of Drummikill, his mother Agnes Heriot of the family of Trabroun. The house from which he descended he has himself characterized as more remarkable for its antiquity than for its opulence. The only patrimony which his father inherited, was the farm of Mid-Leowen, or, as it is more commonly denominated, the Moss, situated in the parish of Killearn and county of Stirling. During the lifetime of the present proprietor, Mr. William Finlay, who has now attained to the primitive age of ninety, the farm-house in which Buchanan was born, has twice been rebuilt: but on each occasion, its original dimensions and characteristics have been studiously preserved; and an oak beam, together with an intermediate wall, has even retained its ancient position. The present building, which may be considered as a correct model of Buchanan's paternal residence, is a lowly cottage thatched with straw; but this cottage is still visited with a kind of religious veneration. A fragment of the oak is regarded as a precious relique; and an Irish student who thirsted for a portion of Buchanan's inspiration, is known to have travelled from Glasgow, for the purpose of visiting the house, ? Will. Buchanan's Essay upon the Family and Surname of Buchanan, p. 87. Syo. and passing a night directly under the original beam.b Buchanan's father died of the stone at a premature age; and, about the same period, his grandfather found himself in a state of insolvency. The family, which had never been opulent, was thus reduced to extreme poverty: but his mother strug led hard with the misery of her condition; and all her children, five sons and three daughters, arrived at the age of maturity. The third son, whose extraordinary attainments have rendered the family illustrious, is reported by oral tradition, which must not however be too rashly credited, to have been indebted for the rudiments of learning to the public school of Killearn; which long continued to maintain a very considerable degree of celebrity. MidLeowen, which stands on the banks of the Blane,d is situated at the distance of about two miles from the village; and it may be conjectured that the future poet and statesman daily walked b Nimmo's Hist. of Stirlingshire, p. 368. Edinb. 1777, 8vo. In the year 1531, a lease of two farms near Cardross was granted by Robert Erskine, commendator of Dryburgh and Inchmahome, to Agnes Heriot and three of her sons, Patrick, Alexander, and George. (Anderson's Life of Smollett, p 12, 5th edit. Edinb. 1806, 8vo.) d Triumphant even the yellow Blane, Tho' by a fen defac'd, Boasts that Buchanan's early strain That often, muse-struck, in her lonliest nook RICHARDSON. to school, and bore along with him his meridian repast. A considerable number of trees, which he is said to have planted in his school-boy days, are still to be seen in the immediate vicinity of his native cottage: a mountain ash, conspicuous for its age and magnitude, was lately torn from its roots by the violence of a storm; but two fresh scions which arose from its ruins, have been nourished and protected with anxious care. Nor is the name of his mother without its rural memorial; a place which had been adapted to the purpose of shielding her flock, is still denominated Heriot's Shiels. Buchanan, if we may credit a writer whose authority is extremely slender, was afterwards removed to the school of Dunbarton. His unfolding genius recommended him to the favour and protection of his maternal uncle James Heriot; who, apparently in the year 1520, sent him to prosecute his studies in the university of Paris. It was here that he began to cultivate his poetical talents; partly impelled, as he informs us, by the natural temperament of his mind, partly by the necessity of performing the usual exercises prescribed to younger students. Buchanan did not profess to be one of those bright geniuses who can acquire a new language every six weeks: e Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. xvi, p. 105. f Mackenzie's Lives of Scots Writers, vol. iii, p. 156. |