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WILLIAM THOM The Motives, Which have determined the University of Glasgow to desert the Blackfriar Church, and betake themselves to a Chapel. Glasgow, MDCCLIV Quarto, old marbled paper covers, 62pp + (2pp)adverts. Firest edition. William Thom was an eccentric minister of Govan who through a series of pamphlets published in the 1760's criticised thye University of Glasgow and its professors including Adam Smith. Recently Thom has become the object of serious interest and several commentators have pointed to him as a notable publicist and reformer. Thom had a lawsuit with the University (which he lost) over a matter of a chalder of meal in the amount of his stipend, and there was scarcely any act of, or any abscence of action by, the University which did not form a text for one his pamphlets. In this pamphlet Thom makes fun the professors: "if we stay away from church, we must either ride in the fields, or walk in the College-garden, or stay in our rooms: if we ride abroad, the people...imagine we are profane; if we walk in the College-garden, they make the same conclusion; if we stay in our rooms, we must either read plays, or our own systems: if our servants catch us reading plays, they whisper to every body that we are graceless; if we read our own systems, we very soon fall asleep upon them". Robert Donovan, Evangelical Civic Humanism in Glasgow...William Thom, (in) Hook & Sher, The Glasgow Enlightenment, 1995. Viner, Guide3 to John Rae's Life of Adam Smith, pp.81-83 William Thom. £500 |
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