His fame was now more than local. In December 1763 he accepted the invitation of the University of Glasgow to fill the Chair of Moral Philosophy which Adam Smith had resigned. Before he entered on this new career he had given to the world an _Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense_. This classic work embodies the result of twenty years of steady reflection at New Machar and Aberdeen, in quest of the actual foundation of human knowledge. Before we follow him to Glasgow, we must examine this issue of his intellectual life in Aberdeenshire—due to the challenge of modern agnosticism in the person of David Hume. CHAPTER V UNIVERSAL SCEPTICISM VERSUS INSPIRED COMMON SENSE: AN ‘INQUIRY INTO THE HUMAN MIND ON THE PRINCIPLES OF COMMON SENSE’ 1764 As early as October 1762, as we have seen, Reid had given signs of an intention to offer the world some results of his meditations regarding the foundations of belief. Accordingly, in the end of the following year, he produced his first book, _An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense_. Its motto expresses its leading argument—‘The inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.’ For it was to the inspirations, or revelations, of what he called the ‘common sense’ or ‘common judgment,’ regarded as the root of any human understanding of man and his environment, that he made his final appeal against the all-embracing doubt of Hume. This was the rock on which he took his stand in the universal deluge. Reid was now in his fifty-fourth year. Hitherto his modesty had concealed his strength from all but a few friends. His book was concerned with questions that were not likely to withdraw him rapidly from ‘the obscurity of a learned retirement.’ The _Inquiry_, with its appeal to the final reason latent in human nature, is not to be interpreted as an appeal to popular opinion against theories of philosophers. In fact, its implied argument is not obvious to popular intelligence, although it is profoundly connected with all the chief interests of human life. Great books of this sort attract only the few who think. His brother-in-law, Mr. Rose, mentions that ‘Alexander Millar, the London bookseller, being in Aberdeen at this time, and in company with Dr. Reid, protested against books in metaphysics as bad bargains for publishers; by which he said he had himself lost money, but never gained any. Notwithstanding, Dr. Reid, having his _Inquiry_ ready for publication, sold it to Mr. Millar for £50. When his friends bantered him upon the small sum he had received for so valuable a performance, he jocosely replied, “I think it is well sold.”’[10]