affectionate reception; and was so cheerful, and in his conversation so easy, that I almost thought myself in the company rather of an old acquaintance than of a great statesman. He was pleased to pay me some very obliging compliments, asked about my health, and how I meant to pass the summer; spoke of the Duchess of Gordon, the improvements of Edinburgh, and various other matters: and when I told him, I knew not what apology to make for intruding upon him, said, that no apology was necessary, for that he was very glad to see me, and desired to see me again." Before returning to Scotland, the travellers went to Bath, and from thence to Sandleford, the seat of Mrs. Montagu.[Pg lxii] [Pg lxi] [Pg lxii] The second volume of the Elements of Moral Science appeared in 1793. During the same year the sudden death of his favourite sister, Mrs. Valentine, increased the domestic sorrows of Beattie. His health was at this period so greatly impaired, that being unable to attend to his duties of Professor in the Marischal College, he engaged his old pupil, Mr. Glennie, as an assistant: occasionally, however, he continued to lecture to his class till the commencement of the winter session of 1797. For some time past he had occupied himself in the melancholy yet pleasing task of editing a volume of the compositions of his eldest son. From a pardonable partiality for the writings of a beloved child, and from his not very accurate attainments in classical scholarship, he admitted into the collection several pieces, both English and Latin, which fall considerably below mediocrity. A few copies of the work were privately printed in 1794, under the title of Essays and Fragments in Prose and Verse, by James Hay Beattie, and were "offered as presents to those friends with whom the author was particularly acquainted or connected."[Y] Though it undoubt[Pg lxiii]edly shows that the deceased was a young man of uncommon quickness of talent, and the most indefatigable application, it exhibits nothing which has a claim to be considered as the offspring of genius.[Z] The most interesting portion of the[Pg lxiv] volume is the biographical sketch prefixed to it by the afflicted father, a memoir of exquisite simplicity and pathos. The account given by Beattie of the method which he adopted in im[Pg lxv]parting to his son the first idea of a Supreme Being is too striking to be omitted here: [Pg lxiii] [Pg lxiv] [Pg lxv] "The doctrines of religion
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