The town says that even his bed was not safe for him, though
his wife was cousin-german to my antagonist.
"'Twas vulgarly given out that the contest was between Deists and
Christians, and when the news of my success came to the playhouse,
the whisper rose that the Christians were defeated. Are you not
surprised that we could keep our popularity, notwithstanding this
imputation, which my friends could not deny to be well founded?"
It would seem that the "good company" was less enterprising in its
asseverations in this canvass than in the last.
The first volume of the _History of Great Britain, containing the reign
of James I. and Charles I._, was published in 1754. At first, the sale
was large, especially in Edinburgh, and if notoriety _per se_ was Hume's
object, he attained it. But he liked applause as well as fame and, to
his bitter disappointment, he says:--
"I was assailed by one cry of reproach, disapprobation, and even
detestation: English, Scotch, and Irish, Whig and Tory, Churchman
and Sectary, Freethinker and Religionist, Patriot and Courtier,
united in their rage against the man who had presumed to shed a
generous tear for the fate of Charles I. and the Earl of Strafford;
and after the first ebullitions of their fury were over, what was
still more mortifying, the book seemed to fall into oblivion. Mr.
Millar told me that in a twelvemonth he sold only forty-five copies
of it.
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