PHILOSOPHERS: WHO NEEDS THE PAST TENSE?

In a paper by Spinoza-scholar Edwin Curley, he writes:

Alan Donagan commented on the habit philosophers have of speaking of their predecessors in the present tense: 'Hume says that ...' 'Hume's reasons for saying that are....' Alan was commenting on J.G.A. Pocock's view that this shows a lack of real historical interest in your subject, that if you were thinking about your subject historically, you would, as historians do, use the past tense.

He continues...

What philosophers do betrays a desire to treat the great figures of philosophy's past as if they were our contemporaries. This may produce good philosophy; it does not produce good history.

Perhaps, but I'm curious what other philosophers might say about this. Thoughts?