244 HUME. 



There is a long letter to Dr. Clephane anxiously desiring 

 his opinion upon the true causes of his l History ' having so 

 entirely failed, and indicating his own notion that this was 

 owing to his freedom in treating religious and ecclesiastical 

 subjects, but expressing his surprise that such a tone should 

 not rather have recommended his book to the favour of one 

 class and the hostility of another, than have made it sink into 

 oblivion and neglect. In a letter to Colonel Edmonstone he 

 treats the same disappointment in a more jocose manner, 

 indicating what he conceives to be the taste of the public, and 

 their fondness for worthless writings. 



" Edinburgh, 25th September, 1757. 



" I am engaged in writing a new volume of history from 

 the beginning of Henry VII. till the accession of James I. 

 It will probably be published in the winter after next. I 

 believe I shall write no more history, but proceed directly to 

 attack the Lord's Prayer, and the Ten Commandments, and 

 the Single Catechism, and to recommend suicide and adultery, 

 and persist until it shall please the Lord to take me to 

 himself. " Yours ever, 



"D. H." 



To ANDREW MILLAR, the Bookseller. 



" 12th April, 1755. 



" The second volume of my ' History' I can easily find a 

 way of conveying to you, when finished, and corrected, and 

 fairly copied. Perhaps I may be in London myself about 

 that time. I have always said to all my acquaintance, that if 

 the first volume bore a little of a Tory aspect, the second 

 would probably be as grateful to the opposite party. The 

 two first princes of the House of Stuart were certainly more 

 excusable than the two second. The constitution was in their 

 time very ambiguous and undetermined, and their parliaments 

 were in many respects refractory and obdurate. But Charles 

 the Second knew that he had succeeded to a very limited 

 monarchy. His Long Parliament was indulgent to him, and 

 even consisted almost entirely of Royalists, yet he could not 

 be quiet nor contented with a legal authority. I need not 



