David Hume was the greatest British philosopher of his era and one of the most important logical and analytic thinkers of all time. When Franklin met him in Scotland in 1759, Hume had already written the two seminal tracts, A Treatise of Human Nature and Essays Concerning Human Understanding, that are now considered among the most important works in the development of empirical thought, and he was completing the six-volume History of England that would make him rich and famous.
Franklin assiduously courted Hume to the colonial cause and shared with him an interest in language. When Hume berated him for coining new words, Franklin agreed to quit using the terms “colonize” and “unshakeable.” But he lamented that “I cannot but wish the usage of our tongue permitted making new words when we want them.” He also included in one of his letters a delightful tale of a Puritan dispute over a maypole, another illustration of his deftness at poking fun at religious tolerance. Although they would later disagree, Hume was impressed by Franklin. “America has sent us many good things, gold, silver, sugar, tobacco, indigo,” he wrote him. “But you are the first philosopher, and indeed the first great man of letters, for whom we are beholden to her.”
TO DAVID HUME, SEPTEMBER 27, 1760
Dear Sir,
I have too long postponed answering your obliging letter, a fault I will not attempt to excuse, but rather rely on your goodness to forgive it if I am more punctual for the future.
I am obliged to you for the favorable sentiments you express of the pieces sent you; though the volume relating to our Pennsylvania affairs was not written by me, nor any part of it, except the remarks on the proprietor’s estimate of his estate, and some of the inserted messages and reports of the assembly which I wrote when at home, as a member of committees appointed by the house for that service; the rest was by another hand. But though I am satisfied by what you say, that the Duke of Bedford was hearty in the scheme of the expedition, I am not so clear that others in the administration were equally in earnest in that matter. It is certain that after the Duke of Newcastle’s first orders to raise troops in the colonies, and promise to send over commissions to the officers, with arms, clothing, &c. for the men, we never had another syllable from him for 18 months; during all which time the army lay idle at Albany for want of orders and necessaries; and it began to be thought at least that if an expedition had ever been intended, the first design and the orders given, must, thro’ the multiplicity of business here at home, have been quite forgotten.
I am not a little pleased to hear of your change of sentiments in some particulars relating to America; because I think it of importance to our general welfare that the people of this nation should have right notions of us, and I know no one that has it more in his power to rectify their notions, than Mr. Hume. I have lately read with great pleasure, as I do every thing of yours, the excellent essay on the jealousy of commerce: I think it cannot but have a good effect in promoting a certain interest too little thought of by selfish man, and scarce ever mentioned, so that we hardly have a name for it; I mean the interest of humanity, or common good of mankind: but I hope particularly from that essay, an abatement of the jealousy that reigns here of the commerce of the colonies, at least so far as such abatement may be reasonable.
I thank you for your friendly admonition relating to some unusual words in the pamphlet. It will be of service to me. The pejorate, and the colonize, since they are not in common use here, I give up as bad; for certainly in writings intended for persuasion and for general information, one cannot be too clear, and every expression in the least obscure is a fault. The unshakeable too, though clear, I give up as rather low. The introducing new words where we are already possessed of old ones sufficiently expressive, I confess must be generally wrong, as it tends to change the language; yet at the same time I cannot but wish the usage of our tongue permitted making new words when we want them, by composition of old ones whose meanings are already well understood. The German allows of it, and it is a common practice with their writers. Many of our present English words were originally so made; and many of the Latin words. In point of clearness such compound words would have the advantage of any we can borrow from the ancient or from foreign languages. For instance, the word inaccessible, though long in use among us, is not yet, I dare say, so universally understood by our people as the word uncomeatable would immediately be, which we are not allowed to write. But I hope with you, that we shall always in America make the best English of this island our standard, and I believe it will be so. I assure you, it often gives me pleasure to reflect how greatly the audience (if I may so term it) of a good English writer will in another century or two be increased, by the increase of English people in our colonies.
My son presents his respects with mine to you and Dr. Monro. We received your printed circular letter to the members of the society, and purpose some time next winter to send each of us a little philosophical essay. With the greatest esteem I am, dear sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
TO DAVID HUME, MAY 19, 1762
Dear sir,
It is no small pleasure to me to hear from you that my paper on the means of preserving buildings from damage by lightning, was acceptable to the philosophical society. Mr. Russel’s proposals of improvement are very sensible and just. A leaden spout or pipe is undoubtedly a good conductor so far as it goes. If the conductor enters the ground just at the foundation, and from thence is carried horizontally to some well, or to a distant rod driven downright into the earth; I would then propose that the part under ground should be lead, as less liable to consume with rust than iron. Because if the conductor near the foot of the wall should be wasted, the lightning might act on the moisture of the earth, and by suddenly ratifying it occasion an explosion that may damage the foundation. In the experiment of discharging my large case of electrical bottles thro’a piece of small glass tube filled with water, the suddenly rarified water has exploded with a force equal, I think, to that of so much gunpowder; bursting the tube into many pieces, and driving them with violence in all directions and to all parts of the room. The shivering of trees into small splinters like a broom, is probably owing to this rarefaction of the sap in the longitudinal pores or capillary pipes in the substance of the wood. And the blowing-up of bricks or stones in a hearth, rending stones out of a foundation, and splitting of walls, is also probably an effect sometimes of rarified moisture in the earth, under the hearth, or in the walls. We should therefore have a durable conductor under ground, or convey the lightning to the earth at some distance.
It must afford Lord Mareschall a good deal of diversion to preside in a dispute so ridiculous as that you mention. Judges in their decisions often use precedents. I have somewhere met with one that is what the lawyers call a case in point. The church people and the Puritans in a country town, had once a bitter contention concerning the erecting of a maypole, which the former desired and the latter opposed. Each party endeavored to strengthen itself by obtaining the authority of the mayor, directing or forbidding a maypole. He heard their altercation with great patience, and then gravely determined thus; you that are for having no maypole shall have no maypole; and you that are for having a maypole shall have a maypole. Get about your business and let me hear no more of this quarrel. So methinks Lord Mareschal might say; you that are for no more damnation than is proportioned to your offences, have my consent that it may be so: and you that are for being damned eternally, God eternally damn you all, and let me hear no more of your disputes.
Your compliment of gold and wisdom is very obliging to me, but a little injurious to your country. The various value of every thing in every part of this world, arises you know from the various proportions of the quantity to the demand. We are told that gold and silver in Solomon’s time were so plenty as to be of no more value in his country than the stones in the street. You have here at present just such a plenty of wisdom. Your people are therefore not to be censured for desiring no more among them than they have; and if I have any, I should certainly carry it where from its scarcity it may probably come to a better market.
I nevertheless regret extremely the leaving a country in which I have received so much friendship, and friends whose conversation has been so agreeable and so improving to me; and that I am henceforth to reside at so great a distance from them is no small mortification, to my dear friend, Yours most affectionately