Humphry Clinker

by Tobias Smollett

  Just how Pyrrhonian and Academic scepticism differed is a matter of scholarship. But Cicero certainly suggests a difference, and Hume, from his study of Cicero, learned to use the terms ‘Pyrrhonian’ and ‘Academic’ to mark a distinction. Sceptical reflections often begin with the observation that the search for truth is frustrated by the disagreements found amongst men. Experts so often tell us different things; and even in common life we find that people’s perceptions differ radically. When we are tossed about in the sea of conflicting opinions, the sceptic offers an escape to tranquillity of mind, by leading us to suspend our assent from any judgement. He does this, according to Sextus, by arguing both for and against any thesis in such a way that the issue seems undecidable. Faced with a balance between pro and con, the wise man does not commit himself either way.

  Now Cicero implies that the Academic sceptics went so far towards committing themselves as to deny that knowledge can be achieved. (Sextus criticizes this as dogmatic.) And they were attacked by the Stoics, by the argument that if knowledge is impossible, then so is action. If we cannot know anything, we cannot know what to do. In response, the Academics formulated a notion of ‘probability’. (The term in this context translates Cicero’s ‘probabile’, which in turn translates the original Greek expression.) The idea was that, although we have no sure criterion by which to sort truth from error, yet some things strike us as plausible or convincing, and, without committing ourselves to thinking that they are true, we can direct our actions by them. Probability is all we need, in practical terms.

  Hume endorses this general position, and uses it to criticize the total scepticism of the Pyrrhonians. But his basis for the position is his own, and not anything he found in Cicero. It is to be found in his theory, already mentioned, that reason is a kind of natural instinct. On the one hand, this is a sceptical position. Hume denies that we can provide any antecedent justification for reasoning as we do from causes and effects. And, since that is so, we have no grounds for assuming that the conclusions we reach must be true. On the other hand, we do find ourselves, so to speak, persuaded by such inferences. Since it is our nature to reason as we do, there is no alternative. Hume’s view here is much stronger than the classical sceptics. He is arguing that we cannot but think and reason as we do, not just that it is a practical policy to guide action by what seems probable. And, consequently, the idea of total scepticism, a total suspense of judgement, is a fantasy. There could be no such person as a total sceptic:

  Nature, by an absolute and uncontroulable necessity has determin’d us to judge as well as to breathe and feel… Whoever has taken the pains to refute the cavils of… total scepticism, has really disputed without an antagonist.20

  When Hume speaks of nature in these terms, he is taking a positive view of the convictions we find ourselves to have. But it is as much part of his complex theory of human nature that many beliefs arise in us which are not merely not known to be true, but positively absurd or harmful. In the Treatise he tries to separate the strong, irresistible and beneficial convictions which experience generates in the mind of the sceptical wise man (that fire burns, for example) from the fanciful, avoidable and often harmful notions that clutter the minds of the vulgar. Part of his theory is that powerful emotions often underlie the latter. We have seen that this diagnosis is important in his account of the origins of superstition and enthusiasm in religion.

  The wise, who are enlightened by Hume’s theory of human nature, know themselves better than do the vulgar. They can form general, reflective rules, based on the theory, by which to guard against the fictions of a lively imagination. In fact, it is the very process of reflection which diminishes the initial credibility of the ideas presented to us by emotion and imagination. So it would seem that the more reflective we are in our mental life, the better. But there is a twist in this. If we were to attempt to govern our beliefs entirely by reflective, general principles, we would end up without any beliefs at all – precisely the Pyrrhonian desideratum. For, as the sceptics showed, general principles of logic and methodology can always be set against one another so as to pull us in opposite directions. Hume’s most considered view is that the beliefs of the wise man will be a vector of experience and reflection.

  When Hume says that reason, in the sense of the capacity to infer effects from causes and vice versa, is an instinct, he goes on to offer an account of how it operates. Very roughly, he thinks that we initially believe the evidence of our senses and memory, which give us vivid and forceful impressions. When we have had experience of the constant conjunction of two phenomena, such as fire and heat, the ideas of these become associated in the mind by a kind of conditioning. Hume calls this ‘habit’ or ‘custom’. Then, whenever we have an impression of one of these phenomena, as when we see fire, the idea which is habitually associated with it, such as heat, immediately enters our consciousness. We see the child put her hand in the fire, and at once think that she will be burned. The belief we have in the evidence of our senses, which Hume identifies with the vividness and force of our perceptions, is transferred to the associated idea, and we believe that too. We do not merely think that she will be burned, we believe that she will. So belief itself turns out to be a naturally produced psychological state, which consists essentially in a kind of feeling: ideas which are the contents of belief feel strong, forceful and vivid.

  It is because all this happens, he thinks, naturally and inevitably in everyday cases, like the example of the fire, that the Pyrrhonian idea that we might always suspend our assent, and have no beliefs at all, is absurd. This general position about how far it is possible to maintain a sceptical suspense of judgement is laid out at the beginning of the Dialogues, in the discussion between Cleanthes and Philo in Part I. But, very much in line with Hume’s view, Philo claims that a sceptical suspense is possible where we are considering only abstract, reflective arguments. In those circumstances, the sceptic can always argue against the thesis being considered, so producing a weakening of conviction to balance the persuasive force of the original argument. If the topic is one on which we have no strong impulse to hold one view rather than another which results inevitably and unreflectively from past experience, then the dialectic of arguments for and against will lead to suspense of judgement:

  All sceptics pretend that, if reason be considered in an abstract view, it furnishes invincible arguments against itself, and that we could never retain any conviction or assurance, on any subject, were not the sceptical reasonings so refined and subtle that they are not able to counterpoise the more solid and more natural arguments derived from the senses and experience. But it is evident, whenever our arguments lose this advantage and run wide of common life, that the most refined scepticism comes to be upon a footing with them, and is able to oppose and counterbalance them. The one has no more weight than the other. The mind must remain in suspense between them; and it is that very suspense or balance which is the triumph of scepticism.

  Philo intends to show that in natural theology, our arguments do run wide of common life. But he is prepared to find himself convinced by very ‘refined’ and ‘abstract’ reasoning in, say, Newton’s writings. Cleanthes therefore tries to show that religious belief can be supported by arguments of just the same kind as are used in science; hence the design argument. Philo’s attacks are aimed at showing that the logic of the argument is not of the same type. Already by the end of Part VIII, he has achieved this aim. But at a number of places, and very clearly in Part XII, he accepts that it is, nevertheless, very natural to believe that the world is the creation of ‘a first intelligent author’. What the sceptical technique does is to undermine the claim of the natural theologian that this natural assumption – what Cleanthes calls ‘the religious hypothesis’ – can be proved by reasoning of a kind employed in science, namely, analogical reasoning from effects to causes.

  Apart from his own philosophy, Hume used a number of sources to construct the positions of his characters. As was mentioned earlie
r, Butler is one source for Cleanthes, in his use of analogical argument and his willingness to allow that probable reasoning is a proper method in natural theology. Demea’s cosmological argument is based on sections of A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God (1705), by the influential theologian and Newtonian Samuel Clarke (1675–1729). And R. H. Hurlbutt has identified sources for parts of Cleanthes’ speeches in two other Newtonians, George Cheyne (1671–1743) and Colin Maclaurin (1698–1746).21 But it is, in my view, better to conceive of Hume’s characters as representing types of theologians, rather than to think of them as standing each for a particular historical thinker. Of course, Philo’s speeches far outweigh those of the others, both in quantity and in sophistication, and for the most part represent Hume’s views. But Hume does enough, all the same, to give Philo some life of his own, particularly in the last Part. Here Philo expresses some elements of fideism:

  A person, seasoned with a just sense of the imperfections of natural reason, will fly to revealed truth with the greatest avidity… To be a philosophical sceptic is, in a man of letters, the first and most essential step towards being a sound, believing Christian.

  This idea, that scepticism, by undermining the pretensions of reason, makes it possible for us to accept religious revelation by faith alone, has a long intellectual history. It would be perfectly familiar to Hume, not least from the writings of Pierre Bayle (1647–1706). But there is no doubt that Hume himself had no such tendency.

  At the end of the Dialogues, Pamphilus judges that Cleanthes’ principles are nearer to the truth than the others. This, too, is no guide to Hume’s opinion. It echoes the ending of De Natura Deorum, where Cicero claims to have found that the theology proposed by the Stoic speaker ‘approximated more nearly to a semblance of the truth’ than the scepticism of the Academic spokesman. Since Cicero is identified in that work as one of the ‘disciples of Philo, and have learned from him to know nothing’, Hume is using the rhetorical device learned from his classical model. His intention in using the dialogue form is to avoid a direct statement of his position. He could well have had in mind Cicero again:

  Those however who seek to learn my personal opinion on the various questions show an unreasonable degree of curiosity. In discussion it is not so much weight of authority as force of argument that should be demanded. Indeed the authority of those who profess to teach is often a positive hindrance to those who desire to learn; they cease to employ their. own judgement…

  Additionally, the dialogue form enables Hume to practise the sceptical technique of balancing opposing arguments. According to his own theory of the nature of belief, this leads to a state of equilibrium, freeing the mind from dogmatism. This is illustrated most dramatically in Part XII, where Philo suggests that the end result of the discussion is a verdict so meagre in its content that whether we regard it as favouring theism or not is a purely verbal matter. But it is crucial, in Hume’s eyes, that this minimal conclusion – that the cause or causes of order in the universe probably bear some remote analogy to human intelligence – is strictly a philosophical conclusion. It belongs to what Philo calls ‘the philosophical and rational kind’ of religion, and, as such, has no practical consequences whatever for how we ought to live our lives. And, of course, no sane man will think it worth the spilling of a single drop of blood. Hume consistently argued that where men and women hold religious beliefs as certain truths, regard all who do not share them as in error and seek to enforce religious practices, the consequences are always pernicious. But a purely theoretical examination of natural religion is, by its very inability to achieve results of any consequence, itself an antidote to the dogmatism and passion of popular religion. As Hume made his final revisions of the text of the Dialogues in the last months of his life, his judgement on the relation between religious conviction and philosophical investigation remained the same as it had been when he wrote the Treatise forty years earlier:

  For as superstition arises naturally and easily from the popular opinions of mankind, it seizes more strongly on the mind, and is often able to disturb us in the conduct of our lives and actions. Philosophy on the contrary, if just, can present us only with mild and moderate sentiments; and if false and extravagant, its opinions are merely the objects of a cold and general speculation, and seldom go so far as to interrupt the course of our natural propensities… Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.22

  NOTES

  (Further bibliographical details are given in the Select Bibliography, page 152.

  1. (p. 1) Quoted in Kemp Smith, Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Appendix A.

  2. (p. 5) See E. C. Mossner, The Life of David Hume, Chapter 33.

  3. (p. 5) ‘Hume and the Legacy of the Dialogues’ in G. P. Morice (ed.), David Hume: Bicentenary Papers (Edinburgh, 1977), p. 2. For Mossner’s biography of Hume, see preceding note. Details of the work by Berkeley, and of Mossner’s edition of the Treatise, are given in the Select Bibliography. All references of the form ‘T.n’ are to page n of the Penguin Classics edition of the Treatise.

  4. (p. 8) The Natural History of Religion, Section II.

  5. (p. 8) Ibid., Section III.

  6. (p. 9) ‘Of Superstition and Enthusiasm’ in Essays: Moral; Political and Literary.

  7. (p. 10) ‘There is no object, which implies the existence of any other if we consider these objects in themselves, and never look beyond the ideas which we form of them. Such an inference wou’d amount to knowledge, and wou’d imply the absolute contradiction and impossibility of conceiving any thing different.’ T. 135.

  8. (p. 11) Treatise, Book I, Part III, Section I, ‘Of knowledge’, Section II, ‘Of probability; and of the idea of cause and effect’.

  9. (p. 11) In Hume’s writings, including the Dialogues, the word ‘pretend’ is commonly used to mean ‘propose’, ‘claim’, ‘offer for consideration’.

  10. (p. 11) T.43.

  11. (p. 11) In a letter of 1737, Hume advised a friend to read works by Malebranche, Berkeley, Pierre Bayle (1647–1706) and Descartes, which ‘will make you easily comprehend the metaphysical parts of my reasoning’. The letter does not mention Locke, but there is ample evidence of his influence on the Treatise. For the provenance of the letter and details of its publication, see R. H. Popkin, The High Road to Pyrrhonism (San Diego, 1980), p. 290. Modern editions of the works mentioned by Hume are listed in the Select Bibliography.

  12. (p. 12) T.243.

  13. (p. 12) See below, Part II, pp. 53.

  14. (p. 14) Treatise, Book I, Part III, Section VI, ‘Of the inference from the impression to the idea’.

  15. (p. 14) T.228.

  16. (p. 15) T.42.

  17. (p. 15) An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section XII, Part III.

  18. (p. 19) T.142.

  19. (p. 20) See the Introduction by M. A. Screech to Michel de Montaigne, An Apology for Raymond Sebond (Penguin Classics, 1987), p. xv.

  20. (p. 26) T.234.

  21. (p. 28) R. H. Hurlbutt, ‘David Hume and Scientific Theism’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 17,1956, pp. 486-97.

  22. (p. 30) T.319.

  TEXTUAL NOTE

  THE present text is based on Hume’s manuscript, with some modernization. In most instances where Hume uses an initial capital for a substantive, this text employs lower case; but there are exceptions, such as ‘God’. Abbreviated forms such as ‘tho’ and ‘convey’d’ have been expanded: ‘though’, ‘conveyed’. Spelling has been modernized; but for the most part Hume’s punctuation is retained, since changes might affect the meaning.

  Hume’s own notes are signalled in the text by asterisks, and appear at the foot of the page. Editorial notes are signalled by superscript numerals, and are together after the text.

  I am grateful to the Council of the Royal Society of Edinburgh for permission to use the manuscript, and to the staff of the National Library of Scotland for their help, and for making photocopies of
the manuscript and of the so-called Second Edition, London, 1779.

  DIALOGUES CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGION

  PAMPHILUS TO HERMIPPUS

  IT has been remarked, my Hermippus, that, though the ancient philosophers conveyed most of their instruction in the form of dialogue, this method of composition has been little practised in later ages, and has seldom succeeded in the hands of those, who have attempted it. Accurate and regular argument, indeed, such as is now expected of philosophical inquirers, naturally throws a man into the methodical and didactic manner; where he can immediately, without preparation, explain the point, at which he aims; and thence proceed, without interruption, to deduce the proofs, on which it is established. To deliver a SYSTEM in conversation scarcely appears natural; and while the dialogue-writer desires, by departing from the direct style of composition, to give a freer air to his performance, and avoid the appearance of author and reader, he is apt to run into a worse inconvenience, and convey the image of pedagogue and pupil. Or if he carries on the dispute in the natural spirit of good-company, by throwing in a variety of topics, and preserving a proper balance among the speakers; he often loses so much time in preparations and transitions, that the reader will scarcely think himself compensated, by all the graces of dialogue, for the order, brevity, and precision, which are sacrificed to them.