yet got rid of in real life, as well as his skeptical is most imbued with the spirit and language of a weighing and examination of principles, and in great writer is least likely to make actual quotathe idealizing process kept only the figures, and tions from his page. There are evidently other names, and dates, and landmarks of actual events, causes which derange the calculation. The and threw over them the coloring of the artist, the authorities produced must of course often depend mist of the magician, where "all was delusion, more upon the subject in hand than on the familiar nought was truth.' With these views, taking reading of the writer; and the author of the essay Charles as the centre of his composition, Hume" On the Populousness of Ancient Nations" was gave him all the interest he could heap upon him, necessarily led by his subject to consult books that according to his notions. To have represented might be foreign to his general studies and taste. him as strict and rigid even to austerity, in reli- Still the point is not without interest, and somegious tenets and observances, as he in later life thing may be found from such an inquiry. We certainly was, would have lowered him in the phi- give it for no more than it is worth. losopher's eye: moreover, it would have interfered with the artistic simplicity of effect, which required the dark side of rebellion to be made darker with unrelieved fanaticism. The oppressions of the law, the illegal extortion of money on the king's side, which every one now admits, are not passed over, nor denied, nor palliated; but by a single dash of the brush, the shadow of the picture is made to cover them so that the eye never rests on them. The iron severity of Strafford, the bigotry and oppression of Laud, the tergiversation of Charles a deep blemish in a noble nature-all are there, but huddled into the background; while the artist brings into the full blaze of his sunshine the amiable and heroic qualities of the king, the courage and genius of his great minister, and even the primate's zeal and genuine piety, to increase the tragic effect of their sufferings and death. It is done with admirable skill; and the spectator, enchanted with the picture, rejects all criticism against the truth of its facts. The story flows on so sweetly, it is impossible to stop it to ask the impertinent question, "Is it true?""

The index of a common edition of the collected Essays, professing to notice all the authors quoted or remarked upon, gives the names of forty Greek writers, thirty-eight Latin, twenty-eight French, nineteen English, nine Italian. Of the Greek authors, Diodorus Siculus and Plutarch are each cited about thirty times :-Polybius, Xenophon, and Strabo, about half as often-Herodotus, Thucydides, Demosthenes, and Lucian, each about twelve times;-Plato and Aristotle, each nine times;-Hesiod, Lysias, seven times each; Homer five times; and no other Greek authors so often as these. Of Latin writers, Tacitus is quoted twenty-four times; the elder Pliny, fifteen; Cicero, nineteen; Horace, fourteen; Livy, twelve ; Columella, seven; Quinctilian and Cæsar, each six; Martial, four; Petronius and Virgil, each thrice; Terence, twice. Of French writers, he cites Fontenelle four times; the Abbé Dubos as often; Racine thrice; Rochefoucault twice; Voltaire and Boileau, each once. Among the Italians. Machiavelli is quoted seven times; Ariosto and Guicciardini, each twice; Boccaccio, once. His In this artist skill the historian of the House of English_authorities are still more curious. Stuart is unrivalled. You can find few false state-quotes Bacon and Locke, each seven times; Pope, ments or mistakes on matters of any real impor- five times; Swift, thrice; Shakspeare, twice; tance-not many suppressions of fact. You can Bolingbroke, twice; Berkeley, Hutchinson, Addirarely detect any ingenious sophistry. Praise and son, Prior, Parnell, each once. He quotes three blame are duly awarded where merited. But all or four early fathers; two modern theologians; is made subservient to the "effect" which the the Bible, the Koran, and Cervantes, each once. great picture must produce to be perfect as a work of art.

It is here that Hume shows his mastery, more than in any perfection of mere style and language; and yet the easy, equal, sustained style of the historian was well suited to his object, and, indolent as he certainly was in many points, this achievement was the result of much study and labor well concealed. It never falls below the dignity and interest of the narrative, and shuns all flights that might distract the attention from the great scene spread before us.

He

Now undoubtedly, such a list shows extensive research and study; and it would be hard to find an instance where a great array of authorities is used to better account than in the "inquiry regarding the populousness of ancient nations." His correspondence also is full of classical quotations and allusions. There is, however, something in the manner of the references which frequently suggests the idea, that the author consulted his Greek authors in the Latin translations; and there is a small slip of aos, meaning "blood," in one of his last letters, (ii. p. 504,) which is scarcely In Hume's time and for long after, (and perhaps consistent with any habitual reading of Greek. He it is so still,) no Scotchman wrote English without had evidently no familiar acquaintance with the fear of blunders; and Hume was peculiarily sensi-Greek dramatists, probably not more than the tive in this matter. Even when success might French books of belles-lettres supplied. Homer have given confidence, his correspondence shows us how careful he was to have the assistance of his English friends for purifying his language of its northern spots and turns. By what discipline could one thus suffering under the irksome dread of provincialism school himself into the easy seeming language of Hume? He has furnished us with no key to this himself. In the dearth of other information, we have looked over the index of his philosophical works to find the authors quoted or referred to. At the same time we know how fallacious it is to rest on such foundations. It is one thing to cite an author and another to have studied his style; and perhaps the man who

he undoubtedly read in the original, and he loves to quote him even in his familiar letters, but too correctly, and as if he had the book open to make the quotation. Thucydides he must have studied; and he knew how to value the great historian when he pronounces "the first page of his work the commencement of real history." (Essay on Eloquence.) He appreciated the clearness and truth of Xenophon and Cæsar; but his admiration was reserved for the mixed historical and romantic biographies of Plutarch, which he recommended to Robertson as a model, and of which he himself at one time meditated a translation, (vol. ii., p. 84.) Hume knew Cicero well. Horace, and still more

Virgil, he often quoted from memory in his letters, | dence at Grignan stops the correspondence of the supplying or altering as he best could. He prob-queen of letter-writers. When Hume is quietly ably read Latin with sufficient ease-but it is evi- placed among his dearest friends, and busy with dent that he had never studied the language with his great work, he cannot have much time or occaany sort of care.* As for English, it would seem sion for letter-writing. The incident of his quarthat Hume scarcely studied in that language, rel with the learned body of lawyers, whose officer except when the subject on which he was engaged he was, for polluting the shelves of a great public compelled him, or read its authors for his pleasure. library, in fact the national depository of literature, He certainly drew none of his language from the with the works of Lafontaine and Crebillon, (p. "pure well of English undefiled." The Bible, 395,) is ridiculous enough, unless it was a mere the best book for the study of the present English pretex for attacking him, when it becomes sometongue, he was not likely to dwell upon. Shak- thing worse. But he was able now to stand alone. speare and Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, were His works were rising in popularity and proat. barbarous, neglecting the unities and so forth; We find notices of several visits to London in conMilton, though learned in all the learning of the nexion with new editions. He had moved in 1762 classics, was no classicist, and, moreover, was from his tenement" in Riddell's Land to a more fanatical; the band of writers who first wielded spacious house which he bought in St. James' English prose as masters were mostly churchmen, Court-the same flat, as Mr. Burton proves by and were indeed in his time generally disregarded a legal document, in which Boswell afterwards or unknown. Bacon he had read, but only for his received Johnson-though Bozzy of course did not philosophy. Johnson had not yet directed the tell his guest the name of his landlord. In 1763 student of English composition to give his days he wrote to Adam Smith:-"I set up a chaise and nights to Addison; and though Robertson was in May next: and you may be sure a journey to never weary of poring over Swift, it may be Glasgow will be one of the first I shall undertake." doubted if Hume could appreciate the most idio- (Vol. ii., p. 148.) In short, he was advancing in matic of modern English styles. He chose his the steady progress of an industrious and prudent models and his rules elsewhere. He studied the and most successful literary man, surrounded by Parisian writers on criticism and belles-lettres; friends and all comforts, now playing the bountiful followed Boileau and his school; affected to rave host in his own house to a band of guests such as of Sophocles and Racine as near of kin; and, will never meet again, now enjoying the freewithout an intimate knowledge of the languages dom of the "Poker" club-when the quiet tenor of the classics, or a heartfelt appreciation of their of his days was interrupted by his visit to Paris spirit, still set them up as the ideal objects of his as secretary to Lord Hertford, the English ambasimitation both in form and essence. sador.

It was undoubtedly on those models that he Hume's reception and success in Paris (1764–5 formed his style but he bestowed upon it no com--6) were enough to turn almost any head; and mon labor, and brought to the study no common they had some effect upon his. His skeptical qualifications. Clear good sense, an admirable philosophy, distasteful even then to the general precision of thought and reasoning, gave a similar mind of England, was received with universal precision and transparency of diction: a remark- applause in the circle of encyclopædists. His hisable simplicity of mind, joined to a quick sense of tory had already drawn upon him the volunteered the ridiculous, guarded him against attempting too correspondence of the Comtesse de Boufflers, and high a flight. These qualities of his nature, with he was assured of a general welcome. To prepare a never-ceasing watchfulness of his words,† ena-him the more to enjoy it, he had to contrast it with bled him to produce a narrative which, without the a decided want of success in London society. He gracefulness of native and racy English, has the great merit of expressing his sense clearly and simply, and, by a wonderful art, leading us to forget the writer and the language under the fascination of his story. There is no greater triumph in this department, but it is the victory of thinking rather than of writing.

Much as we should wish to keep company with Hume in the society of his Edinburgh friends, we should be unreasonable to expect it. The resi

* One specimen of verse, when Hume was forty-five, may suffice. It must have been a strange ear that allowed this mangling of an Ovidian hexameter.

Nam simul ac mea caluerant pectora musæ.-(ii, p. 20,) The grammar is worthy of the quantity. He plainly intended caluerant to mean heated, and to govern pectora.

never loved the English; and, in the time of Hume and Lord Bute, North Britons were not popular in the south. He wrote thus bitterly to Elliot :

"I believe, taking the continent of Europe from Petersburg to Lisbon, and from Bergen to Naples, there is not one who ever heard my name who has not heard of it with advantage, both in point of morals and genius. I do not believe there is one Englishman in fifty who, if he heard I had broke my neck to-night, would be sorry; some, because I am not a whig; some, because I am not a Christian; and all, because I am a Scotsman. Can you seriously talk of my continuing an Englishman? Am I or you an Englishman? Do they not treat with derision our pretensions to that name, and with hatred our just pretensions to surpass and govern them?"-Vol. ii., p. 238.

And again, to Dr. Blair :

The care of his style appears even in his letters, many of which are preserved in the first draft, and show constant correction where another word or phrase seemed neater than that first chosen. The same practice is London and Paris; of which I gave warning to "There is a very remarkable difference between met with even in the letters actually sent to his familiars, Helvetius, when he went over lately to England, and-what is not always the case with others-his alterations were always for the better. His style of letter- and of which he told me, on his return, he was writing became much easier as he advanced in life, and fully sensible. If a man have the misfortune, in in his later correspondence he gave up a practice which the former place, to attach himself to letters, even offends the reader of his (collected) early letters,-repeat- if he succeeds, I know not with whom he is to ing the same story, or thought, or play of words-sometimes almost in the same phrase, in several letters, to dif

ferent friends.

live, nor how he is to pass his time in a suitable society. The little company there that is worth

conversing with, are cold and unsociable; or are retains that amiable character which made him warmed only by faction and cabal; so that a man once the delight of all France. He had always who plays no part in public affairs becomes alto- the best cook and the best company in Paris. But gether insignificant; and, if he is not rich, he though I know you will laugh at me, as they do, becomes even contemptible. Hence that nation I must confess that I am more carried away from are relapsing fast into the deepest stupidity and their society than I should be by the great ladies ignorance."-Vol. ii., p. 268. with whom I became acquainted at my first introThus wrote David Hume of London in 1765—duction to court, and whom my connections with exactly in the most flourishing æra of Boswell's immortal cycle-exactly when Burke, Johnson, Beauclerk, Goldsmith, Reynolds, Garrick-not to mention Warburton, and Chesterfield, and Walpole-were in the topmost blaze of their social enjoyment and renown! The "History of the Stuarts" had appeared nine years before.

"The men of letters here are really very agreeable all of them men of the world, living in entire, or almost entire, harmony among themselves, and quite irreproachable in their morals. "I allow you to communicate this story to Dr. It would give you, and Jardine, and Robertson, Jardine. I hope it will refute all his idle notions great satisfaction to find that there is not a single that I have no turn for gallantry and gaiety-that deist among them. Those whose persons and I am on a bad footing with the ladies-that my conversation I like best, are D'Alembert, Buffon, turn of converations can never be agreeable to Marmontel, Diderot, Duclos, Helvetius, and old them that I never can have any pretensions 10 President Hénault, who, though now decaying, their favors, &c., &c., &c. A man in vogue will

always have something to pretend to with the fair | by witnesses who laugh at the triumphing hero

sex.

while they affirm the triumph. Mr. Burton has collected a few passages from contemporaries, of which the following are to our purpose :

"Do you not think it happy for me to retain such a taste for idleness and follies at my years; especially since I have come into a country where "Ce qu'il y a encore de plaisant, c'est que the follies are so much more agreeable than else- toutes les jolies femmes se le sont arraché, et que where? I could only wish that some of my old le gros philosophe Ecossais s'est plu dans leur sofriends were to participate with me of these ciété. C'est un excellent homme, que David amusements; though I know none of them that Hume; il est naturellement serein, il entend finecan, on occasion, be so thoroughly idle as my-ment, il dit quelquefois avec sel, quoiqu'il parle self."-Vol. ii., p. 196.

After the lapse of more than a twelvemonth, he writes thus to Blair :

peu; mais il est lourd-il n'a ni chaleur, ni grâce, ni agrément dans l'esprit, ni rien qui soit propre à s'allier au ramage de ces charmantes petites machines qu'on appelle jolies femmes. O que nous sommes un drôle de peuple!"-Correspondance Littéraire de Grimm, vol. v., p. 125.

Madame d'Epinay gives us the picture of the fat historian in some charades of the day, cajoled into enacting the part of a sultan, who was to make violent love to two beauties of the seraglio, (the two prettiest women in Paris.) He is on a sofa between them, gazing steadfastly at them

"Il se frappe le ventre et les genoux à plusieurs reprises, et ne trouve jamais autre chose à leur dire que-Eh bien! mes demoiselles... Eh bien! vous voilà donc ... Eh bien! vous voilà. . . vous voilà ici.' Cette phrase dura un quart d'heure sans qu'il pût en sortir."

He was not pressed to play any more; but, says the lady,

"In Paris a man that distinguishes himself in letters meets immediately with regard and attention. I found, immediately on my landing here, the effects of this disposition. Lord Beauchamp told me that I must go instantly with him to the Duchess de la Vallière. When I excused myself, on account of dress, he told me that he had her orders, though I were in boots. I accordingly went with him in a travelling frock, where I saw a very fine lady reclining on a sofa, who made me speeches and compliments without bounds. The style of panegyric was then taken up by a fat gentleman, whom I cast my eyes upon, and observed him to wear a star of the richest diamonds;-it was the Duke of Orleans. The duchess told me she was engaged to sup in President Hénault's, but that she would not part with me; I must go along with her. The good presi- "Il n'en est pas moins fêté et cajolé. C'est en dent received me with open arms; and told me, vérité une chose plaisante que le rôle qu'il joue among other fine things, that, a few days before, ici. Malheureusement pour lui, ou plutôt pour la the dauphin said to him, &c., &c., &c. Such | dignité philosophique, (car, pour lui, il paraît s'acinstances of attention I found very frequent, and commoder fort de ce train de vie,) il n'y avait aueven daily. You ask me, if they were not very cune manie dominante dans ce pays lorsqu'il y est agreeable? I answer-no; neither in expecta- arrivé: on l'a regardé comme une trouvaille dans tion, possession, nor recollection. I left that fire- cette circonstance, et l'effervescence de nos jeunes side, where you probably sit at present, with the têtes s'est tourné de son côté. Toutes les jolies greatest reluctance. After I came to London, my femmes s'en sont emparées; il est de tous les souuneasiness, as I heard more of the prepossessions pers fins, et il n'est point de fête sans lui."of the French nation in my favor, increased; and Mém. de Mde. d'Epinay, vol. iii., p. 284. nothing would have given me greater joy than any Horace Walpole writes from Paris:—“ Hume is accident that would have broke off my engage-treated here with perfect veneration. His history, ments. When I came to Paris, I repented heartily so falsified in many parts, so partial in as many, so of having entered, at my years, on such a scene; very unequal in its parts, is thought the standard and, as I found that Lord Hertford had entertained of writing," (vol. ii, p. 225.) "For a good opinion and good will for Andrew Stuart, Lord Lyttleton, if he would come hither and turn I spoke to Wedderburn, in order to contrive expe- free thinker once more, he would be reckoned the dients for substituting him in my place. Lord most agreeable man in France-next to Mr. Hume, Hertford thought for some time that I would lose who is the only thing that they believe implicitly, all patience and would run away from him. But which they must do, for I defy them to understand the faculty of speaking French returned gradually any language that he speaks."-(Vol. ii., p. 226.) to me. I formed many acquaintance and some This great and firm success in the most difficult friendships. All the learned seemed to conspire society in the world is not to be accounted for, in showing me instances of regard. The great either by the literary merits of Hume, or in the ladies were not wanting to a man so highly in manner Madame d'Epinay explains it. There fashion and, having now contracted the circle of might be something in the present want of a my acquaintance, I live tolerably at my ease. Ilion." There was much in the admiration of have even thoughts of settling at Paris for the rest of my life; but I am sometimes frightened with the idea that it is not a scene suited to the languor of old age. I then think of retiring to a provincial town, or returning to Edinburgh, or — but it is not worth while to form projects about the matter. D'Alembert and I talk very seriously of taking a journey to Italy together; and, if Lord Hertford leave France soon, this journey may probably have place."-Vol. ii., p. 268.

:

the metaphysician and historian. His skepticism was better still, and, of course, the more valued as coming from benighted England. But, after all, we can well believe that these only gave the needful standing-place. His success subsequently is at all events very much to be attributed to the same qualities that made him the favorite of his little society at home. The "Honest David Hume" of Dr. Carlyle and the Edinburgh club, was the "bon David" of the French salons. His unselfish, kindly He has plainly schooled himself into moderation, nature, the sincerity of his friendships, the goodand we might trust his own report as not over-ness of his temper, were the qualities that won stated. But we have his success recorded by him love and esteem everywhere, and in that overother pens not liable to exaggeration; spoken to refined society there was a charm in the unaffected

simplicity, and perhaps a little amusement from the very awkwardness of person, manner, and language, of the "gros et grand philosophe."

Hume, however, enjoyed his Parisian triumph for two years of unabated brilliancy, and departed amidst the regrets and solicitations to return, of all that was distinguished in French society. He brought with him to England one still greater "lion" than himself.

Rousseau, not so much by reason of his great genies as by dint of a diseased and monstrous vanity, a little persecution, which he courted, an affectation of eccentric simplicity and shunning the public gaze, was in truth at that moment the most famous "lion" in Europe. Hume writes to Blair from Paris:

"It is impossible to express or imagine the enthusiasm of this nation in his favor. As I am supposed to have him in my custody, all the world, especially the great ladies, tease me to be introduced to him. I have had rouleaus thrust into my hand, with earnest applications that I would prevail on him to accept of them. I am persuaded that, were I to open here a subscription with his consent, I should receive £50,000 in a fortnight. The second day after his arrival, he slipped out early in the morning to take a walk in the Luxembourg gardens. The thing was known soon after. I am strongly solicited to prevail on him to take another walk, and then to give warning to my friends. Were the public to be informed, he could not fail to have many thousand spectators. People may talk of ancient Greece as they please; but no nation was ever so fond of genius as this, and no person ever so much engaged their attention as Rousseau. Voltaire and everybody else are quite eclipsed by him.

"I am sensible that my connexions with him add to my importance at present. Even his maid La Vasseur, who is very homely and very awkward, is more talked of than the Princess of Morocco or the Countess of Egmont, on account of her fidelity and attachment towards him. His very dog, who is no better than a collie, has a name and reputation in the world."-Vol. ii., p.

299.

In a letter from London he tells Blair, "the philosophers of Paris foretold to me that I could not conduct him to Calais without a quarrel; but I think I could live with him all my life in mutual friendship and esteem." (Vol. ii., p. 310.) One of the philosophers" who foresaw the event was the Baron d'Holbach, who told Hume, as he was leaving Paris, "Vous ne connaissez pas l'homme. Je vous le dis franchement, vous allez réchauffer un serpent dans votre sein." Morellet, to whom we owe the anecdote, adds that, when news of the quarrel arrived three weeks afterwards, none of the party at d'Holbach's table, Grimm, Diderot, Saint Lambert, Helvetius, &c., were at all surprised. (Morellet, Mém., chap. v.)

with the rude and boisterous elements, such as perpetually disturb this lower world." (Vol. ii., p. 314.) In that morbid sensibility of his nature, lay an abundant punishment for the evils inflicted upon others by the most engrossing and exclusive selfishness and a vanity already nearly approaching to madness.

After Hume's arrival in London he acted for a year as under secretary of state to Mr. Conway, and then retired finally to Edinburgh. "I returned," he says, "in 1769, very opulent, (for I possessed a revenue of £1000 a year,) healthy, and though somewhat stricken in years, with the prospect of enjoying long my ease and of seeing the increase of my reputation." How easily he fell back into his old haunts and habits, we learn from a letter to Sir Gilbert Elliot, 16th October, 1769:

"I have been settled here two months, and am here body and soul, without casting the least thought of regret to London, or even to Paris. I think it improbable that I shall ever in my life cross the Tweed, except perhaps a jaunt to the north of England for health or amusement. I live still, and must for a twelvemonth, in my old house in James' Court, which is very cheerful, and even elegant, but too small to display my great talent for cookery, the science to which I intend to addict the remaining years of my life. I have just now lying on the table before me, a receipt for making soupe à la reine, copied with my own hand: for beef and cabbage, (a charming dish,) and old mutton and old claret, nobody excels me. I make also sheep-head broth, in a manner that Mr. Keith speaks of it for eight days after; and the Duc de Nivernois would bind himself apprentice to my lass to learn it. I have already sent a challenge to David Moncreif: you will see that in a twelvemonth he will take to the writing of history, the field I have deserted; for as to giving of dinners, he can now have no further pretensions. I should have made a very bad use of my abode in Paris, if I could not get the better of a mere provincial like him. All my friends encourage me in this ambition; as thinking it will redound very much to my honor."-Vol. ii., p. 431.

Of the last part of Hume's life there is not much to notice. He found occupation in building a house; and St. David's Street, in the oldest part of the New Town of Edinburgh, is understood to have derived its name as well as its beginning from "le bon David.” He took some interest in public affairs, but much more in the education of his nephews, and the affairs of all his friends. He wrote a friendly review of Henry's praiseworthy attempt at a new fashion of history, and welcomed Gibbon's first volume as likely to redeem the character of the "declining literature of England." He enjoyed life; but made no more efforts. He had run the race and won the prize of his ambition. Like the wedding in the last act of a comedy, the Mr. Burton has passed rapidly over the Rous- return to Edinburgh with a fortune of £1000 seau adventures, and though we do not praise him a year and a sufficiency of reputation is the termitherefore, and think the subject deserved more nation of the action. His life had been successful prominence in a life of Hume, we are compelled to in all its objects beyond his highest expectation, imitate his example. The letters written at the and he could now afford to withdraw. He was time establish beyond dispute the zealous and deli-"somewhat stricken in years;" fat and addicted cate sympathy felt by Hume for his unfortunate to fat living; but he might have taken his mutton companion; though they prove also a somewhat and claret for many years, had he not been asexcessive resentment at Rousseau's ingratitude. Hume himself has described him as "like a man who was stript not only of his clothes but of his skin, and turned out in that situation to combat

burgh," (1825,) that Hume's house was that at the south*It appears from Mr. Chambers' "Traditions of Edinwest angle of St. Andrew's Square, with the entrance in St. David's Street.