David Fordyce
David Fordyce (1711, Broadford, Aberdeenshire – 1751) was a Scottish philosopher, a contributor to the Scottish Enlightenment. Fordyce was educated at Marischal College, Aberdeen (MA, 1728). He entered the ministry and returned to Marischal as regent in 1742, teaching Moral Philosophy there until 1751, when he died by drowning at sea. His popular Elements of Moral Philosophy was first published in Robert Dodsley's Preceptor, vol. 2 (1748). Life He was born at Broadford, near Aberdeen, and baptised 1 April 1711, the second son of George Fordyce (1663–1733) of Broadford, provost of Aberdeen; he was brother to the physician William Fordyce, the minister James Fordyce and Alexander Fordyce, a banker. After attending Aberdeen grammar school he was entered Marischal College in 1724, where he went through a course of philosophy under Daniel Garden, and took mathematics under John Stewart. He took his M.A. degree in 1728. Being intended for the church he next studied divinity under James Chalmers (Teacher), and obtained a licence as a preacher; but he never received a call. There followed an itinerant period, of nearly a decade. He was in Glasgow, taking part in some intellectual debates as a protégé of Thomas Blackwell, in 1735. He had