HUME, DAVID: Philosopher and historian; b. in Edinburgh Apr. 26 (o.s.), 1711; d. there Aug. 25, 1776. He was of good Scotch descent, his father tracing his ancestry to Lord Home of Douglas. His mother was "a woman of singular merit." In 1723 he appears to have been a student at the University of Edinburgh, but he was not graduated. He halted in his choice between several callings-law, mercantile life, and that of the scholar and philosopher. His first work was a Treatise of Human Nature (vols. i., ii., London, 1739; vol. iii., 1740). For a time he turned aside to political subjects and published Essays, Moral and Political (2 vols., Edinburgh, 1741-4~; final ed., 1 vol., 1788), which met with great success. In 1744, owing to opposition on theological grounds, he failed of election to the chair of ethics and pneumatic philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. He next published his Philosophical Essays concerning Human Understanding (London, 1748; 2d ed., 1750), and from 1749 to 1751 was engaged upon his Dialogues on Natural Religion (not published until 1779), Inquiry concerning the Principlesof Morals (1751), and Political Discourses (Edinburgh, 1752; Fr. transl., Amsterdam, 1754). His History of Great Britain appeared in 2 vols. at Edinburgh, 1754-57 (with autobiography and final corrections, 8 vols., 1778), and the Natural History of Religion in 1757. From 1758 Hume lived in London, Paris (17637, where he was a member of the English embassy, and extremely popular with educated men and women), London again (1767-69), and in St. David's Street (named after him), Edinburgh, from 1769.

Hume's early fame as a historian has been overshadowed by his philosophical writings . The principal subjects of these are the human understanding, liberty and necessity, the principles of morals, immortality, the idea of cause, theism, and miracles as re-

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lated to credibility and the order of nature. Following Locke, he turned from speculation to experience and thus entered the path of criticism. In his theory of knowledge he divided perceptions into impressions -the original sensations and reflections, which are therefore the more vivid-and ideas or thoughtsthe fainter and less vivid reproduction of the impressions. Thus the material for all our ideas is derived from impressions. With Locke, he defines the will as " the internal impression we feel and are conscious of when we knowingly give rise to any new emotion of our body or new perception of our mind." Liberty is " a power of acting or not acting according to the determinations of the will." Moral necessity is of the same nature as physical necessity, although the operation of motives is extremely subtle and perhaps impossible completely to trace. Responsibility is, however, not destroyed; this depends not on the cause of the action, but on the disposition of the person. Goodness is necessary to the good man and in the highest degree to God. Immortality appears to have been left an open question. Neither the idea of immaterial substance nor the doctrine of personal identity, neither the nature of divine justice nor the incompatibility of the noble powers of man with the swift span of earthly existence proves that the soul survives death. All this is rendered still more precarious when Hume resolves the soul-i.e., the self-into a series of perceptions which, if removed by death, would annihilate the person. He traces the idea of cause neither to external objects, nor to reflection, nor to the senses, but to an experience of unvarying succession or custom. This idea, which has exerted a profound influence on later thought, was completed 'by Kant, who showed the nature of the necessity which the human mind has associated with causality. On the subject of theism Hume finds no sure footing. Neither cosmology, nor teleology, nor the moral argument is adequate as a ground of belief in God. Polytheism appears to him not a stage in the progressive apprehension of the divine; " the gods of the polytheists are no better than the elves and fairies of our ancestors." Concerning miracles conceived of as " violation of the laws of nature . . . by a particular volition of the Deity," he argues that no amount of testimony would render them credible. " There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men of such unqualified goodness, education, and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity as to place them beyond all suspicion of any design to deceive others; of such credit and reputation in the eyes of mankind as to have a great deal to lose in case of their being detected in any falsehood; and at the same time attesting facts, performed in such a public manner, and so celebrated a part of the world, as to render detection unavoidable; all which circumstances are requisite to give us a full assurance of the testimony of men." This argument of Hume has force against the scholastic idea of miracles, but not against the view of Augustine. As a psychologist Hume was unsurpassed by any who preceded him. He was a philosopher, but not a theologian, and his fame justly

rests not as earlier on his historical or political writings, but on his inquiry into the nature, the source, and the limitations of human knowledge. His skepticism is not thoroughgoing, but only relates to speculative metaphysics. Starting with experience, he allows no deviation from this as providing the content of intelligence. His significance for religion and theology lies not so much in his direct discussion of these subjects as in the view of man and the world involved in his philosophy. It would have been glory enough for him had he done nothing else than waken Kant from his "dogmatic slumbers." See Deism.

C. A. Beckwith.

Bibliography: A rich bibliography is in Baldwin, Dictionary, iii. 1, pp. 271-276. Sources for a life are his autobiography, prefixed to editions of the History and often reprinted separately; Private Correspondence of David Hume, Edinburgh, 1820; Letters of David Hume, ed. T. Murray, ib. 1841; Letters from Eminent Persona . .; to David Hume, ed. J. H. Burton, ib.1849; and Letters of David Hume to William Strahan, ed. G. B. Hill, Oxford, 1888. The standard life is J. Hill Burton, Life and Correspondence of David Hume, 2 vols., Edinburgh, 1846. Consult farther: The Introduction prefixed by T. H. Green to the ed. of Hume's Philosophical Works, London, 1882; W. Knight, in Philosophical Claaska for English Readers, Edinburgh, 1886; T. H. Huxley, in English Men of Letters, London, 1887; idem, Collected Essays, vol. vi., New York, 1894; H. Calderwood, in Famous Scots Series, Edinburgh, 1898; DNB, xxviii. 215-226, For discussions of his philosophy consult: G. Compayr6, La Philosophie de David Hume, Paris, 1873; J. McCosh, Scottish Philosophy, pp. 113-161, New York, 1875; G. von Gizyeki, Die Ethik David Hum", Breslau, 1878 ; L. Stephen, Hist. of English Thought in 18th Century, pp. 43 sqq. et passim, New York, 1881; J. Orr, David Hume and his Influence on Philosophy and Theology, 'Edinburgh, !1903; and the works on the hist. of philosophy by Erdmann, Ueberweg, and Windelband.