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HUME, DAVID (1711-1776)
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See also:HUME, See also:DAVID (1711-1776) , See also:English philosopher, historian and See also:political economist, was See also:born at See also:Edinburgh, on the 26th of See also:April (O.S.) 1711. His See also:father, See also:Joseph Hume or See also:Home, a See also:scion of the See also:noble See also:house of Home of See also:Douglas (but see Notes and Queries, 4th sec% iv. 72), was owner of a small See also:estate in
See also:Berwickshire, on the See also:banks of the Whiteadder, called, from the See also:spring rising in front of the dwelling-house, Ninewells. David was the youngest of a See also:family of three, two sons and a daughter, who after the See also:early See also:death of the father were brought up with See also:great care and devotion by their See also:mother, the daughter of See also:Sir David See also:Falconer, See also:president of the See also:college of See also:justice.
Of Hume's early See also:education little is known beyond what he has himself stated in his See also:Life. He appears to have entered the See also:Greek classes of the university of Edinburgh in 1723, and, he tells us, " passed through the See also:ordinary course of education with success." From a See also:letter printed in See also:Burton's Life (i. 30-39), it appears that about 1726 Hume returned to Ninewells with a See also:fair knowledge of Latin, slight acquaintance with Greek and See also:literary tastes decidedly inclining to " books of reasoning and See also:philosophy, and to See also:poetry and the polite authors." We do not know, except by inference, to what studies he especially devoted himself. It is, however, clear that from his earliest years he began to speculate upon the nature of knowledge in the abstract, and its See also:concrete applications, as in See also:theology, and that with this See also:object he studied largely the writings of See also:Cicero and See also:Seneca and See also:recent English philosophers (especially See also:Locke, See also:Berkeley and See also: At this See also:time the intensity. of his intellectual activity in the See also:area opened up to him by Locke and Berkeley reduced him to a See also:state of See also:physical exhaustion. In these circumstances he determined to try the effect of See also:complete See also:change of See also:scene and occupation, and in 1734 entered a business house in See also:Bristol. In a few months he found " the scene wholly unsuitable " to him, and about the See also:middle of 1734 set out for See also:France, resolved to spend some years in quiet study. He visited See also:Paris, resided for a time at Rheims and then settled at La See also:Fleche, famous in the See also:history of philosophy as the school of See also:Descartes. His See also:health seems to have been perfectly restored, and during the three years of his stay in France his speculations were worked into systematic form in the See also:Treatise of Human Nature. In the autumn of 1737 he was in See also:London arranging for its publication and polishing it in preparation for the judgments of the learned. In See also:January 1730 appeared the first and second volumes of the
Treatise of Human Nature, being an See also:Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects, containing See also:book L. Of the Understanding, and book ii., Of the Passions. The third See also:Volume, containing book iii., Of Morals, was published in the following See also:year. The publisher of the first two volumes, See also: " being naturally of a cheerful and sanguine See also:temper, I very soon recovered the See also:blow, and prosecuted with great ardour my studies in the See also:country." This brief See also:notice, however, is not sufficient to explain the full significance of the event for Hume's own life. The work undoubtedly failed to do what its author expected from it; even the notice, otherwise not unsatisfactory, which it obtained in the History of the See also:Works of the Learned, then the See also:principal See also:critical See also:journal, did not in the least appreciate the true bearing of the Treatise on current discussions. Hume naturally expected that the See also:world would see as clearly as he did the connexion between the concrete problems agitating contemporary thought and the abstract principles on which their See also:solution depended. Accordingly he looked for opposition, and expected that, if his principles were received, a change in See also:general See also:light and amusing See also:style, showing Hume's usual keenness of conceptions of things would ensue. His disappointment at its I sight in some directions and his almost equal See also:blindness in others. reception was great; and though he never entirely relinquished his metaphysical speculations, though all that is of value in his later writings depends on the acute See also:analysis of human nature to which he was from the first attracted, one cannot but regret that his high See also:powers were henceforth withdrawn for the most See also:part from the See also:consideration of the See also:foundations of belief, and expended on its See also:practical applications. In later years he attributed his want of success to the immature style of his early exposition, to the rashness of a See also:young innovator in an old and well-established See also:province of literature. But this has little See also:foundation beyond the irritation of an author at his own failure to attract such See also:attention as he See also:deems his due. None of the principles of the Treatise is given up in the later writings, and no addition is made to them. Nor can the See also:superior See also:polish of the more mature productions counterbalance the concentrated vigour of the more youthful work. After the publication of the Treatise Hume retired to his See also:brother's house at Ninewells and carried on his studies, mainly in the direction of politics and political See also:economy. In 1741 he published the first volume of his Essays, which had a considerable and immediate success. A second edition was called for in the following year, in which also a second volume was published. These essays Butler, to whom he had sent a copy of his Treatise, but with whom he had failed to make See also:personal acquaintance, warmly commended. The philosophical relation between Butler and Hume is curious. So far as analysis of knowledge is concerned they are in See also:harmony, and Hume's sceptical conclusions regarding belief in matters of fact are the foundations on which Butler's See also:defence of See also:religion rests. Butler, however, retained, in spite of his destructive theory of knowledge, confidence in the rational proofs for the existence of See also:God, and certainly maintains what may be vaguely described as an a priori view of See also:conscience. Hume had the greatest respect for the author of the See also:Analogy, ranks him with Locke and Berkeley as an originator of the experimental method in moral See also:science, and in his specially theological essays, such as that on Particular See also:Providence and a Future State, has Butler's views specifically in mind. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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