Hume, David 1711-1776
Archival location guide — where this economist’s surviving papers are held, their notable correspondents, and key published sources.
Born 1711 · died 1776
David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist and essayist who is known for his highly influential system of empiricism, philosophical scepticism and metaphysical naturalism. Beginning with A Treatise of Human Nature (1739–40), Hume strove to create a naturalistic science of man that examined the psychological basis of human nature. Following John Locke, Hume rejected the existence of innate ideas, holding that all our ideas derive ultimately from impressions, but in his fork he distinguished relations of ideas, known a priori, from matters of fact, whose knowledge rests on experience. This places him in the empiricist tradition of Locke and George Berkeley, while drawing his experimental method from Francis Bacon.
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Correspondence, consisting of 525 letters to Hume, some from economists, and 159 letters of Hume, including those to Adam Smith and Francis Hutcheson. Also a small group of letters about Hume from just before and after his death, 1775-1776. Some manuscripts of verses, notes, memoranda and his published works, plus papers not in Hume’s hand. 13 bound volumes in all.
Hume papers, Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Notes and corrected proofs for some of his published works.
National Library of Scotland (NLS), MSS. 509, 732-734, 786, 1703.
His manuscript account, with copies of correspondence, of the quarrel with Rousseau.
N. L. S., MS. 5722.
A memorandum on Canadian paper money, with two related letters of 1765.
NLS, M S. 2619.
His diary of the 1746 military expedition to Port L'Orient. BL Add. MS. 36638.
Printed Material
The Letters of David Hume , ed. John Young Thomson Greig, 2 vols. ( Oxford, 1932).
The first volume has letters, 1727-1765, and the second 1766-1776.
New Letters of David Hume , ed. E. C. Mossner and R. Klibansky ( Oxford, 1954).
Includes the letters which have been discovered since Greig's volumes appeared.
David Hume, Writings on Economics , ed. E. Rotwein ( London, 1955).
A collection of Hume's writings from various sources which deal with economic questions.
New Palgrave ; ODNB; ESS VII 550; IESS VI 546.
Portraits: BL(P); NPG; SNPG; Edinburgh University.