BOOK I. self called upon to offer any opinion, whether the new solution which Mr Home has given in the later editions of the Essays, be more free from objection, or better fitted to remove the difficulties attending this most intricate of questions, than the scheme which he at first proposed. The subject itself, we have the best grounds for believing, to be above the reach of the human understand "cool moments; consequently that it is not a delusion of na"ture, but of passion only. Candour I shall always esteem "essential in addressing the public, no less than in private dealings; and now I am happy in thinking, that morality "rests on a foundation that has no delusion in it—In "the second edition, however, there is another error that I "was not able to disentangle myself from. In the Essay of Liberty and Necessity, our notions of chance and contingency are held to be delusive; and consequently that so "far we are led by our nature to deviate from truth. It is a harsh doctrine, that we should be so led astray in any in 66 stance. As that doctrine never sat easy upon me, I dis"covered it also to be erroneous; and the error is corrected "in the present edition, where I hope it is made clearly out, "that the notion we have of chance and contingency, is en tirely conformable to the necessary chain of causes and ef"fects. And now, rejoice with me, my good reader, in being at last relieved from so many distressing errors." Preface to the third edition of Essays on the Principles of Mo rality and Natural Religion, &c. (Edinburgh, 1779). ing: (perhaps purposely intended by our Creator to impress man with a just sense of the limitation of the powers of his mind): and instead of straining our faculties in a vain endeavour to comprehend, explain and reconcile its contradictory phenomena, it were better at once to acquiesce in that conclusion which one of the most subtile of metaphysicians has himself drawn, after a full statement of all that with certainty could be affirmed on the question of Liberty and Necessity" These are mysteries which mere "natural and unassisted reason is very un"fit to handle; and whatever system she "embraces, she must find herself involved "in inextricable difficulties, and even con"tradictions, at every step which she takes "with regard to such subjects. To recon"cile the indifference and contingency of "human actions with prescience, or to de"fend absolute decrees, and yet free the Deity from being the author of sin, has "been found hitherto to exceed all the power of philosophy. Happy, if she be "thence sensible of her temerity, when she pries into these sublime mysteries; and leaving a scene so full of obscurities and 66 CHAP. V. BOOK I. perplexities, return, with suitable modes"ty, to her true and proper province, the "examination of common life; where she "will find difficulties enow to employ her inquiries, without launching into so bound"less an ocean of doubt, uncertainty and " contradiction *!” * DAVID HUME'S Essay on Liberty and Necessity.Essays and Treatises on several Subjects, vol. ii. OF LORD KAMES. BOOK II. CHAPTER I. Mr Home appointed a Judge.-His character in that ca- CHAP. I. Mr Home Judge. N February 1752, Mr Home was appointed one of the Judges of the Court of Ses- appointed a sion, and took his seat on the Bench on the 6th of that month, by the title of LORD KAMES. This promotion was attended with BOOK II. the general satisfaction of his country; as he stood high in the public esteem, both on the score of his abilities and knowledge of the laws, and his integrity and moral virtues * His charac ter in that capacity. As a judge, his opinions and decrees were dictated by an acute understanding, an ardent feeling of justice, and a perfect acquaintance with the jurisprudence of his country, which, notwithstanding the variety of pursuits in which his comprehensive mind had alternately found exercise, had always been his principal study, and the favourite object of his researches. Lord DESKFORD (fifth Earl of FINDLATER) to Lord KAMES, 11th February 1752: “ I have several letters saying, "that the country is greatly obliged to the Ministry for giving "them so good a Judge. It has been remarked, that, without "intervals of darkness, we should not be sensible of the bene"fit of light; and that, were it not for the bad weather with "which we are frequently visited, we should not have so "sensible a pleasure in the serenity of a fine day. If Ad"ministration were always to do what they ought, people "would say they only do their duty; but, like sagacious po"liticians, they often do wrong, to make us receive it as a "favour when they sometimes do right." |