Professor Gregorie occupied the Chair of Philosophy at St Andrews until the Revolution, but then his love for the discrowned king compelled him to resign. He could not bring himself to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, and thus for a few years he was without any settled work. Happily for him, however, David his elder brother was in 1692, by the influence of Sir Isaac Newton, made Savilian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford, thus leaving a vacancy in the Chair of Mathematics at Edinburgh. He, too, had been somewhat under a cloud because of his love for the Stuarts, and although his greatness had prevented the party which was in power from ejecting him from his post, yet his life had been made sufficiently uncomfortable for him.
But now things were changed. Feeling was no longer hot and bitter, and James succeeded to his chair in 1692, with a prospect of a long and quiet tenure of it. At the time of his election the College revenues were low, and he had to accept the chair on a diminished salary of nine hundred merks, or £50 sterling, in addition to the students’ fees. In the end Gregorie certainly got his money’s worth out of the university, for he retired at fifty-nine, owing to age and infirmity, and then lived for seventeen years, during which time Colin Maclaurin, who had been made joint-professor with him, got no salary. His case was indeed a piteous one, and Sir Isaac Newton made him a yearly allowance of £20, towards providing for him, ‘till Mr Gregorie’s place became void.’ The entries in the Records of Marischal College, Aberdeen, concerning Maclaurin’s conduct there, or rather not there, are quaint.
‘_December 23, 1724._—On consideration that M’Laurine has been abroad and not attended to his charge for near thir three years the Council appoint Mr Daniel Gordon, one of the regents “who had formerly taught Mathematicks at the University of St Andrews” to teach the class during the current session.’
‘_January 20, 1725._—M’Laurine having returned a Committee is appointed to confer with him anent: 1st, his going away without Liberty from the Counsell. 2nd, His being so long absent from his charge.’
‘_April 27, 1725._—M’Laurine appears before the Council, expresses regret, and is reponed.’