Education and Early Writings
Ferrier was born in Edinburgh, the son of John Ferrier, writer to the signet. He was educated at the Royal High School, the University of Edinburgh and Magdalen College, Oxford, and subsequently, his metaphysical tastes having been fostered by his intimate friend, Sir William Hamilton, spent some time at Heidelberg studying German philosophy.
In 1842 he was appointed professor of civil history at Edinburgh University, and in 1845 professor of moral philosophy and political economy at the University of St Andrews. He was twice an unsuccessful candidate for chairs in Edinburgh, for that of moral philosophy on Wilson's resignation in 1852, and for that of logic and metaphysics in 1856, after Hamilton's death. He remained at St Andrew's till his death. He married his cousin, Margaret Anne, daughter of John Wilson. He had five children, one of whom became the wife of Sir Alexander Grant.
Read more about this topic: James Frederick Ferrier
Famous quotes containing the words education and, education, early and/or writings:
“Our children will not survive our habits of thinking, our failures of the spirit, our wreck of the universe into which we bring new life as blithely as we do. Mostly, our children will resemble our own misery and spite and anger, because we give them no choice about it. In the name of motherhood and fatherhood and education and good manners, we threaten and suffocate and bind and ensnare and bribe and trick children into wholesale emulation of our ways.”
—June Jordan (b. 1939)
“Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.”
—Jane Austen (1775–1817)
“When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed
And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night,
I mourned, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.
Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“An able reader often discovers in other people’s writings perfections beyond those that the author put in or perceived, and lends them richer meanings and aspects.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)