Dictionary.net

A famous Scottish author and jurist; born at Kames, Berwickshire, in 1696; died at Edinburgh, Dec. 27, 1782. Educated at the University of Edinburgh, after nearly thirty years' practice as a lawyer he became judge in 1752. Besides important legal works, he wrote on antiquities, metaphysics, ethics, religion, Aesthetics, education, agriculture, etc. His chief literary production, "Elements of Criticism" (3 vols., 1762), forestalled, as regards works of the imagination, the modern psychological school. Of this book, Goldsmith said it was "easier to write than to read". Like his contemporary Lord Chesterfield, he was a great social favorite.