The state of learning in Scotland at that period, and the progress which it made in the subsequent part of the century, have not been examined with the attention which they deserve, and which has been bestowed on contemporaneous objects of inferior importance. There were unquestionably learned Scotsmen in the early part of the sixteenth century; but most of them owed their chief acquirements to the advantage of a foreign education. Those improvements, which the revival of literature had introduced into the schools of Italy and France, were long in reaching the universities of Scotland, though originally formed upon their model; and, when they did arrive, they were regarded with a suspicious eye, and discountenanced by the clergy. The principal branches cultivated in our universities were the Aristotelian philosophy, scholastic theology, and canon law.[7] {4} Even in the darkest ages, Scotland was never altogether destitute of schools for teaching the Latin language.[8] It is probable that these were at first attached to monasteries; and it was long a common practice among the barons to board their children with the monks for their education.[9] When the regular clergy had degenerated, and learning was no longer confined to them, grammar‑schools were erected in the principal towns, and taught by persons who had qualified themselves for this task in the best manner that the circumstances of the country admitted. The schools of Aberdeen, Perth, Stirling, Dumbarton, Killearn, and Haddington, are particularly mentioned in writings about the beginning of the sixteenth century. The two first of these acquired the greatest celebrity, owing to the skill of the masters who presided over them. In the year 1520, John Vaus was rector of the school of Aberdeen, and is commended by Hector Boece, the learned principal of the university, {5} for his knowledge of the Latin tongue, and his success in the education of youth.[10] At a period somewhat later, Andrew Simson acted as master of the school of Perth, where he taught Latin with applause. He had sometimes three hundred boys under his charge at once, including sons of the principal nobility and gentry; and from his school proceeded many of those who afterwards distinguished themselves both in church and state.[11]