Bloomsbury Hume's Reception in Early America (History of American Thought)

"Hume's Reception in Early America" presents 87 American responses to David Hume dating from 1758 to 1850. Besides classic responses, like those written by Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Alexander Hamilton, these two volumes contain dozens of hitherto unknown and hard-to-locate items, many of which have not been reprinted since their original publication. There are selections from early American books, letters, essays, pamphlets, poems and official reports. Newspapers, religious magazines, literary and political journals are all well represented. Some of the selections are philosophical and scholarly; others are anecdotal and intended for a popular audience. The assessments of Hume and his ideas presented in these more obscure writings are valuable for understanding his reception in early America. The set's wide-ranging contents are divided into four parts containing responses to: Hume's "Essays, Moral, Political, and Literary" (Part 1); his Philosophical Writings (Part 2); his "History of England" (Part 3); and his character and death (Part 4). Each of these parts has a separate introductory essay, and every selection is introduced by a short headnote that sets the piece in its historical context and provides a list of bibliographical references. About the Author Mark G. Spencer is associate professor in the Department of History at Brock University, ON. He teaches courses on colonial and early U.S. history and the history of ideas in the Atlantic world, including the early U.S. history survey and upper-level and graduate courses on the American Enlightenment and American Revolution. His current research projects include a SSHRC-supported volume on David Hume as historian (contracted with Penn State University Press) and work on the American Enlightenment.