Life and Correspondence of David Hume, Volume 1

by John Hill Burton

"Dear Sir,—About six weeks ago, I gave our friend, Jack Stuart, the trouble of delivering you a letter, and some papers enclosed, which I was desirous to submit to your criticism and examination. I say not this by way of compliment and ceremonial, but seriously and in good earnest: it is pretty usual for people to be pleased with their own performance, especially in the heat of composition; but I have scarcely wrote any thing more whimsical, or whose merit I am more diffident of.

"But, in sending in these papers, I am afraid that

I have not taken the best step towards conveying them to your hand. I should also have wrote you to ask for them, otherwise, perhaps, our friend may wear them out in his pocket, and forget the delivery of them: be so good, therefore, as to desire them from him, and having read them at your leisure, return them to him in a packet, and he will send them to me by the carrier. You would easily observe what I mentioned to you, that they had a reference to some other work, and were not complete in themselves: but, with this allowance, are they tolerable?"[322:1]

The paper to which the following letter refers, was published as an appendix to the "Inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals," to be shortly noticed, and was simply termed, "A Dialogue." It is, perhaps, more imaginative than any other of Hume's works, "The Epicurean" not excepted. It draws startling contrasts, by taking from ancient and modern times, two communities of men strikingly opposed to each other in habits, and describing those of the one in the social language of the other. In this manner, it gives an account of the vices of the Greeks, in the manner in which they would be described by a modern fashionable Englishman, seeking pleasure and companionship in Greece, as it was in the days of Alcibiades. This method of exhibiting national manners through the magnifying glass of national prejudices, has, in later times, been frequently adopted,[322:2] and, perhaps, owes its popularity to the success with which it was exhibited in Montesquieu's "Lettres Persanes," and Goldsmith's "Citizen of the World."

Gilbert Elliot of Minto, to Hume.

February, 1751.

Dear Sir,—I have read over your Dialogue, with all the application I am master of. Though I have never looked into any thing of your writing, which did not either entertain or instruct me; yet, I must freely own to you, that I have received from this last piece an additional satisfaction, and what indeed I have a thousand times wished for in some of your other performances. In the first part of this work, you have given full scope to the native bent of your genius. The ancients and moderns, how opposite soever in other respects, equally combine in favour of the most unbounded scepticism. Principles, customs, and manners, the most contradictory, all seemingly lead to the same end; and agreeably to your laudable practice, the poor reader is left in the most disconsolate state of doubt and uncertainty. When I had got thus far, what do you think were my sentiments? I will not be so candid as to tell you; but how agreeable was my surprise, when I found you had led me into this maze, with no other view, than to point out to me more clearly the direct road. Why can't you always write in this manner? Indulge yourself as much as you will in starting difficulties, and perplexing received opinions: but let us be convinced at length, that you have not less ability to establish true principles, than subtlety to detect false ones. This unphilosophical, or, if you will, this lazy disposition of mine, you are at liberty to treat as you think proper; yet am I no enemy to free inquiry, and I would gladly flatter myself, no slave to prejudice or authority. I admit also that there is no writing or talking of any subject that is of importance enough to become the object of reasoning, without having recourse to some degree of subtlety or refinement. The only question is, where to stop,—how far we can go, and why no farther. To this question I should be extremely happy to receive a satisfactory answer. I can't tell if I shall rightly express what I have just now in my mind: but I often imagine to myself, that I perceive within me a certain instinctive feeling, which shoves away at once all subtle refinements, and tells me with authority, that these air-built notions are inconsistent with life and experience, and, by consequence

cannot be true or solid. From this I am led to think, that the speculative principles of our nature ought to go hand in hand with the practical ones; and, for my own part, when the former are so far pushed, as to leave the latter quite out of sight, I am always apt to suspect that we have transgressed our limits. If it should be asked—how far will these practical principles go? I can only answer, that the former difficulty will recur, unless it be found that there is something in the intellectual part of our nature, resembling the moral sentiment in the moral part of our nature, which determines this, as it were, instinctively. Very possibly I have wrote nonsense. However, this notion first occurred to me at London, in conversation with a man of some depth of thinking; and talking of it since to your friend H. Home, he seems to entertain some notions nearly of the same kind, and to have pushed them much farther.

This is but an idle digression, so I return to the Dialogue.

With regard to the composition in general, I have nothing to observe, as it appears to me to be conducted with the greatest propriety, and the artifice in the beginning occasions, I think, a very agreeable surprise. I don't know, if, in the account of the modern manners, you [had] an eye to Bruyere's introduction to his translation of Theophrastes.[324:1] If you had not, as he has a thought handled pretty much in that manner, perhaps looking into it might furnish some farther hints to embellish that part of your work.[324:2]