"
[7] Burton, _Life_, vol. i. p. 109.
CHAPTER II.
LATER YEARS: THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
In 1744, Hume's friends had endeavoured to procure his nomination to the
Chair of "Ethics and pneumatic philosophy"[8] in the University of
Edinburgh. About this matter he writes to his friend William Mure:--
"The accusation of heresy, deism, scepticism, atheism, &c., &c.,
&c. was started against me; but never took, being bore down by the
contrary authority of all the good company in town."
If the "good company in town" bore down the first three of these
charges, it is to be hoped, for the sake of their veracity, that they
knew their candidate chiefly as the very good company that he always
was; and had paid as little attention, as good company usually does, to
so solid a work as the _Treatise_. Hume expresses a naive surprise, not
unmixed with indignation, that Hutcheson and Leechman, both clergymen
and sincere, though liberal, professors of orthodoxy, should have
expressed doubts as to his fitness for becoming a professedly
presbyterian teacher of presbyterian youth. The town council, however,
would not have him, and filled up the place with a safe nobody.
In May, 1746, a new prospect opened. General St. Clair was appointed to
the command of an expedition to Canada, and he invited Hume, at a week's
notice, to be his secretary; to which office that of judge advocate was
afterwards added.
Hume writes to a friend: "The office is very genteel, 10_s_.
Pages:
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41