David Fordyce (1711-1751) was only thirty-one when appointed Professor of Moral Philosophy at Marischal College in the University of Aberdeen. The popularity of his early works, Dialogues Concerning Education and Theodorus: A Dialogue Concerning the Art of Preaching, earned Fordyce the invitation to compose a "home-textbooks" series, a work on moral philosophy: The Elements of Moral Philosophy. First appearing in 1754, this was the principal work in moral philosophy in the curriculum of Harvard University during the second half of the eighteenth century and was included with only slight modification as the entry on moral philosophy in the first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, published in 1771 Thomas D. Kennedy is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Valparaiso University. In addition to his work on David Fordyce, he has written on William Leechman and the Glasgow Enlightenment, and on moral theology in eighteenth-century Scotland.