Hume originally wrote out his lectures in bound notebooks, but over the years he revised, added, and deleted, and in many cases he rewrote pages or sections on separate sheets, and the original structure is usually destroyed. Sometimes the original version has survived alongside the new, sometimes it has not; some pages whose context has disappeared are collected in Adv.MS.81.6.32, which also contains a section on bankruptcy which Hume apparently later omitted (not printed in the Stair Society edition; in the student`s notes, Adv.MSS.7.2.4-7.2.17, it appears at the end of Part IV).

The introductory chapter is missing (known from the transcript, Adv.MS.81.6.33, and from the students` notes); other gaps (filled from the students` notes) are mentioned in the prefaces of the Stair Society edition.