"It appears to me that apothecaries bear the same relation to physicians, that priests do to philosophers; the ignorance of the former makes them positive, and dogmatical, and assuming, and enterprising, and pretending, and consequently much more taking with the people. Follow my example--let us not trouble ourselves about the matter; let the one stuff the beasts' guts with antimony, and the other their heads with divinity, what is that to us? according to the Greek proverb, they are no more, but as ες την αμιδα ενουρουντες. "You may tell me, indeed, that I mistake the matter quite; that it is not your kindness for the people, which makes you concerned, but something else. In short, that if self-interest were not in the case, they might take clysters, and physic, and ipecacuanha, till they were tired of them. Now, dear Doctor, this mercenary way of thinking I never could have suspected you of, and am heartily ashamed to find you of such a temper. "If you answer this any time within the twelve months 'tis sufficient, and I promise not to answer you next at less than six months' interval; and so, as the Germans say, je me recomante a fos ponnes craces. Yours, &c." The "Bellman's Petition," more than once alluded to in Hume's letters, is a little jeu d'esprit, to which he seems to have attributed far more than its due importance. The clergy and schoolmasters of Scotland were then appealing to the legislature for an increase of their incomes; and in this production, Hume, in a sort of parody on the representation of these reverend and learned bodies, shows that bell-ringers have the same, or even greater claims on the liberality of the public. It is perhaps a little too like the original, of which it professes to be a parody; and though it has some wit, is deficient in the bitter ridicule, which Swift would have thrown into such an effort. The following are some passages:-- "That as your petitioners serve in the quality of grave-diggers, the great use and necessity of their order, in every well regulated commonwealth, has never yet been called in question by any reasoner; an advantage they possess above their brethren the reverend clergy. "That their usefulness is as extensive as it is great, for even those who neglect religion or despise learning, must yet, some time or other, stand in need of the good offices of this grave and venerable order. "That it seems impossible the landed gentry can oppose the interest of your petitioners; since, by securing so perfectly as they have hitherto done, the persons of the fathers and elder brothers of the foresaid gentry, your petitioners, next after the physicians, are the persons in the world, to whom the present proprietors of land are the most beholden. "That, as your petitioners are but half ecclesiastics, it may be expected they will not be altogether unreasonable nor exorbitant in their demands.