I EARLY LIFE 5 



" weakness of mind " in a man who not only 

 showed himself to be an intellectual athlete, but 

 who had an eminent share of practical wisdom 

 and tenacity of purpose. One would like to know, 

 however, when it was that Mrs. Hume committed 

 herself to this not too flattering judgment of her 

 younger son. For as Hume reached the mature 

 age of four and thirty, before he obtained any 

 employment of sufficient importance to convert 

 the meagre pittance of a middling laird's younger 

 brother into a decent maintenance, it is not im- 

 probable that a shrewd Scots wife may have 

 thought his devotion to philosophy and poverty to 

 be due to mere infirmity of purpose. But she 

 lived till 1749, long enough to see more than the 

 dawn of her son's literary fame and official im- 

 portance, and probably changed her mind about 

 " Davie's " force of character. 



David Hume appears to have owed little to 

 schools or universities. There is some evidence 

 that he entered the Greek class in the University 

 of Edinburgh in 1723 when he was a boy of 

 twelve years of age but it is not known how long 

 his studies were continued, and he did not gradu- 

 ate. In 1727, at any rate, he was living at 

 Ninewells, and already possessed by that love of 

 learning and thirst for literary fame, which, as 

 " My Own Life " tells us, was the ruling passion 

 of his life and the chief source of his enjoyments. 

 A letter of this date, addressed to his friend 



