-
John Erskine of Carnock, were presented by the
Faculty to the patrons of the vacant chair, who
elected the latter, and he was afterwards well known
as the author of the ? Institutes of the Law of Scotland.?
John Balfour was subsequently appointed
sheriff-substitute of the county of Edinburgh, and
having a turn for philosophy, he became early
adverse to the speculative reasoning of David
Hume, and openly opposed them in two treatises ;
one was entitled ?A Delineation of the Nature
PILRIG HOUSE
In the spring of 1779 he resigned his professorship,
and lived a retired life at Pilrig, where he
died on the 6th of March, 1795, in his ninetysecond
year, and was succeeded by his son, John
Balfour of Pilrig.
The estate is now becoming covered with streets.
There is a body called the ? Pilrig Model Buildings
Association,? formed in 1849, for erecting houses
for the working-classes, and the success of this
scheme has been such that there has scarcely been
and Obligation of Morality,- with Reflections on
Mr. Hume?s Inquiry concerning the Principles of
Morals.? A second edition of this appeared in
1763. The other, ?? Philosophical Dissertations,?
appeared also at Edinburgh in 1782.
Hurne was much pleased with these treatises,
though opposed to his own theories, and on the
appearance of the first, wrote the author a letter,
requesting his friendship, as he was obliged by his
politeness.
In August, 1754, Balfour was appointed to the
chair of Moral Philosophy in the University of
Edinburgh, and ten years afterwards was transferred
to the chair of Public Law. He published his
?Philosophical Essays? a short time after.
an arrear of rent among its tenants since the
year named.
This was the earliest of the many schemes started
in Edinburgh for improving the dwellings of the
labouring classes, and it has been followed up in
many directions, though all it; features have not
been copied.
Inverleith, or Innerleith, as it was often called of
old, was the only baronial estate of any extent
that lay immediately north-east of Stockbridge.
The most influential heritor in the once? vast
parish of St Cuthbert was Touris the Baron or
Laird of Inverleith, whose possessions included,
directly south-west from North Leith, the lands of
Coates,. Dalry, Pocketsleve, the High Riggs, or all
