professing upon the wrong instruments: they had not sufficient compass-they wanted power and depth of tone; he kept hitting and hammering arias and fantasias upon the harpsichord, instead of expatiating in all the mazes of a grand concerto upon the violoncello. When he did change for the right instrument, he made it speak and he took his proper place in the orchestra; but of that hereafter.

than of recalling the recollection of our open follies. But the Philosophical Historian is superlatively egotistical and self-adulatory; he rolls and swelters in vanity.

pensable for preserving literary caste. Free-thinking, however, was then a quasiaristocratical luxury. It had not yet descended to the Lord Provost and the TownCouncil; and when Hume became a candidate for the chair of Moral Philosophy, the zealots' having been bold enough to assert that he was an apostle of infidelity, he lost his election.

All his miscellaneous productions, excepting only his 'Natural History of Religion,' and some slight Essays upon the passions,' 'tragedy,' and 'taste,' appeared before the publication of the first Stuart volume. Hume's general information, his Hume's first offering to the literary world, apparent mildness and good temper, his as we are told in 'My own Life,' was a gentlemanlike flow of language when he Treatise of Human Nature, being an At- was not provoked, his conversational powtempt to introduce the Experimental Meth-ers, and the general tendency of his moral od of Reasoning into moral subjects;' not and philosophical essays, gained him much a very intelligible title even when, by sub- notoriety and favor in the literary circles stituting on for of, we render it somewhat and coteries at Edinburgh. Deism was more comformable to the vulgar idiom of our spreading, with exceeding rapidity, amongst language. 'Never,' adds he,' was any lite- the more intellectual classes of the northern rary attempt more unfortunate than my capital. Philosophy became almost indisTreatise it fell dead-born from the press, without reaching such distinction as even to excite a murmur among the zealots.' And he proceeds to represent how cheerfully he sustained the disappointment, and then recovered from the blow. In this auto-biographical confession, which contains two facts, the failure of the work and Hume's own conduct, there are two misrepresentations; the baby was not still-born Such contests are usually poor tests of -it was quite alive, and cried lustily, so as sound principle: however, on this occato excite the ogres, that is to say, the re- sion, the opposition was honest and sincere. viewers, to strangle it an operation effect- it was instigated by the more orthodox ually performed, in the Journal entitled and uncompromising members of the Kirk, 'The Works of the Learned.' In the next who really adhered in heart and life to place, Hume, instead of submitting with Christianity as taught by Calvin and John stoical indifference to the loss of said baby, Knox; and Hume hated them henceforraged like a lioness deprived of her cub. ward with his whole soul. But the 'enRushing into the shop of Jacob Robinson, thusiasts' constituted a minority-both a the publisher of the Review, he out with moral and a numerical minority; all the his sword and demanded satisfaction. Ja- ministry who professed liberal opinions, cob took refuge within his proper strong-valued and sought Hume's friendship. Stighold, and entrenched himself behind the matized as the propagandist of unbelief, he counter, and thus escaped being pinked was consoled, supported, protected by the after the most approved fashion. Both cordial friendship of the most distinguished parties acted very naturally-the stoical members of the Scottish establishment— philosopher in being furious at the criticism, Blair, Wallace, Drysdale, Wishart, Jardine, and the bookseller in declining to become a Home, Robertson, and Carlyle. This revmartyr for his editor; but 'My own Life' is erend patronage, not any ability or cleverwholly silent about the matter. My own ness of the writer, gave activity to Hume's Life,' indeed, belongs to a class of compo- venom. It removed the reproach previoussitions rarely commanding much confi-ly attached to infidelity. It at once took dence say, one in a hundred. Autos off the interdict. usually takes good care not to tell any tales, warmest adherents to Hume's irreligion which, in his own conceit, would lower his have never dared to risk their own literary repute with Heteros-not one in a thou- reputation by praising the talent of Hume, sand. In all such compositions there is a as evinced in the most offensive of his pubgreat root of self-deception. We are far more proud of confessing our secret sins,

Those who are the

lications, such as the 'Natural History of Religion,' which includes the Bad Influ

'An ingenious author has honored this discourse with an answer full of politeness, erudition, and good sense. So learned a refutation would have made the author suspect that his reasonings were entirely overthrown, had he not used the precaution from the beginning to keep himself on the skeptical side; and having taken this advantage of the ground, he was enabled, though with much inferior force, to preserve himself from a total defeat. That reverend gentleman will always find, where his antagonist is so entrenched, that it will be very difficult to force him. Varro, in such a situation, could defend himself against Hannibal, Pharnaces against Cæsar.'

ence of Popular Religions on Morality,' the accuracies. It is now chiefly remarkable, 'Essay on Miracles,' and the Inquiry con- as having elicited from Hume an important cerning the Human Understanding;' and and instructive description of his peculiar when Magee (On Atonement and Sacri- tactics. In a second edition, he added the fice,' vol. ii. p. 276) spoke of them as following curious note:standing memorials of a heart as wicked, and a head as weak, as ever pretended to the character of philosopher and moralist,' it is the harshness of the language, not the injustice of the sentiment, which can in any degree dispose us against the criticism. Deficient in any sustained argument, prolix and inconclusive, his hold upon your attention principally arises from the effort which you are constantly compelled to make, in order to follow the reasoning, which vanishes as soon as it begins to assume a definite form. If you are an antagonist, he wearies you, not by his blows, but by continually slipping out of your grasp. Such works would absolutely have destroyed Hume's reputation as a philosophical reasoner, had he not been an unbeliever-had not opposition to faith been usually, in those days, considered as a prima facie proof of a strong and vigorous mind.

The Inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals' may stand high in the scale of mediocrity. What have we in this pragmatic dissertation? A favorable approbation of qualities commonly favored; a dislike of vices commonly odious; commonplace observations brought forth with placid solemnity; obvious truths, intermixed with as obvious fallacies. Cold approbation is the utmost Hume bestows. He has no objection to the more amiable of the natural good qualities of mankind, if they trouble him not in his easy way. Without seeking to encourage any vice which might diminish the safety of society, he is apathetic even in the cause of pagan virtue.

But becoming afterwards aware, that this was an unguarded disclosure of the trick which gave most success to his sophistry, he omitted it, when, for a third time, he republished the essay in an octavo form.

In the large library, which, as he tells us, suggested his work, Hume wanted, like his predecessors, important materials then concealed in manuscript, but now familiar to every historical inquirer. Domesday, the groundwork of Anglo-Saxon and AngloNorman territorial organization, was enshrined in the Chapter House at Westminster, protected strictly under lock and key: rarely could the edifice be entered; if the antiquary sought to consult the treasure, thirteen shillings and fourpence of lawful money must be paid for each inspection of the volume; guarded so jealously that the finger was never allowed to wander beyond the margin, lest the characters should susThe best of Hume's miscellaneous pro- tain injury from the contact with unexductions are his political and constitutional chequered hands. He had to labor under essays they are clear and sensible, and many other similar disadvantages, removed they have all the force resulting from a by more recent editorial diligence. shrewd and tranquil intellect. He recom- Such deficiencies, though they may dimends himself by his disinvoltura and minish the completeness of history, are not worldly good sense, and a due appreciation detrimental to the literary character of the of the popular fallacies by which the multi-historian. Ordinary and vulgated sources tude are deluded. These pieces have the will usually give all that is needed for a value of slight sketches by a good artist, broad outline, which may be rendered suffi free and expressive, but they need finish ciently effective, as a test of the author's and carrying out into compositions. The talent, with few minor details. Here are most elaborate of them is the Essay upon some new and unpublished materials for the Populousness of Ancient Nations.' Its the History of the Siege of Rhodes, M. reasonings received an elaborate reply from Wallace; and Gibbon, in his valuable 'Adversaria,' has pointed out some striking in

l'Abbé.' The reply of M. l'Abbé Vertot -as we have it in the facetious, anecdotic chapter of the French school-grammars of

the progress of the history; nor have we any means of visiting the fattest of epicurean hogs in his stye,'-this is Gibbon's kind phrase, explained by the ingenious index-maker as a 'jocose allusion to Mr. Hume's indolence.' The only glimpse we gain is through a story told by a late venerable Scottish crony. Some one having hinted that David had neglected an authority he ought to have consulted, the old gentleman replied,- Why, mon, David read a vast deal before he set about a piece of his book; but his usual seat was the sofa, and he often wrote with his legs up; and it would have been unco fashious to have moved across the room when any little

the last age was, 'Mon siége est fait.' In the case of Vertot, the answer has become a standing joke against his memory, but the point of the sarcasm is given by his general untrustworthiness. Had M. l'Abbé been faithful to the extent of his knowledge, no candid fellow-laborer would be inclined to blame him, for being content to work well upon a limited stock. In discussing Hume's claims to be adopted as 'the guide and philosopher,' who, on all topics connected with our history entirely gives the law,' it is therefore important to ascertain whether he employed due diligence, in studying the materials which were accessible to him, and in availing himself of the ample library, which, as he informs doubt occurred.' us, stimulated him to his enterprise. Gib- In the absence of more precise informabon thought not he describes Hume's tion, we must endeavor to ascertain, by interHistory as 'elegant, but superficial' ap-nal evidence, the books which Hume had by parently a slight epithet of blame, but his side, when, compiling the earlier portion which, employed by Gibbon, obtains great of his history, he worked in this somewhat intensity. Congenial, unhappily, as their American guise. It has been ably shown opinions might be in some respects, no two literary characters could be more distinct. Hume's historical Muse is dressed à la Pompadour she is so painted that you never see her true complexion, you never get deeper than the rouge and the fard. Hume, in his best moods, only fluttered about the truth; never sought to know it. Gibbon sought to know the truth; but for the purpose of wickedly and perfidiously perverting it. Yet how admirable was the talent exerted by Gibbon, in hostility to the Power by whom the gift was bestowed-his nice sense of the due subordination of the different branches, into which he divided his studies; the good sense which taught him to intersperse them amidst each other, so varied as to relieve the mind, and yet so continuous as not to distract attention-to slacken the bow, but never leave it unstrung! His constant vigilance to improve every opportunity-recovering his Greek, to the sound of the fife and the tattoo, when on duty at Devizes; placing Homer in parallel with the verse of Pope and the geography of Strabo; comparing the returned numbers of the establishment of the Berkshire militia, with its actual rank and file, 560 nominal and 273 effective, and hence drawing his inferences respecting the real magnitude of the armies commemorated in history.

by the most competent judge amongst our contemporaries (Ed. Rev. vol. liii. p. 15), that, from Carte, Hume borrowed not only the arrangement of events but the structure of his expressions, giving, however, the color of his own thought and style to the narration, and occasionally verifying Carte's statement by referring to his quotations. Hume made nearly as much use of Tyrrell, balancing the narratives of the two historians, wisely availing himself of the hints given by Whig and Tory. Brady was his principal help for constitutional information. Original sources were occasionally consulted by him, though very uncritically and sparingly; some of considerable importance are wholly passed by: for example, the anonymous life of Richard II. published by Hearne. The reason is obvious; Carte unaccountably neglected it, therefore Hume was ignorant of the book's existence. Hume may have turned over the leaves of the chroniclers, but he never rendered them the object of study, and never distinguished between primary and secondary authorities. Of Church history he knew absolutely nothing. Slight references to the imperfect English Concilia by Spelman, testify his ignorance or neglect of the more complete edition which we owe to Wilkins; a book which, a quarter of a century ago, was estimated as waste paper, but which now is worth more pounds than it was then worth shillings. Hume was entirely unacquainted with any of the ample collections, in which the transactions of the Church are recorded.

A few passages, relating to Ecclesiastical] bility added to their evil influence, he law and history, are borrowed from the pun- became firmly convinced that ' priests of all gent Satires of Fra Paolo Sarpi: his facts religion are the same,' seeking merely the for the Crusades, from Maimbourg or Ver- gratification of their own sordid and selfish tot; his notices of continental history, gen- passions and propensities. erally, from the Essai sur les Mœurs by The 'careless inimitable beauties of Voltaire, and some other of the then fash- Hume,' as they are styled by Gibbon, that ionable works of French infidel literature. is to say, his solecisms, his Scotticisms, his In the Stuart portions, Hume worked more Gallicisms, his violation of the rules of Engfreely and independently, from original wri-glish grammar, and still more of English ters; though Eachard, and also Bishop idiom, were criticised with some severity Kennet's compilation, useful for the documents and textual extracts it contains, were serviceable in saving the walk across the

room.

by Dr. Priestley, in his English Grammar, the rarest of his productions. The mere language of an historian,' as Dr. Arnold observes, will furnish us with something of key to his mind--will tell us, or at least give us cause to presume, in what his main strength lies, and in what he is deficient.'

Hume's language shows us that his main strength lies in his art of rhetorical persuasion-in his striving always to lead the hearer to form inferences beyond his words

On

Possibly many elucidations of Hume's literary character might be derived from the large collection of his correspondence, now deposited in the Library of the Edinburgh Royal Society. An editor would, however, find difficulty in dealing with the papers, so as to afford sufficient instruction, and, at the same time, avoid public offence. Se--in his being able to throw out his written lections from correspondence are worth discourse with the ease of conversation, little, unless they are sufficiently ample to avoiding its triviality-and in a thorough exhibit a continuous view of the mind and appreciation of the respect which an author pursuits of the man, and the mutual inter- gains, who can neither be depreciated for change of thought. Those who have vulgarity nor ridiculed for bombast. examined the Hume papers-which we the other hand, Hume's language equally know only by report-speak highly of their discloses his deficiency in historical knowinterest, but add, that they furnish painful ledge, evinced by his inability to relate his disclosures concerning the opinions then history in appropriate diction: he wants the prevailing amongst the clergy of the north- happy medium between that paraphrase ern metropolis; distinguished ministers which obliterates the character of the origiof the Gospel encouraging the scoffs of their nal, and the untrue fidelity, which even still familiar friend, the author of the Essay more would disguise its real features. upon Miracles,' and echoing the blasphe- Whoever writes the history of remote times, mics of their associate, the author of the is virtually a translator; and a strict and "Essay upon Suicide.' Can we doubt but literal translation fully meets the meaning that Hume, who possessed within him the of the German term. It is an übersetzung, natural germ of many virtues, was exceed- an oversetting. Translation, it has been ingly strengthened in his infidelity, by the well observed, is a problem, how, two laninconsistency of those whom he terms 'reli- guages being given, the nearest approximagionists' leading him to the conclusion tion may be made in the second, to the that their conviction is in all ages more expression of ideas already conveyed through affected than real, and scarcely ever the medium of the first.' Perhaps the approaches in any degree to that solid worst solution is the conceit of rendering belief and persuasion, which governs us in sound for sound, in which the sound usually the common affairs of life? The usual ceases to be an echo of the sense. Speak, course of men's conduct belies their words, in translating from Norsk or Anglo-Saxon, and shows that their assent in these mat- of the stink of a rose, that is to say, the ters is some unaccountable operation of rose's smell—the dream of a fiddle instead the mind between disbelief and conviction, of its tone-the green beam for the growing but approaching nearer to the former than tree-the smear-monger for the butter-merthe latter. Thus generalizing from his chant; represent a mother as lamenting knowledge of the private sentiments of these that her knave's lungs are addled, instead betrayers of their Lord, these preachers of of her boy being ill of consumption; describe the Gospel, honoring the reviler of their Sa- the preacher holding forth from his pulpit. viour, whose talents and worldly respecta- as the beadle spelling from the steeple; or,

Helped onwards by such guides as Carte and Tyrrell, it was impossible that so acute a writer as Hume could commit any palpable blunder in the main facts of his history; but he absolutely teems with all the errors which can be committed by talent, when endeavoring to disguise ignorance by putting on the airs of knowledge. Hume's history is made out of the cast of a cast, in which all the sharpness of the original has been lost. He gives great effect to the dull and rounded forms, by touching up the figures with his chisel, and recutting them so as to suit his conception; but this process, cleverly as it may be executed, only denaturalizes them the more.

recurring to the original sense, when sound [ple, a few sentences of Ordericus Vitalis, or fails you, praise the excellent taste of his William of Malmesbury, with the pseudomajesty of Bavaria in erecting the marble Ingulphus, forged, as we have shown, slaughter-house to the honor of Germania's subsequently to the reign of Edward II.,* worthies-such Teutonisms would not add or Knighton. Hume, compiling chiefly to the clearness of our ideas. Very insidi- from dull and vapid translations and comous, in all cases, are the deceptions sug-pilations, and quite unable to catch a disgested by titles of dignity, designations tinct perception of the originals, never connected with state or office, of which the approaches to the truth of historical diction, signification changes so rapidly from age to though he fully attains its rhetorical beauty. age, whilst the symbol remains the same. Dominus, or lord, conveys in the originals no peculiar notion of pre-eminence. It is sufficiently humble in the familiar compound of landlord; but speak of the lord of the land, and what a vision it raises of feudal dignity! In words which, according to the laws of language, you must employ, the great difficulty consists in guarding against ambiguities, arising from the change of meaning. Parliament is not a senate occupied in making speeches and passing laws, but the King, enthroned at the head of his great court of remedial justice; a bishop's palace, nothing regal, but a place, a mansion; throne, unconnected with royalty, and only the official seat of the prelate. We are amused at the absurdity of the The historian should consider himself as an Romancers of the middle ages, who porinterpreter, standing between two nations, tray Alexander in full armor, and Nectaneand he cannot well execute his task, unless bus hearing mass in the Temple of Termhe has lived with both. He must be famil-agaunt. These anachronisms, the proofs iarized, not merely with their language, but of a total misconception of the Grecian age, with their habits, and customs, and are not a whit greater than when Hume thoughts. He must be able to reduce all speaks of Anglo-Saxon gentlemen.' The the conventional phrases of society into notion of a gentleman is a complex idea, truth, to know when the speech which entirely belonging to our own times-it makes the roof resound means nothing-implies courtesy of manners, education, a and be equally able to find the expressive qualification of property not defined by meaning of silence. A very useful intro- pounds, shillings, and pence, but which duction to the study of patristical latinity--places him above poverty, though not nea main source, together with the Vulgate, cessarily in opulence; and belongs to a of the medieval idioms--will be found in state of society which never could have exMr. Woodham's Tertullian. It is unneces-isted in the Anglo-Saxon age--nor could sary to remark that the baser latinity of the the term ever have been employed by any mediæval writers differs widely from that of writer who had the Saxon Chronicle before classical authors; but the discrepancy lies him. far deeper than the adoption of barbarous words, whose signification can be disclosed by a glossary, or the solecisms which can be corrected by grammatical rules. Their rough refectory—and kitchen-Latin, came Edwin, in Hume's History, retires to natural to them; they thought in it; hence, his estates in the North, with the view of though employing uncouth and ungraceful commencing an insurrection '-just as a language, they expressed themselves, when Cumberland squire might have done in the needed, with terseness and power. It also '45. Possibly Hume may have found in exhibits strong idiomatical peculiarities, not

The Gallicism Tiberiade reveals Hume travelling to Tiberias in the Holy Land, under the guidance of the Abbé, and not of William of Tyre.

merely of individuals, but of æras. Anglo-vol. xxxiv, p. 296; in which article we have spok*Sources of English History, Quart. Rev.,' Norman latinity differs much from the later en fully of Hume's uncritical use of the ancient Plantagenet latinity. Compare, for exam-sources.