FORDYCE, DAVID, professor of moral philosophy in Marischal College, Aberdeen, was born in that city in 1711. Having received the early part of his education at the grammar school, he, at the age of thirteen, entered the Greek class in Marischal College, Aberdeen; in 1728 he took the degree of master of arts, and in 1742 he was admitted professor of philosophy in the same college. Being originally designed for the church, he applied himself with great ardour to the study of divinity, in which he made great progress, though he never became a settled minister in the establishment of his native country. That he was well qualified to be such, however, appears from his Theodorus, a dialogue concerning the art of preaching, which he afterwards published. In 1750 he went abroad on his travels, in order to obtain fresh stores of knowledge; but after a successful tour through several parts of Europe, he was, on his return home, unfortunately cast away in a storm on the coast of Holland, in the forty-first year of his age. Besides the above work, he wrote Dialogues on Education, 8vo, and a Treatise on Moral Philosophy, published in the Preceptor. The third edition of his Theodorus was published in London, after his death, by his brother James, the subject of the following article.