Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 1.djvu/72

 already manifested. Being obliged to fly from St Andrews, he retired to Germany, where he became a thorough convert to the Protestant doctrines. The Reformation in England induced Ales to go to London, in 1535, where he was highly esteemed by Cranmer, Latimer, and Cromwell, who were at that time in favour with the king. Henry regarded him also with favour, and used to call him "his scholar." Upon the fall of Cromwell, he was obliged to return to Germany, where the Elector of Brandenburg appointed him professor of divinity at Frankfort-upon-the-Oder, in 1540. As a reformer, Ales did not always maintain the most orthodox doctrines; hence he was obliged, in 1542, to fly from his chair at Frankfort, and betake himself to Leipsic. He spent the remainder of his life in that city, as professor of divinity, and died in 1565. His works are:— The fifth in this list is the most favourable specimen of his abilities.  , an eminent nobleman, statesman, and poet of the reign of James VI. and Charles I. The original rank of this personage was that of a small landed proprietor or laird; but he was elevated, by dint of his various accomplishments, and through the favour of the two sovereigns above-mentioned, to the rank of an earl. His family, which possessed the small estate of Menstrie, near Stirling, is said to have derived the name Alexander from the prenomen of their ancestor, Alexander Macdonald, a highlander, who had been settled in this property by the Earl of Argyle, whose residence of Castle Campbell is in the neighbourhood. "William Alexander is supposed to have first seen the light in 1580. Nature having obviously marked him for a higher destiny than that to which he was born, he received from his friends the best education which the time and place could afford, and, at a very early age, he accompanied the young Earl of Argyle upon his foreign travels, in the capacity of tutor. Previous to this period, when only fifteen years of age, he had been smit with the charms of some country beauty, "the cynosure of neighbouring eyes;" on his return from the continent, his passion was found to have suffered no abatement. He spent some time in rural retirement, and wrote no fewer than a hundred sonnets, as a ventilation to the fervours of his breast; but all his poetry was in vain, so far as the lady was concerned, She thought of matrimony, while he thought of love; and accordingly, on being solicited by a more aged suitor, in other respects eligible, did not scruple to accept his hand. The poet took a more sensible way of consoling himself for this disappointment than might have been expected; he married another lady, the daughter and heiress of Sir William Erskine. His century of sonnets was published in London in 1604, under the title of "Aurora, containing the First Fancies of the Author's Youth, by W. Alexander, of Menstrie." From the situation of Alexander's estate, near the residence of the king at Stirling, and in a vale which his majesty frequented for the pleasure of hawking, he had early been introduced to royal notice; and, accordingly, it appears that, when James removed to London, in 1603, the poet did not remain long behind, but soon became a dependent upon the English court. It is honourable to Alexander that in this situation he did not, like most court poets of that age, employ his pen in the adulation of majesty; his works breathe a very different
 * 1) "De necessitate et merito Bonorum Operum, disputatio proposita in celebri academia Leipsica, ad 29 Nov. 1560."
 * 2) "Commentarii in evangelium Joannis, et in utramque epistolam ad Timotheum."
 * 3) "Expositio in Psalmos Davidis."
 * 4) "De Justificatione, contra Oscandram."
 * 5) "De Sancta Trinitate, cum confutatione erroris Valentini."
 * 6) "Responsio ad triginta et duos articulos theologorum Lovaniensium."