The Life of William Robertson

Jeffrey R. Smitten

ISBN 10: 0748646108 / ISBN 13: 9780748646104

Edité par Edinburgh University Press, GB, 2016

A propos de cet article

This is the first biography to see William Robertson as both a man and an intellectual figure at the centre of the Scottish Enlightenment. William Robertson differed from his contemporaries, such as Voltaire, Hume and Gibbon, because he used the critical tools of the Enlightenment to strengthen religion, not to attack it. As an historian, he helped shape eighteenth-century historiography. As a minister of the Church of Scotland, he sought to make the church fit for a polite age. And, as principal of the University of Edinburgh, he presided over a flourishing of intellectual inquiry in the midst of the Enlightenment. But despite his European fame, he was a controversial figure.

N° de réf. du vendeur LU-9780748646104

Détails bibliographiques

• Titre: The Life of William Robertson
• Éditeur: Edinburgh University Press, GB
• Date de parution: 2016
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN à 10 chiffres: 0748646108
• ISBN à 13 chiffres: 9780748646104
• Reliure: Hardback
• État de l'article: New

A propos de ce titre

Synopsis

A prominent figure in the Scottish Enlightenment, William Robertson differed from his better-known contemporaries, such as Voltaire, Hume and Gibbon, because he used the critical tools of the Enlightenment not to attack religion but to strengthen it. As a historian, he helped shape 18th-century historiography. As a minister of the Church of Scotland, he sought to make the church fit for a polite age. And, as principal of the University of Edinburgh, he presided over a flourishing of intellectual inquiry in the midst of the Enlightenment. But despite his European fame, he was a controversial figure. Drawing extensively on his unpublished correspondence, Jeffrey Smitten captures both the man and his work in his own words. By foregrounding Robertson's religious outlook, he offers a more contextualized and nuanced interpretation of his motives, intentions, as well as his beliefs than we have had before.

À propos de l?auteur

Jeffrey R. Smitten, Professor Emeritus of English at Utah State University, has published a number of articles on William Robertson and edited Dugald Stewart's biography of Robertson. With Richard B. Sher, he co-edited Scotland and America in the Age of the Enlightenment (1990) and, with Sher and Nicholas Phillipson, an edition of Robertson's Works. He has also served as Executive Secretary of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies.