In 1763, he attended the Earl of Hertford on his embas sy to Paris, where he was loaded with great civilities. He expresses himself highly pleased with the politeness and information which characterised the society of that metro polis.
In 1766 he returned to England, and then to Edinburgh. On this occasion he brought with him the celebrated Rous seau, who was exposed to some trouble in Switzerland and France, for the opinions which he had published on reli gious subjects, and had it in contemplation to take up his abode in a retired situation in England. Mr Hume, ad miring his genius, and attached to him by fellow feeling as a free-thinker, exerted himself to provide for his comfort. But the morbid sensibility of Rosseau disappointed every scheme of kindness that could be adopted. He conceived himself to be neglected by the world, and was prone to sus pect his best friends of intending to undermine his inter ests, and subject bins to ridicule and scorn. Mr Hume soon perceived the troublesome temper of his friend ; yet he treated him with great tenderness, making allowance for an excess of natural irritability, heightened by a severe bodily disorder under which he laboured. He even found that one of his complaints, that of extreme poverty, was an entirely false pretence, held out for exciting the interest of others. These frailties. Mr Hume deplored, hut did not cease to do what lay in his power to serve him. At last Rousseau suspected Mr Hume of being the author of a very improper sarcastic letter, which was circulated in the name of the King of Prussia, as addressed to Rousseau, and was the work of Mr Horace Walpole. Suspicions of all kinds accumulated in his gloomy mind, till they burst forth in a storm of invective in the form of a long letter to Hume, To this Hume published a reply by the advice of the Pa risian literati, though contrary to that of Mr Walpole, who thought Rousseau's letter a sufficient answer to itself, and the whole business unworthy of notice. Nothing could have rendered it necessary to answer an effusion so absurd, and so evidently the offspring of disease, except the cele brity of Rousseau, the interest which his admirers took in every thing he did and felt, and their disposition to vindi cate the most far-fetched of his insinuations as the dictates of sentiment and sagacity, as to reiterate with zeal his re proachful complaints against other less favourite charac ters. This friendly connection was thus inevitably dissolv ed. Every part of it bore testimony to the humanity, ten derness, and sincere friendship of Mr Hume, who, far from neglecting to make due allowances, seems to have exceed ed the ordinary limits of human patience.
In 1767, he was invited by Mr Conway to be under secretary of state ; a situation which he accepted and held till 1769, when he returned to Edinburgh.
In 1775, his health began to decline. He was attacked with a disorder in his bowels, which gradually increased, and which he perceived at last, at the time that he drew up his short account of his life, to be mortal and incurable. But he continued his former occupations and amusements, and enjoyed unabated good spirits both in his private studies and in company. He lived in a house in James's court in Edinburgh, surrounded by the friends whom he most highly valued. The literary society of Edinburgh at this time contained a few men of the first genius and talent, along with many other persons who made the various ob jects of liberal study their principal delight. Dr Robert son, principal of the university, the historian, was one of the most eminent, and notwithstanding the wide difference of opinion which existed between him and flume on the most important subjects, yet as all hope of proselytism on either side was cut off, they avoided all disputes which tended to agitate the passions, and by mutual consent en joyed the pleasure and improvement, which in other re spects they were fitted to impart to one another. The
zeal of Dr Blair prevented him from being equally cir cumspect ; and Hume found himself obliged to intimate to that worthy clergyman the necessity of abstaining from all topics which implied serious differences sentiment, if they were ever to enjoy one another's society. This is decidedly, though delicately, expressed in the letter which he wrote to him, after the perusal of the work of Dr Campbell on Miracles, which Dr Blair had sent to him. Dr. Joseph Black, the celebrated professor of chemistry, and Dr Adam Smith, were among the most intimate of his friends. The latter, however, was now engaged in the composition of that work which has associated his name, in an indelible manner, with the great interests of society, his Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Na tions, and lived in a state of retirement with his mother at Kirkcaldy, a town on the opposite shore of the Frith of Forth. This separation was vexatious to Hume, who often ineffectually urged his friend to take up his residence in Edinburgh. They had both written on the origin of moral ideas ; they had embraced different opinions, and found it interesting to make the discussions implied in them part of the subject of their conversation. They were both ready to enter on any subject to which the ingenuity of either was directed, and a delightful diversity of topics was un doubtedly suggested by the fates, characters, and all the memorabilia of many literary friends, whom, on former oc casions, and in different parts of the country and of Eu rope, they had known. Lord Kames, Mr Smellie, Allan Ramsay the painter, (son of the Scottish poet,) were also among the number of the literati who, in the days of Flume, adorned the circle of this metropolis. The manners of literary men were particularly easy, and they had the cha racter of great frankness and ready accessibility. No cause of political enmity operated as a source of division ; differences of religious opinion were tempered in their ex pression by good manners ; the facility of intercourse was not obstructed by affectation, or a harsh incommodious eti quette ; literary controversies and private debates were managed without occasion of offence. If any excess ex isted, it seems to have been on the side of familiarity, which admitted of an indulgence in a coarse species of raillery. From this school issued the following curious sentiment, to be found in Lord Kames's Art of Thinking: You are a fool, you dream, and such like, are expressions we may easily bear from friends. Among free spirits I love freedom. Let the words go the full length of the thought. In a manly society, familiarity is agreeable, be cause it has nothing effeminate or ceremonious." These manners may be consistent with correctness when of spon taneous origin ; but when recommended and studied, they become flat and unmeaning. Familiarity degenerates into insipidity, and those who have indulged it begin to envy the ceremony which, though at first stiff and forbidding, preserves mutual respect, and obviates the cloying influ ence of extreme freedom. Men oscillate from one incon venient bias to another, and those who can do it without going far into either extreme are the most happy. Such, in general, is the literary society of Edinburgh. Sober convivial clubs of men of taste and genius have at different times been formed, some of which have been supported with much greater steadiness than the precarious nature of such institutions renders generally practicable. They are soon broken up by the admittance of unaccommodating characters, and on the other hand, they are apt to lose the stamp of liberality, when conducted on a principle of fasti dious selection. It is therefore chiefly by a quick succes sion of them, formed by the buoyant spirit of liberal socia= lity readily surmounting occasional causes of separation, that they prove agreeable and useful.