The Life of William Robertson: Minister, Historian and Principal

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 Drawing extensively on his unpublished correspondence, Jeffrey Smitten captures both the man and his work in his own words.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.