By the little company I have seen I find the town very full
of your book, which meets with general approbation. Many
people think particular parts disputable, but this you
certainly expected. I am glad that I am one of the number,
as these parts will be the subject of future conversation
between us. I set out for Bath, I believe, on Monday, by Sir
John Pringle's directions. He says that he sees nothing to
be apprehended in my case. If you write to me (hem! hem!)--I
say if you write to me, send your letter under cover to Mr.
Strahan, who will have my direction.[255]

The ostensible letter which accompanied the other is--

LONDON, _3rd May 1776_.

MY DEAR SIR--After reflecting more maturely on that article
of my will by which I leave you the disposal of all my
papers, with a request that you should publish my _Dialogues
concerning Natural Religion_, I have become sensible that
both on account of the nature of the work and of your
situation it may be improper to hurry on that publication. I
therefore take the present opportunity of qualifying that
friendly request. I am content to leave it entirely to your
discretion at what time you will publish that piece, or
whether you will publish it at all.

You will find among my papers a very inoffensive piece
called "My Own Life," which I composed a few days before I
left Edinburgh, when I thought, as did all my friends, that
my life was despaired of. There can be no objection that the
small piece should be sent to Messrs. Strahan and Cadell and
the proprietors of my other works, to be prefixed to any
future edition of them.[256]

The ink of those letters was scarcely dry before Hume's heart softened
again towards his _Dialogues_, and in order to make more sure of their
eventual publication than he could feel while they were entrusted to
Smith's hands, he wrote Strahan from Bath on the 8th of June asking if
he would agree to act as literary executor and undertake the editing
and publishing of the work. In this letter he says: "I have hitherto
forborne to publish it because I was of late desirous to live quietly
and keep remote from all clamour, for though it be not more
exceptionable than some things I had formerly published, yet you know
some of them were thought exceptionable, and in prudence perhaps I
ought to have suppressed them.