The Scottish Renaissance

John Passmore on Hume: Section 1


When I entered college at the age of 18 I was a philosophy major. I found this sort of thing fascinating then. And I still fall to thinking about this kind of thing when I can't sleep. Or maybe my inability to sleep comes from thinking along these lines. As I stayed longer in college I became more interested in literature and history. Philosophy is too narrow. But to properly understand history some understanding of philosophy and literature is necessary. Both history and literature are more bound up with real people. But I ended by becoming a nurse and worked nearly 30 years as a nurse. I continued to read literature and history. It wasn't until I was into my fifties that I read much of Faulkner (who I place next to Twain in being all-the-way-to-the-bone American). And then I sped through four or five volumes in a couple of months in which I enjoyed my time away from work much more than usually.

John Passmore on Hume: Section 2