294
to separate your particular from the common cause
of the church and country, which, as it hath been the
mean of your particular restitution, so is it the only
mean to maintain you in this estate, and to make it
sure and firm."
During the subsequent short period of this earl's
life Hume seems to have retained his confidence,
and to have acted the part of a faithful and judicious
adviser. After Angus death, which took place in
1588, it is probable that he lived in retirement. Ac-
cordingly, we do not find any further notice of him
till he appeared as an author in 1605.
One of King James' most favourite projects was
the union of the kingdoms of England and Scotland,
and soon after his accession to the English throne
commissioners were appointed to consider the grounds
upon which this object could be safely and advantage-
ously attained. It would altogether exceed our limits
were we to give even a faint outline of the proceed-
ings of these commissioners, and it is the less neces-
sary as their deliberations did not lead to the desired
result. The subject, however, met with the attention
of the most learned of our countrymen. The first
work written on this subject was from the pen of
Robert Pont, one of the most respectable clergymen
of his day, and a senator of the College of Justice,
while ecclesiastics were permitted to hold that office.
His work, which was published in 1604, is in the
form of a dialogue between three imaginary person-
ages—Irenæus, Polyhistor, and Hospes, and is now
chiefly interesting as containing some striking re-
marks on the state of the country and the obstacles
to the administration of justice. Pont was followed
by David Hume, our author, who published next year
his treatise De Unione Insulæ Britannia, of which
Bishop Nicholson only says that "it is written in a
clear Latin style, such as the author was eminent for,
and is dedicated to the king: it shows how great an
advantage such a union would bring to the island in
general, and in particular to the several nations and
people of England and Scotland, and answers the
objections against the change of the two names into
that of Britain—the alteration of the regal style in
writs and processes of law—the removal of the parlia-
ment and other courts into England," &c. The first
part only of this work of Hume's was published.
Bishop Nicholson mentions that a MS. of the second
part was in Sir Robert Sibbald's collection, and
Wodrow also possessed what he considered a very
valuable copy of it.
In the year 1608 Hume commenced a correspond-
ence on the subject of Episcopacy and Presbytery
with James Law, then Bishop of Orkney, and after-
wards promoted to the archiepiscopal see of Glasgow.
This epistolary warfare took its rise in a private con-
versation between Mr. Hume and the bishop, when
he came to visit the presbytery of Jedburgh in that
year. The subject presented by much too large a
field to be exhausted at a private meeting, and ac-
cordingly supplied materials for their communica-
tions for about three years. But here again we are
left to lament that so little of it has been preserved.
Calderwood has collected a few of the letters, but
the gaps are so frequent, and consequently so little
connection is kept up, that they would be entirely
uninteresting to a general reader. In 1613 Hume
began a correspondence of the same nature with
Bishop Cowper on his accepting the diocese of Gal-
loway. The bishop set forth an apology for him-
self, and to this Hume wrote a reply, which, how-
ever, was not printed, as it was unfavourable to
the views of the court. Cowper answered his
statements in his Dicaiology, but printed only such
parts of Hume's argument as could be most easily
refuted. To this Hume once more replied at great
length.
Shortly before this period he undertook the His-
tory of the House of Wedderburn, (written) by a Son
of the Family, in the year 1611"—a work which has
hitherto remained in manuscript. "It has some-
times grieved me," he remarks, in a dedication to
the Earl of Home and to his own brother, "when
I have been glancing over the histories of our coun-
try, to have mention made so seldom of our ances-
tors—scarce above once or twice—and that too very
shortly and superficially; whereas they were always
remarkable for bravery, magnanimity, clemency,
liberality, munificence, hospitality, fidelity, piety in
religion, and obedience to their prince; and indeed
there never was a family who had a greater love and
regard for their country, or more earnestly devoted
themselves to, or more frequently risked their
lives for, its service. It ought, in a more particular
manner, to grieve you that they have been so long
buried in oblivion; and do you take care that they
be so no more. I give you, as it were, the prelude,
or lay the ground-work of the history; perhaps a pen
more equal to the task, or at least who can do it
with more decency, will give it the finishing stroke."
He does not enter into a minute inquiry into the
origin of the family, a species of antiquarianism of
which it must be confessed our Scottish historians
are sufficiently fond:—"My intention," he says,
"does not extend farther than to write those things
that are peculiar to the house of Wedderburn." The
work begins with " David, first laird of Wedder-
burn," who appears to have lived about the end of
the fourteenth century, and concludes with an ac-
count of the earlier part of his brother's life.
During the latter period of his life Hume appears
to have devoted himself almost entirely to literary
pursuits. He had appeared before the world as a
poet in his Lusus Poetici, published in 1605, and
afterwards incorporated into the excellent collection
entitled Deliciæ Poetarum Scotorum, edited by Dr.
Arthur Johnston. He seems to have added to his
poetical works when years and habits of study might
be supposed to have cooled his imaginative powers.
When Prince Henry died he gave vent to his grief
in a poem entitled Henrici Principis fusta, which,
Wodrow conjectures, was probably sent to Sir James
Semple of Beltrees, then a favourite at court, and by
whom it is not improbable that it was shown to his
majesty. A few years afterwards (1617) he wrote
his Regi Suo Graticulatio—a congratulatory poem on
the king's revisiting his native country. In the same
year he prepared (but did not publish) a prose work
under the following title, " Cambdenia; id est, Examen
nonnullorum a Gulielmo Cambdeno in 'Britannia'
sua positorum, praecipue quæ ad irrisionem Scoticæ
gentis, et eorum et Pictorum falsam originem." "In
a very short preface to his readers," says Wodrow,
"Mr. Hume observes that nothing more useful to
this island was ever proposed, than the union of the
two islands, and scarce ever any proposal was more
opposed ; witness the insults in the House of Com-
mons, and Paget's fury, rather than speech, against
it, for which he was very justly fined. After some
other things to the same purpose, he adds, that Mr.
Cambden hath now in his Britannia appeared on
the same side, and is at no small labour to extol to
the skies England and his Britons, and to depress
and expose Scotland—how unjustly he does so is
Mr. Hume's design in this work." Cambden's asser-
tions were also noticed by William Drummond in
his Nuntius Scoto-Britannus, and in another of his
works more professedly levelled against him, entitled
A Pair of Spectacles for Cambden.