George Campbell: Scottish School Of Common Sense

George Campbell (1719 – 1796) was a leading member of the Scottish School of Common Sense and whose explanation of it we used above. As a young minister at Banchory his work on translating the gospels led on to his philosophical works and his part in establishing the Aberdeen Philosophical Society. Campbell also stated that rhetoric, the field in which he would make his mark, was linked to logic in that the good orator required a logical argument to convince his audience. Like Thomas Reid he held that there was a universal logic, but contended that this was not accompanied by a universal grammar: the prerequisite for that would be a universal language. In concert with James Beattie he saw commonsense as an original source of knowledge from
Always to the forefront was his responsibility as a parish minister for Gladsmuir, and his role at the General Assembly as a great orator elevated him to the Moderator position in which he demonstrated his ability to reconcile moderates and evangelicals. In the case of Home’s Edinburgh staging of Douglas when some in the church were outraged at the theatrical production he again won the day and came to the assistance of Alexander Carlyle who was charged with attending, although the latter was somewhat grudging in his gratitude when acquitted. In 1745 Robertson volunteered to help defend Edinburgh against the threat of the Jacobites but in the event the occupation was accomplished with
At the age of four he was abducted by gypsies, though promptly rescued. He never married and became an archetypal absent minded professor who talked to himself and wandered fifteen miles away from town in his night attire! Like his friend Hume he was at best a deist and possibly fully atheist. Clearly this was going to be an extraordinary life. Educated at both Glasgow and Balliol Oxford on a Snell exhibition, he found the former to be intellectually superior, especially through the influence of Francis Hutcheson. In 1748 he began delivering lectures at Edinburgh University under the patronage of Lord Kames, and within two years he was a professor back at Glasgow. Now began his reputation as the father of modern economics as he developed the idea of the progress of opulence and his economic philosophy of the obvious and simple system of natural liberty. At this time he also formed his association with David Hume and in the most productive relationship of the Scottish Enlightenment, they published work on almost every imaginable topic from history to