There is some evidence that he entered the Greek class in the University of Edinburgh in 1723--when he was a boy of twelve years of age--but it is not known how long his studies were continued, and he did not graduate.
In 1727, at any rate, he was living at Ninewells, and already possessed by that love of learning and thirst for literary fame, which, as _My Own Life_ tells us, was the ruling passion of his life and the chief source of his enjoyments.

A letter of this date, addressed to his friend Michael Ramsay, is certainly a most singular production for a boy of sixteen.

After sundry quotations from Virgil the letter proceeds:-- "The perfectly wise man that outbraves fortune, is much greater than the husbandman who slips by her; and, indeed, this pastoral and saturnian happiness I have in a great measure come at just now.
I live like a king, pretty much by myself, neither full of action nor perturbation--_molles somnos_.

This state, however, I can foresee is not to be relied on.

My peace of mind is not sufficiently confirmed by philosophy to withstand the blows of fortune.