Kames, Henry Home, Lord

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Kames, Henry Home, Lord (1696–1782). Judge and man of letters. Son of a petty laird, educated for the Scottish bar, Kames became a lord of Session in 1752. He was a prominent member of the Edinburgh literati and an important patron whose protégés included Adam Smith and John Millar. A prolific and often acute essayist, Kames's interests ranged from metaphysics to manners, morals, jurisprudence, belles-lettres, and agricultural improvement. A friend and relative of David Hume, he provided an early and intelligent reply to his kinsman's sceptical metaphysics. A jurist, Kames was one of the first Scots to have been interested in ‘conjectural history’ of the Scottish Enlightenment. His Elements of Criticism (1762) was an early and influential textbook, widely acclaimed in the Anglo-Saxon world. He was a gregarious if overbearing man.

Nicholas Phillipson

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