David Hume, considered by many the finest Anglophone philosopher, one of the first fully modern secular minds, and, along with Adam Smith, the leading light of the Scottish Enlightenment, was the author of four major philosophical works and many essays.

Born on April 26, 1711, in Edinburgh, Scotland, Hume spent his childhood mostly at Ninewells, the family estate near Berwick. Though his family was of good social standing, they were not rich, and, as the second son, he had to be prepared to earn a living to supplement an inadequate inherited income. He attended Edinburgh University from the ages of eleven to fifteen, in which city he remained to study law. Finding this not to his taste, Hume returned to Ninewells and threw himself into an intensive program of intellectual self-development. He read widely in ancient and modern literature, improved his knowledge of science and languages...