ABSTRACT
Hume (1711-76), philosopher, historian, and diplomat, appended to his history of England in the reigns of James I and Charles I an account of the state of literature in the seventeenth century. He argued that Renaissance writers reproduced the decadent elements of ancient culture in its decline and that the writers of the age of James I exemplify the prevailing bad taste. He essayed an analytical account of the history of literary taste, drawing on ancient and modern examples (The History of England (1754-62), 1813, vi, pp. 171-5).
