DAVID HUME

Born in Edinburgh, Hume spent his childhood at Ninewells, his family's modest estate in the border lowlands. He came from a “good family” (MOL 2)—socially well connected but not wealthy. His father died just after David's second birthday, leaving him and his elder brother and sister.

Katherine Falconer Hume realized that David was uncommonly precocious, so when his older brother went up to Edinburgh University, Hume went with him, although he was only 10 or 11. There he studied Latin and Greek, read widely in history and literature, ancient and modern philosophy, and also did some mathematics and natural philosophy—what we now call natural science.

The education David received, both at home and at the university, aimed at training pupils to a life of virtue regulated by stern Scottish Calvinist strictures. Prayers and sermons were prominent aspects of his home and university life. At some point, Hume read The Whole Duty of Man, a widely circulated Anglican devotional tract that details our duties to God, our fellow human beings, and ourselves.

Hume's family thought him suited for a legal career, but he found the law “nauseous”, preferring to read classical texts, especially Cicero. He decided to become a “Scholar and Philosopher”, and followed a rigorous program of reading and reflection for three years until “there seem'd to be open'd up to me a new Scene of Thought” (HL 3.2). The intensity of developing his philosophical vision precipitated a psychological crisis in the isolated scholar.

The crisis eventually passed, and Hume remained intent on articulating his “new Scene of Thought”. As a second son, his inheritance was meager, so he moved to France, where he could live cheaply, and finally settled in La Flèche, a sleepy village in Anjou best known for its Jesuit college where Descartes and Mersenne had studied a century before. Here he read French and other continental authors, especially Malebranche, Dubos, and Bayle, and occasionally baited the Jesuits with arguments attacking their beliefs. By this time, Hume had not only rejected the religious beliefs with which he was raised, but was also opposed to organized religion in general, an opposition that remained constant throughout his life. In 1734, when he was only 23, he began writing A Treatise of Human Nature.

Hume returned to England in 1737 to ready the Treatise for the press. To curry favor with Joseph Butler (1692–1752), he “castrated” his manuscript, deleting his controversial discussion of miracles, along with other “nobler parts” (HL 6.2). Book I, “Of the Understanding”, and Book II, “Of the Passions”, appeared anonymously in 1739. The next year saw the publication of Book III, “Of Morals” as well as his anonymous “Abstract” of Books I and II.

The Treatise was no literary sensation, but it didn't fall “deadborn from the press” (MOL 6), as Hume disappointedly described its reception. Despite his surgical deletions, it attracted enough of “a Murmour among the Zealots” (MOL 6) to fuel his lifelong reputation as an atheist and a sceptic. When he applied for the Chair of Ethics and Pneumatical (“Mental”) Philosophy at Edinburgh in 1745, his reputation provoked vocal and ultimately successful opposition. Six years later, he stood for the Chair of Logic at Glasgow, only to be turned down again. Hume never held an academic post.

In 1745, he accepted a position as a young nobleman's tutor, only to discover that his charge was insane. A year later he became secretary to his cousin, Lieutenant General James St Clair, eventually accompanying him on an extended diplomatic mission in Austria and Italy.

In 1748, An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding appeared, covering the central ideas of Book I of the Treatiseand his discussion of liberty and necessity from Book II. He also included material he had excised from the Treatise. In 1751, he published An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, a “recasting” of Book III of theTreatise, which he described as “incomparably the best” of all his work (MOL 10). More essays, the Political Discourses, appeared in 1752, and Hume's correspondence reveals that a draft of the Dialogues concerning Natural Religion was also underway at this time.

An offer to serve as Librarian to the Edinburgh Faculty of Advocates gave Hume the opportunity to begin another project, a History of England, using the law library's excellent resources. Published in six volumes between 1754 and 1762, his History was a bestseller well into the next century, finally giving him the financial independence he had long sought. But even as a librarian, Hume's reputation as an atheist and sceptic dogged him. One of his orders for “indecent Books” prompted an unsuccessful move for his dismissal and excommunication from the Kirk. Friends and publishers persuaded him to suppress some of his more controversial writings on religion during his lifetime.

In 1763, Hume accepted a position as private secretary to the British Ambassador to France. During his three-year stay in Paris, he became Secretary to the Embassy, and eventually its chargé d'affaires. He became the rage of the Parisian salons, enjoying the conversation and company of famous European intellectuals. He was known for his love of good food and wine, as well as his enjoyment of the attentions and affections of women.

Hume returned to Edinburgh in 1769. He built a house in Edinburgh's New Town, and spent his autumnal years quietly and comfortably, dining and conversing with friends, not all of whom were “studious and literary”, for he also found that his “company was not unacceptable to the young and careless” (MOL 21). He spent considerable time revising his works for new editions of his Essays and Treatises, which contained his collected Essays, the two Enquiries, A Dissertation on the Passions, and The Natural History of Religion, but —significantly—not A Treatise of Human Nature.

In 1775, Hume was diagnosed with intestinal cancer. Before his death in 1776, he arranged for the posthumous publication of his most controversial work, the Dialogues concerning Natural Religion, and composed a brief autobiography, “My Own Life”. Although there was much curiosity about how “the great infidel” would face his death, his friends agreed that he prepared himself with the same peaceful cheer that characterized his life.