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EDUCATION John Mair (or ‘Major’) was born about 1467 in Gleghorn , near Haddington , East Lothian , Scotland, where he attended Grammar School . According to him, this was ''“the town which fostered the beginning of my studies, and in whose kindly embrace I was nourished as a novice with the sweetest milk of the art of grammar''”. It is not known whether he attended University in Scotland as a student – he claimed never to have seen the university town of St Andrews , Fife as a young man – but he says that in 1491 he attended ‘Godshouse’, which later became Christ's College , University Of Cambridge , England . In 1492 he matriculated in the University Of Paris , France , where he took his Master’s degree in 1494 . He became a lecturer (‘regent’) in Arts in 1495 and began the study of theology under Jan Standonck in the College Of Montaigu . He consorted with scholars of later renown, from his hometown, Robert Walterston , his home country ( David Cranston of Glasgow ), as well as many of the luminaries of the age, including Erasmus , whose Humanist enthusiasms he shared. Some publications by John Mair ''Lectures in logic'' (Lyons 1516) ''Reportia Parisiensia by Duns Scotus'' co-edited by Mair Paris 1517-18 Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard (''In Libros Sententiarum primum et secundum commentarium'') Paris 1519 History of Greater Britain (''Historia majoris Britannae, tam Angliae quam Scotiae'') Paris 1521 ''De Gestis Scotorum'' Paris 1521 ''Commentary on Aristotle's physical and ethical writings'' Paris 1526 ''Quaestiones logicales'' Paris 1528 ''Commentary on the Four Gospels'' Paris 1528 ''Disputationes de Potestate Papae et Concilii'' (Paris) ''Commentary on Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics'' (his last book) INFLUENCE Calvin and Loyola In 1506 he was awarded a doctorate in Theology by Paris where he began to teach and progress through the hierarchy, becoming for a brief period Rector . (Some 18 of his fellow Scots had held or were to hold this prestigious position). He was a renowned Logician and philosopher. He is reported to have been a very clear and forceful lecturer, attracting students from all over Europe. In contrast, he had a rather dry, some said 'barbaric', written Latin style. He was referred to by Pierre Bayle as writing "''in stylo Sorbonico''", not meaning this as a compliment. His interests ranged across the burning issues of the day. His approach largely followed Nominalism which was in tune with the growing emphasis on the absolutely unconstrained nature of God, which in turn emphasised his grace and the importance of individual belief and submission. His Humanist approach was in tune with the return to the texts in the original languages of the Scriptures and classical authors. He emphasised that authority lay with the whole church and not with the Pope. Similarly, he asserted that authority in a kingdom lay not with the king but with the people, who could retake their power from a delinquent king (a striking echo of the ringing Declaration Of Arbroath 1314 confirming to the Pope the independence of the Scottish crown from that of England). It is not surprising that he emphasised the natural freedom of human beings. His influence extended through enthusiastic pupils to the leading thinkers of the day but most obviously to a group of Spanish thinkers, including Antonio Coronel , who taught John Calvin and very probably Ignatius Of Loyola . In 1522 , at Salamanca , Domingo De San Juan referred to him "''the revered master, John Mair, a man celebrated the world over''". The Salamanca school of (largely Thomist ) philosophers was a brilliant flowering of thought before the coming of the Inquisition . It included Vitoria , '''Cano''' , de '''Soto''' and '''Medina''' , each one thorough soaked in Mairian enthusiasms. Knox Mair wrote in his ''Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard '' ''“Our native soil attracts us with a secret and inexpressible sweetness and does not permit us to forget it”.'' He returned to Scotland in 1518 . Given his success and experience in Paris, it is no surpirse that he became the Principal of the University Of Glasgow . In 1523 left for the University Of St Andrews where he was assessor to the Dean of Arts. In 1525 he went again to Paris from where he returned in 1531 eventually to become Provost of St Salvator’s College in St Andrews until his death in 1550 , aged about eighty three. One of his most notable students was John Knox (co-incidentally, another native of Haddington) who said of Mair that he was such as "''whose work was then held as an oracle on the matters of religion''" If this is not exactly a ringing endorsement, it is not hard to see in Knox's preaching an intense version of Mair's enthusiasms - the utter freedom of God, the importance of the Bible, scepticism of earthly authority. It might be more surprising that he preferred to follow his friend Erasmus 's example and remained within the Roman Catholic Church (though he did envisage a national church for Scotland). Mair also enthused other Scottish Reformers including the Protestant martyr Patrick Hamilton and the Latin stylist George Buchanan , whose enthusiasm for witty Latinisms had him waspishly suggesting that the only thing major about his ex-teacher was his surname - typical Renaissance disdain for the Schoolmen . Empiricism Mair and his circle were interested in the structures of Language – spoken, written and ‘mental’. This latter was the language which underlies the thoughts that are expressed in natural languages, like Scots , English or Latin . He attacks a whole range of questions from a generally ‘nominalist’ perspective – a form of philosophical discourse whose tradition derives from the high Middle Ages and was to continue into that of the Scottish and other European Empiricists . According to Alexander Brodie , Mair’s influence on this latter tradition reached as far as the 18th and 19th Century Scottish School Of Common Sense initiated by Thomas Reid . The highly logical and technical approach of Medieval Philosophy – perhaps added to by Mair’s poor written style as well as his adherence to the Catholic party at the time of the Reformation – explain in some part why this influence is still somewhat occluded. Human Rights More obviously influential was his Moral Philosophy , not primarily because of his Casuistry - an approach acknowledging the complexity of individual cases. This was later so strong in Jesuit teaching, possibly related to the Mair’s renown in Spain mentioned above. His legal views were also influential. His Commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard was most certainly studied and quoted in the debates at Burgos in 1512 , by Frày Anton Montesino , a graduate of Salamanca . This "''debate unique in the history of empires''", as Hugh Thomas calls it, resulted in the recognition in Spanish law of the Indigenous populations of America as being free Human Beings with all the Rights (to liberty and property, for example) attached to them. This pronouncement was hedged in with many subtle qualifications, and the Spanish Crown was never efficient at enforcing it, but it can be regarded as the fount of Human Rights Law . REFERENCES
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