Revisiting David Hume’s Review of the Rev. Robert Henry’s History of Great Britain: Illuminating Hume on Religion, Politics, and Modernity

It has been more than eighty years since E.C. Mossner first brought to the attention of modern scholars the pre-publication proof sheets of David Hume’s review of Volume Two of the Rev. Robert Henry’s The History of Great Britain, from the Invasion of it by the Romans under Julius Caesar. Written on a New Plan (1774). Intended for the Edinburgh Magazine and Review, Hume’s review was supressed by the journal’s editors. Why? Mossner speculated Hume’s critique was more favourable than the editors wanted. His account of Hume’s supposedly “kindly intended review” has been influential, being quietly absorbed as the unchallenged record. It’s time to revisit Hume’s review and to read it more closely than Mossner and those who have followed him did. Hume always expected diligent readers; in his review of Henry he provides them with an elaborate assessment. Unpacking Hume’s intricacies, we find him ironically playful and less praising than has been thought. When Hume’s review of Henry is read closely—in the contexts of Henry’s History as a whole, Hume’s own History of England, and Hume’s telling final revisions to his History—we see he was quite critical of the core of Henry’s antiquarian account of England’s ancient times. And, all of this helps to illuminate Hume as the philosophical historian of the History of England, especially when it comes to the intertangled topics of religion, politics, and modernity. The essay concludes by fleshing out additional context offered by another anonymous Humean review, one which the author submits might usefully be seen as a companion piece to Hume’s review of Henry.