author of the document, takes, even of that small portion of the mass of abuses of which he had occasion to complain. He neither stretched his eye to the whole of the subject, nor did he carry its vision to the bottom.' Tried by this standard, Mill's History of British India' possesses a very high degree of merit; ' has undoubtedly,' to borrow Lord Macaulay's words, 'great and rare merit.' And that merit consists in this. James Mill had studied legislative and political philosophy far more profoundly than any other historian has yet done; and his powerful and comprehensive mind, stretching its vision over the whole extent of his subject and also penetrating to the bottom of it, saw distinctly and described accurately all those objects, and those only, which were to serve as means to the end he had in view; namely, to convey correct and adequate ideas of the British empire in India, and of the transactions through which it was acquired.' The terms in which Mill and Macaulay respectively speak of Francis present an instructive example of what is meant by the words above quoted, that Mill's history is not sufficiently animated to attract those who read for amusement.' Mill's narrative of the disputes between Francis and Hastings is certainly not so amusing as that of Lord Macaulay. Mill is guarded in his conclusions, carefully weighes the evidence on both sides of a question, and would be most unlikely to make such an assertion as that his firm belief is that Francis was the author of the "Letters of Junius; " and that if the argument by which he has satisfied himself does not settle the question, there is an end of all reasoning on circumstantial evidence.' No doubt this is the sort of writing which attracts those who read for amusement.' Those who read for amuse

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ment like to be saved the trouble of thinking; and this is the sort of writing which performs that service for them. What if Francis should turn out-as he is very likely to do-not to be the author of the 'Letters of Junius?' In that case, according to Lord Macaulay, 'there is an end of all reasoning on circumstantial evidence.' But what does that mean? For the meaning or the purport of the words of some writers who at first sight appear to be very clear, when looked closely into, is found to be very far from clear.

ESSAY IV.

HUME.

THE results of an attempt, which has occupied much time, labour, and thought, to evolve historical truth from a careful and impartial weighing and sifting of evidence, have tended to demonstrate to me that to some cases, at least, the remark of Hume is applicable, that if truth be at all within the reach of human capacity it is certain it must lie very deep and abtruse.' It is very remarkable that Hume himself should have acted so little in conformity with the opinion he thus expressed. From his extreme carelessness or indifference as to the accuracy of his statements, I am inclined to think that there are few

1 Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, vol. i. p. 3. It is necessary, in justice to Hume, to say that I do not find these words in the new form into which he cast his Treatise of Human Nature, under the titles of An Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding, An Inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, and The Natural History of Religion. These form the 2nd volume of his Essays and Treatises, a new edition of which, in two vols., was published at Edinburgh in 1825. In an advertisement prefixed to the 2nd volume, the Treatise of Human Nature is described as a 'juvenile work which the author never acknowledged;' and the advertisement concludes thus: Henceforth the author desires that the following pieces may alone be regarded as containing his philosophical sentiments and principles.' I am inclined to think that the following words in the 4th section of the Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding (Hume's Essays, vol. ii. p. 31) correspond to the words quoted in the text from the Treatise of Human Nature, 'It must certainly be allowed that Nature has kept us at a great distance from all her secrets;' and that Hume, while he thought that philosophical truth lay very deep, either thought that historical truth lay on the surface, or was indifferent about it.

modern works of any pretensions that contain more examples of false generalisation than his. This remark is by no means confined to his treatment of modern, particularly English, history. His essays contain innumerable instances of conclusions drawn from false premises with regard to ancient as well as modern history.

Nor was this confined to historical subjects. Some of his essays contain strange contradictions and inconsistencies. Thus, in his section on 'The Reason of Animals,' though the beginning of the section is devoted to showing that animals, as well as men, learn many things from experience, and infer that the same events will always follow from the same causes,' towards the end of the same section he says: Though the instinct be different, yet still it is an instinct which teaches a man to avoid the fire, as much as that which teaches a bird with such exactness the art of incubation and the whole economy and order of its nursery.'1 A man avoids the fire, not by instinct, but by an act of reasoning from experience. Instinct does not tell him, nor does he know, that fire will burn him till he has made the experiment, as is expressed in the common proverb, a burnt child dreads the fire.' Consequently this is not a case of instinct in men, nor is it in beasts. A burnt cat dreads the fire and avoids it in future, as well as a burnt child. A burnt moth is destroyed in making the experiment, if not with the fire, with the candle; consequently, never profits by that experiment. Hume's essay on The Original Contract' affords another example of just observations in startling contrast with assertions unsupported by any evidence and involving many assumptions and contradictions.

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1 Hume's Essays, vol. ii. p. 108, 2 vols. 8vo. Edinburgh, 1825.

we can reason.

In his essayOf Civil Liberty' Hume says: 'I am apt to entertain a suspicion that the world is still too young to fix many general truths in politics which will remain true to the latest posterity. We have not yet had experience of three thousand years; so that not only the art of reasoning is still imperfect in this science, as in all others, but we even want sufficient materials upon which It is not fully known what degree of refinement, either in virtue or vice, human nature is susceptible of, nor what may be expected of mankind from any great revolution in their education, customs, or principles. Machiavelli was certainly a great genius; but, having confined his study to the furious and tyrannical governments of ancient times, or to the little disorderly principalities of Italy, his reasonings, especially upon monarchical government, have been found extremely defective; and there scarcely is any maxim in his 'Prince' which subsequent experience has not entirely refuted.'1

David Hume was, like Machiavelli, a man of genius. His mind was one of great power and originality. He was a most acute and even subtle reasoner. It has been said that the object of his reasonings was not to attain truth, but to show that it was unattainable. I am inclined to think that his frequent failures in attaining truth are rather attributable to a bad habit he had acquired, through indolence, of carelessness or indifference about the accuracy of his facts. Indeed, those conclusions which are not true or are defective, like Machiavelli's, on political subjects, can often only be avoided by great labour and careful and accurate observation. We should not know, if it were not for the minutes of the proceedings 1 Hume's Essays, vol. i. p. 81, Edinburgh, 1825.