Writing the Global: the Scottish Enlightenment As Literary Practice

Writing the Global: The Scottish Enlightenment as Literary Practice Yusuke Wakazawa PhD University of York English and Related Literature September 2018 2 Abstract This thesis presents the Scottish Enlightenment as a literary practice in which Scottish thinkers deploy diverse forms of writing---for example, philosophical treatise, essay, autobiography, letter, journal, and history---to shape their ideas and interact with readers. After the unsuccessful publication of A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40), David Hume turns to write essays on moral philosophy, politics and commerce, and criticism. I argue that other representatives of the Scottish Enlightenment such as Adam Smith, Adam Ferguson, and William Robertson also display a comparable attention to the choice and use of literary forms. I read the works of the Scottish Enlightenment as texts of eighteenth-century literature rather than a context for that literature. Since I argue that literary culture is an essential component of the Scottish Enlightenment, I include James Boswell and Tobias Smollett as its members. In diverse literary forms, Scottish writers refer to geographical difference, and imagine the globe as heterogenous and interconnected. These writers do not treat geography as a distinctive field of inquiry. Instead, geographical reference is a feature of diverse scholarly genres. I suggest that literary experiments in the Scottish Enlightenment can be read as responding to the circulation of information, people, and things beyond Europe. Scottish writers are interested in the diversity of human beings, and pay attention to the process through which different groups of people in distant regions encounter each other and exchange their sentiments as well as products. The geographical scope of writing in the Scottish Enlightenment encompasses the whole surface of the earth. And Scottish writers explore the emergence and consequences of global interconnection. The construction of this global vision is evident across genres and it is a constitutive element of the Scottish Enlightenment. 3 List of Contents Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………..page 2 Table of Contents………………………………………………………………………...page 3 Declaration……………………………………………………………………………….page 4 Main Body Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..page 5 Chapter 1……………………………………………………………………………page 27 Chapter 2……………………………………………………………………………page 57 Chapter 3……………………………………………………………………………page 87 Chapter 4…………………………………………………………………………..page 124 Chapter 5…………………………………………………………………………..page 149 Chapter 6…………………………………………………………………………..page 175 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………...page 200 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………..page 207 4 Declaration I declare that this thesis is a presentation of original work and I am the sole author. This work has not previously been presented for an award at this, or any other, University. All sources are acknowledged as References. 5 Introduction The Man of Letters, Literary Form, and Geography 1. Hume’s “Literary Pursuits”: A Model for Understanding the Scottish Enlightenment In “My Own Life,” David Hume (1711-1776) recollects that “almost all [his] life has been spent in literary pursuits and occupations” (xxxi). This autobiography was written just four months before his death in 1776 and posthumously published in 1777. At that time, he was known as an eminent philosopher, essayist, and historian in Britain. In the autobiography, he presents himself as a “man of letters” who has been “seized […] with a passion for literature” since his childhood (xxxii-xxxiii, xxxvi). This love of “literature” is indeed “the ruling passion of [his] life” (xxxii-xxxiii). His phrase “literary pursuits” covers diverse kinds of intellectual activities including epistemological, moral, aesthetic, and political inquiries. As James A. Harris points out, eighteenth-century writers and readers did not see “literature” as a specific field of writing associated with the product of imagination (Hume 15). Philosophical and historical writings were part of this domain in the eighteenth century. Hume was a writer who wrote on diverse subjects in various literary forms (by “forms” I mean to refer to the vehicles of inquiry which he chose). In addition to the essay, he made use of history, dialogue, and autobiography. His writing was also engaged with diverse genres of writing such as moral philosophy, politics and commerce, religion, and criticism (by “genre” I mean to refer to eighteenth-century classifications of knowledge). As a man of letters, Hume was keen to attract a wide readership and continuously concerned about his reception in the publishing market. “My Own Life” dramatizes the disappointing response to A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-1740) as his first “literary attempt,” which “fell dead-born from the press” (xxxiv). He felt that Treatise had been ignored, or at least misunderstood, by readers. The autobiography presents this unfortunate 6 reception of the Treatise as the primary cause of his turn to essay-writing. He thought that the failure of his first publication “had proceeded more from the manner than the matter” (xxxv). The first part of Treatise was thus reshaped into Philosophical Essays concerning Human Understanding (1748). Prior to this recasting, the favorable reception of Essays, Moral and Political (1741-1742) convinced him that essays were a proper form for his literary pursuits, which would enable him to write on diverse subjects in an appropriately discursive manner. In the first edition of Essays, Moral and Political, for instance, the scope of Hume’s discussion covered aesthetics, politics, religion, and ethics. The essays included “Of the Delicacy of Taste and Passion,” “Of the First Principles of Government,” “Of Superstition and Enthusiasm,” and “Of Moral Prejudices.” After his success as an essayist, Hume continued to experiment with the use of different forms of writing. He was appointed as a librarian by the Faculty of Advocates in 1752, and started writing The History of England (1754-1762). Before his death in 1776, he also prepared the posthumous Dialogues concerning Natural Religion (1779) in addition to composing his autobiography. In total, his writing engaged with five literary forms: treatise, essays, history, dialogue, and autobiography. Each of these has its distinctive structure of narrative. I call Hume’s intellectual pursuits described above “literary practice.” In other words, this means the act of communication by the use of diverse literary forms. This process includes shaping ideas, crafting narrative, and diffusing opinions. I choose the term “practice” to emphasize that Hume’s writing is not the product of speculation in solitude but the outcome of active participation in various kinds of social exchange. To shape ideas, he converses, exchanges letters, and reads books. His “practice” also involves meeting publishers, interacting with readers, and paying close attention to reviews of his books. The term therefore highlights the way in which Hume’s act of thinking and writing is embedded in a wider process of communication in society. His practice is “literary” in the sense that his writing opposes being confined within one specific category of knowledge, and his “practice” 7 is thus embodied in his wide-ranging activity as a man of letters. My conceptualization of “literary practice” as an analytical term is indebted to three research strands in eighteenth century studies. Firstly, biographical approaches in Hume Studies have highlighted the significant role of the man of letters in the production and diffusion of philosophical ideas in eighteenth-century Britain.1 Jerome Christensen’s Practicing Enlightenment: Hume and the Formation of a Literary Career (1987) directed my attention to “practice” as a crucial term to understand Hume’s intellectual pursuits. Christensen argues that Hume’s social identity as a man of letters embodies his philosophical vision of society itself, and thus his pursuit of developing a literary career is “a symbolic practice” to explore and represent the principles of the “commercial society” where he lives and writes (4). I think that the role of man of letters as Hume’s profession is crucial in examining his relation to other Scottish thinkers including Adam Smith (1723-1790). Secondly, print culture approaches to Hume and his fellow Scottish thinkers have stimulated my interest in the way in which the act of writing was embedded in broader processes of communication in eighteenth-century Britain. In The Enlightenment and the Book (2010), Richard B. Sher reveals Hume’s active involvement in “every aspect of the publication” including “the format, timing, paper, quantity, printing, publishing, and marketing, as well as textual content, of his books” (45). This study presents Hume as a representative eighteenth-century author paying keen attention to the material conditions of circulating his ideas in the publishing market. Jon Mee’s Conversable Worlds: Literature, Contention, and Community 1762 to 1830 (2011) emphasizes the significant role of Hume as an essayist in the formation of eighteenth-century ideas and practices of conversation (57-67). In addition, David Allan’s Making British Culture: English Readers and the Scottish Enlightenment, 1740-1830 (2008) highlights the extensive scope of communication mediated 1 See E. C. Mossner’s The Life of David Hume (2nd ed. 1980) and James A. Harris’s Hume: An Intellectual Biography (2015). 8 by the circulation of print. Thirdly, sociology of knowledge approaches to eighteenth-century

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