Hume: TLDH Vol 1 Ltr 113 To: Blanc [55] p 227
I had heard of the Dutch Translation of my political Discourses† 2 before yours; but have never yet seen it. I sent a Copy of my other Writings (except the History) to the Bookseller at Amsterdam .† 3 This I wou’d not have done, had I known, that you had any Thoughts of translating them: But it is of no Consequence. I have the Honor to be

Sir Your most obedient & most humble Servant

DAVID HUME

Edinburgh

5th of Novr 1755.

† 2 Mauvillon’s.

† 3 Some of these appeared as OEuvres philosophiques de Mr D. Hume [translated by J.-B. Mérian and J.-B.-R. Robinet], Amsterdam , J. H.Schneider, 1758-60, 5 vols., 8vo. The Essays Moral and Political, however,were not all translated into French till later.

Hume: TLDH Vol 1 Ltr 94 To: Blanc [54] Fn 1 p 191

† 1 Jean-Bernard Le Blanc (1707-81), French man of letters, ‘historiographe des Bá¢timens du Roy de France’; author of Lettres d’un Franá§ois concernant le gouvernement, la politique et les moeurs des Anglois et Franá§ois, 3 vols., Paris, 1745 (English translation, Letters on the English and French Nations, 2 vols., Dublin, 1747); translator of Hume’s Political Discourses as Discours politiques de M. Hume, traduits de l’Anglois, Amsterdam (et se vend á  Paris), 1754, 2 vols., 12mo, and 2nd edit., Dresden, 1755, 2 vols. 8vo.

† 2 Le Blanc opened the correspondence with this letter from Paris (MS., R.S.E.; Burton, i. 458 f.). He announces that he is sending a copy of his translation of the Pol. Disc., and asks Hume to read it with care and to point out any errors in translation. The sooner this is done the better, he says, ‘car il est bon de vous dire que cette traduction, grá¢ce á  l’excellence de l’original se débite ici comme un roman…. Le libraire m’avertit qu’il sera bientá´t tems de penser á  la seconde édition. J’attendray votre réponse pour l’enrichir de vos remarques qui feront que celle-ci sera reá§ue du public avec encor plus d’applaudissements.’

† 3 Sic in MS.

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† 1 Published as vol. iv of the Essays and Treatises, 1754.

† 2 I doubt if Le Blanc really meant that. What he said, after asking for Hume’s comments on the translation, was: ‘J’en profiterai á  la premiere édition,
ainsi que des remarques, changements, ou additions qu’il vous plaira me communiquer, soit á  l’occasion de vos discours, soit sur les autres ouvrages anglois dont je parle dans mes notes.’

† 3 Vol. i of Essays and Treatises, 1753.

† 4 The opening of the essay Of the Delicacy of Taste and Passion. In its earlier form it opened: ‘There is a certain delicacy of passion, to which some people are subject, that makes them extremely sensible….’

† 5 Vol. iii of Essays and Treatises, 1753.

† 6 Vol. ii of Essays and Treatises, 1754 (reprinted, still as third edition, in 1756).

† 7 The second edition appeared, first with A. Millar’s name on the titlepage in 1750, and then with M. Cooper’s, in the same year.

† 8 I presume he means the 4 vols. of Essays and Treatises, including vol. iv, Political Discourses.

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† 1 From a letter of Gavin Hamilton, the bookseller in question, to William Strahan, printed by Hill (p. 3, n. 2), it appears that Hume was originally offered
£1,200 in all, in return for which the booksellers were to have the right to print 2,000 copies of each of the 3 vols. of the History when ready. As things fell out, Hume did not give Messrs. Hamilton, Balfour, and Neill the chance to publish any volume after the first. He objected to contracting for books too far ahead.

† 2 A reference to the quarrels between the clergy and the Parlement of Paris, in which the Court took first one side and then the other. In May 1753 the King by lettres de cachet ordered all Presidents and Councillors to residences that were named for them, away from Paris, the Grand Council being sent to Pontoise. The result was the publication of the Grandes Remonstrances on 23 May, containing the memorable statement: ‘If subjects owe obedience to kings,
kings on their side owe obedience to law.’ In 1754 the Court reversed its policy, and recalled the exiled parlementaires.

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† 2 Discours politiques de Mr David Hume, traduits de l’Anglois par M. de M*** [Eléazar de Mauvillon], Amsterdam , 1754 (16mo, pp. ii, 355).

† 3 Le Blanc thought so too. In his letter of 25 Dec. 1754 he says: ‘J’ay vu ici la traduction de vos Discours Politiques imprimée en Hollande; elle ne se peut pas lire…. Le traducteur quel qu’il soit ne sait constament ni l’anglois ni le franá§ois. C’est probablement un de ces auteurs qui travaillent á  la foire pour les libraires de Hollande, et dont les ouvrages bons ou mauvais se débitent aux foires de Leipsig et de Francfort…. Cette traduction passe ici pour être d’un Mr Mauvillon de Leipsig dont le métier est de faire des livres franá§ois pour l’Allemagne, et d’enseigner ce qu’il ne sait pas, c’est á  dire votre langue et la ná´tre’ (MS., R.S.E.; Burton, i. 461).

† 4 Voltaire’s breach with Frederick the Great was an old story by this time.

† 5 Voltaire did spend a month (June-July 1754) at the abbey of Sénones, living to all outward seeming as a monk but writing free-thinking articles for the Encyclopédie. The episode was a piece of hypocrisy designed to facilitate his return to Paris and the French Court.

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† 1 David Mallet edited all Bolingbroke’s Works in 5 vols., 1753-4. With Hume’s opinion cf. Horace Walpole (Letters, iii. 269): ‘It is comical to see how he [Bolingbroke] is given up here, since the best of his writings, his metaphysical divinity, have been published. While he betrayed and abused every man who trusted him, or who had forgiven him, or to whom he was obliged, he was a hero, a patriot, and a philosopher, and the greatest genius of the age: the moment his Craftsmen against Moses and St. Paul, &c., were published, we have discovered that he was the worst man and the worst writer in the world.’

† 2 James Harris (1709-80), a man of rank and wealth; M.P., Lord of Admiralty, and Lord of the Treasury; Secretary and Controller to Queen, 1774-80; author of Hermes, or a Philosophical Inquiry concerning Universal Grammar (1751), and Philosophical Arrangements (1775). As Hume notes, he was an Aristotelian, and applied Aristotle’s methods to modern problems.

† 3 Gabriel Girard (1677-1748), author of Synonymes franá§ois; leurs différentes significations et le choix qu’il en faut faire pour parler avec justesse, a very popular work many times reprinted during the century.

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† 1 Lyttelton’s Henry II, which he wrote and re-wrote with infinite pains and which in the end made very dry reading, did not begin to appear till 1764, but the printing was begun in 1755.

† 2 William Guthrie (1708-70). The book referred to here is probably An Essay upon English Tragedy, with Remarks upon the Abbé Le Blanc’s Observations on the English Stage, 1747.

Hume: TLDH Vol 2 App B [Early French Translators] p 343
APPENDIX B
HUME’S EARLY FRENCH TRANSLATORS (zie: ‘Over vroege Franse vertalingen’)

Hume: TLDH Vol 2 App B [Early French Translators] p 344

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† 1 Octavie Guichard, Madame Belot (died 1805). Left a young widow with an income of only 60 livres a year, she sold her annuity for 1,200 livres and spent the money in learning English. Her first book was Reflexions d’une provinciale sur le discours de J.-Jacques Rousseau touchant l’inégalité des conditions, 1756; her second, Mélanges de littérature angloise, 2 parts, 1759 (which included a translation of Garth’s Dispensary). Her Hume translations were: Histoire de la Maison de Tudor, sur le Trá´ne d’Angleterre, Par M. David Hume, Traduite de l’Anglois, Par Madame B***, Amsterdam , 2 vols., 4to, 1763; and Histoire de la Maison de Plantagenet, sur le Trá´ne d’Angleterre, Depuis l’Invasion de Jules César, jusqu’ á  l’avénement de Henry VII. Par M. David Hume, Traduite de l’Anglois Par Madame B***, Amsterdam , 2 vols., 4to, 1765. She also translated Johnson’s Rasselas, 1768. In Dec. 1765 she married Jean-Baptiste-Franá§ois Durey de Meinières, Président de Meinières (born 1705), who had some time before established her in his house in order that she might have the use of his fine library.

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† 1 Grimm says of Mme Belot’s translation of The Tudors: [‘Elle] ne prend point dans le public, et . . . on lui reproche déjá  un style lourd, froid, et lá¢che (Corr. Litt., iii. 331); and of The Plantagenets: [Le style de Mme Belot] ‘plat et “Ce gouvernement ne ressemblait pas mal á  l’aristocratie polonaise” et Mme Belot traduit: “Ce gouvernement ressemblait assez á  une aristocratie polie”. . . On a dit que M. Hume avait revu lui-même les épreuves de cette traduction, et son séjour á  Paris pouvait rendre la chose vraisemblable; mais cela n’est pas vrai’ (ibid., iv. 403).

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† 1 Apparently Stewart omitted a passage here.

† 2 Several books purporting to be extracts from these Memoirs have been published, but the MSS. themselves seem to have been destroyed during the French Revolution.

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