The affinity between these sentiments, and the political principles afterwards avowed by Knox, and defended by the classic pen of Buchanan, is too {9} striking to require illustration. Some of them, indeed, had been taught by at least one Scottish author, who flourished before the time of Major; but it is most probable that the oral instructions and writings of their master first suggested to them the sentiments which they so readily adopted, and which were afterwards confirmed by mature reflection, and more extensive reading; and that, consequently, the important changes which these contributed to accomplish, should be traced in a certain measure to this distinguished professor. Nor, in such circumstances, could his ecclesiastical opinions fail to have a proportionate share of influence on their habits of thinking with respect to religion and the church. But though, in these respects, the opinions of Major were more free and rational than those generally entertained at that time, it must be confessed, that the portion of instruction which his scholars could derive from him was extremely small, if we allow his publications to be a fair specimen of his academical prelections. Many of the questions which he discusses are utterly useless and trifling; the rest are rendered disgusting by the most servile adherence to all the minutiæ of the scholastic mode of reasoning. The reader of his works must be content with painfully picking a grain of truth from the rubbish of many pages; nor will the drudgery be compensated by those discoveries of inventive genius and acute discrimination, for which the writings of Aquinas, and some others of that subtle school, may still deserve to be consulted. Major is entitled to praise, for exposing to {10} his countrymen several of the more glaring errors and abuses of his time; but his mind was deeply tinctured with superstition , and he defended some of the absurdest tenets of popery by the most ridiculous and puerile arguments.[17] His talents were moderate; with the writings of the ancients, he appears to have been acquainted only through the medium of the collectors of the middle ages; nor does he ever hazard an opinion, or pursue a speculation, beyond the limits which had been marked out by some approved doctor of the church. Add to this, that his style is, to an uncommon degree, harsh and forbidding; “exile, aridum, conscissum, ac minutum.”