An Enquiry Concerning the

Principles of Morals
An Introduction/Overview:
 Overview of Enquiry:
An Enquiry Concerning the Principle of Morals (1751) is
broken down into 9 Units of thought:

1. Of the Great Principle of Morals

2. Of Benevolence
3. Of Justice
4. Of Political Society
5. Why Utility Pleases
6. Of Qualities Useful to Ourselves
7. Of Qualities Immediately Agreeable to Ourselves
8. Of Qualities Immediately Agreeable to Others
9. Conclusion
 What is the aim of book?
Thesis Statement: Moral sense makes the ultimate
distinction between vice & virtue; both moral
sense and reason play a role in the formation of
moral judgments. The basis of virtue lies in its
utility (usefulness), fulfilling two requirements for
moral sentiments: (1) It is useful to ourselves
(agreeable) or (2) to others. Therefore, the
purpose of this book is the contributions moral
sense and reason make in our moral judgments.
 What is the aim of book?

Complimentary Statement: Reason is important

because we make moral judgments about what is
useful to us or to others; it plays the role of an
advisor, not decision-maker. In other words,
reason does not motivate us to action. Rather, the
capacity of sympathy (moral sentiments), which is
rooted in our human constitution, motivate us to
act or ignore those judgments.
 Central Points to Hume’s Ethics:
Hume’s list of virtues are:

– Qualities useful (pleasurable) to others: benevolence,

justice, fidelity.
– Qualities useful to their possessor: discretion,
industry, frugality, strength of mind, good sense.
– Qualities agreeable (immediately pleasurable) to their
possessor: cheerfulness, magnanimity, courage,
tranquility.
– Qualities agreeable to others: politeness, modesty,
decency.
 Hume’s Distinction between
artificial & natural virtues:
Artificial virtues depend on social structures and
include the following:

a. Justice and fidelity to promises;

b. Allegiance;
c. Chastity and modesty;
d. Duties of sovereign states to keep
treaties, to respect boundaries, to protect
ambassadors, and to otherwise subject
themselves to the law of nations.

Artificial virtues may vary from society to society.

Hume’s Distinction between artificial & natural virtues:

Natural virtues, originate in human nature, thus tend to be

more universal:

Compassion Prudence Temperance Generosity

Gratitude Friendship Fidelity Charity
Beneficence Clemency Cleanliness Decorum
Temperance Frugality Pride Modesty
Good Sense Wit Humor Articulateness
Perseverance Patience Good nature
Sensitivity to poetry Self-assertiveness
Elusive quality that makes a person lovely or valuable

Involuntary virtues (e.g., good sense)

voluntary virtues (e.g., ambition)
 Related to purpose are three
questions (chapter 1):
• (1) Is morality derived from reason or sentiment?

• (2) What is the process whereby we obtain knowledge of

moral judgments: chain of arguments and induction or by
some internal sense?

• (3) Are moral judgments the same for every rational

intelligent person? In his pursuit for the origins of
morality he presupposes an anti-supernatural claim, thus
dismissing any theological metaphysical perspectives of
this matter and advances a utilitarian model.
 Chapters 2-5:

In chapters 2-5 Hume surveys three kinds of

conduct that are virtuous; they are virtuous
because they are useful:

Benevolence;

Justice;

Political Society.
 Chapter 2: On Benevolence:

• “On benevolence,” “nothing can bestow

more merit on any human creature than
the sentiment of benevolence in an
eminent degree; and that a part, at least,
of its merit arises from its tendency to
promote the interests of our species, and
bestow happiness on human society”
(2.2.14).
 Chapter 3: On Justice:

• “On Justice”, Hume writes, “public utility is

the sole origin of justice, and that reflections
on the beneficial consequence of this virtue are
the sole foundation of its merit” (3.1.15). This
particular virtue is the considerable source of
merit ascribed to “humanity, benevolence,
friendship, public spirit, and other social
virtues of that stamp [justice]” (3.2. 38).
 Chapter 4: Of Political Society:

• “Of Political Society,” the fundamental value

of the duty of allegiance is the “advantage,
which it procures to so society, by preserving
peace and order among mankind” (4. 39). He
concludes that “common interest and utility
begets infallibly a standard of right and wrong
among the parties concerned” (4. 45).
 Chapters 5-7
• Chapter 5: Why utility pleases is because we are social
beings.

• Chapter 6: Qualities that are USEFUL to us

INDIVIDUALLY include happiness, joy, triumph,
prosperity, honesty, fidelity, truth, temperance, patience,
perseverance, sobriety, and physical fitness.

• In chapter 7 what is immediately AGREEABLE to

OURSELVES include pleasure accompanied with
temperance and decency; greatness of mind, character,
philosophical tranquility or magnanimous predisposition,
benevolence, and bravery.
 Chapter 8: Of Qualities Immediately
Agreeable to Others:
• What is immediately agreeable to others: wit, politeness,
modesty, decency, or any agreeable quality which one
possesses which we characterizes as good manners and
character.

• How one determines those qualities is whether they have a

beneficial, useful, extensive, and positive influence; not
only will they harmonize with the moral sensibilities of
others and ourselves, but will produce pleasure personally
and socially.

• To be sure, no quality is absolutely either blamable or

praiseworthy; it is all according to its degree and
coherence (6.1. 68). But for those that produce public
affection, they must be pursued (e.g., self-love vs.
community-centered) (5.1. 48-49).
 Chapter 9: Conclusion:
• Reason does not cause our actions.

• Our actions are caused by a combination of utility and

sentiment whereby reason is embedded in the passions,
desires, habits, and sentiments of mind. In other words,
morality cannot be separated from psychology.

• There is no such thing as good and evil outside of human

sentiments.

• What promotes happiness among our fellow humans “is

good” and what tends to their misery “is evil”; we do not
need to go any further in our reflection or deliberation on
these matters.

• What is virtuous is useful.

 Chapter 9: Conclusion:

• Hume writes:

“What more, therefore, can we ask to distinguish

these sentiments, dependent on humanity, from
those connected with any other passion , or to
satisfy us, why the former are the origin of morals,
not the latter? Whatever conduct gains my
approbation, by touching my humanity, procures
also the applause of all mankind, by affecting the
same principle in them; but what serves my
avarice or ambition pleases these passions in me
alone, and affects not the avarice and ambition of
the rest of mankind. There is no circumstance of
conduct in any man, provided it has a beneficial
tendency that is not agreeable to my humanity…”
(9.1.112-13).
 Central Ideas:
1. Moral sentiment is where moral decision-making
is grounded.

2. Sympathy is the capacity to be moved or affected

by the happiness & suffering of others-to be
pleased when others prosper and distressed when
others suffer.

3. The inclination for this capacity is experienced to

be a principle of human nature (V.17).
 Central Ideas:
4. Sympathy is not a virtue but the source of moral
approval.

5. When we ascribe moral praise or blame, the praise or

blame derives from an attitude of sympathy.

6. Sympathy, if not universal, is a feature for any normal

human being.

7. Hume attempts to describe and explain how we do in fact

make moral judgments; he does not tell us how we ought
to make them. In other words, he is concerned with
judgments about personal qualities rather than
judgments about actions.
8. Three Stages of Judgments:
First Stage: Sympathy induces us to take into account the
happiness and suffering others and ourselves.

Second Stage: General standards correct the operation of

sympathy so that we attach the same moral importance to
the happiness or suffering of anyone, ourselves, or others,
close to us or remote to us.

Third stage: In some cases we need to take into account

not merely the utility or particular acts, but the usefulness
to society of a whole system of general rules and
conventions.
 8. Three Stages of Judgments:
• Each of these three is a move from a limited to a
more generalized standpoint.

• Together they challenge the Platonic-Aristotelian

view that one’s moral assessments are
necessarily made from the standpoint of a
concern for one’s own well-being.
9. Significant Quotes on Sympathy:
“When a man dominates another his enemy, his rival, his
antagonist, his adversary, he is understood to speak the
language of self-love, and to express sentiments peculiar to
himself and arising form his particular circumstances and
situation. But when he bestows on any man the epithets of
vicious or odious or depraved, he then speaks another
language, and expresses sentiments in which he expects all
his audience are to concur with him. He must therefore,
depart, from his private and particular situation and must
choose a point of view common to him with others; he must
move some universal principle of the human frame (IX.6).”
9. Significant Quotes on Sympathy:
“This universal principle is the sentiment of humanity or
sympathy. And though this affection of humanity may not
generally be esteemed so strong as vanity or ambition, yet,
being common to all men, it can alone be the formulation
of morals or of any general system of blame or praise
(Ibid).”
 10. Similarities:
Hume agrees with Plato and Aristotle on the following:

A. Moral judgments are primarily about virtues and vices.

We praise people insofar as they exhibit virtues and
blame then insofar as they exhibit vices. Only
secondarily are our moral judgments concerned with
specific actions. We praise or blame others because they
reveal morally admirable qualities in the agent.

B. Virtues would not be virtues unless possession of them

were in some sense an advantage. In fact, Hume, an
action is only virtuous if it proceeds from a virtuous
motive. So if an action lacks a virtuous motive, that
action is not virtuous even if it is the same type of action
as a genuinely virtuous action.
 11. Differences:
Hume disagrees with Plato and Aristotle on the following:

A. Differences emerges when we look at what Hume

counts as virtues.

1. For Hume, what makes various qualities

“virtues” is that they are useful or
agreeable with, either to the possessor or
to others.

2. For Hume, in contrast to Plato and Aristotle,

thinks that not only qualities useful or agreeable
to their possessor, but also qualities useful or
agreeable to others, are regarded virtues.
 11. Differences:
Hume contends that virtues may be immediately pleasing, in
which case he describes the qualities as “agreeable”; or may
be an indirect advantage-i.e., possession of such qualities may
help to promote states of affairs which in their turn are
pleasurable, and these are these are the qualities which Hume
describes as ‘useful.’ He parts company from Plato and
Aristotle, however, in that he thinks that not only qualities are
useful or agreeable to their possessor, but also qualities useful
or agreeable to others, are regarded as virtues
 11. Differences:
B. Benevolence also marks a decisive shift from the standpoint of
the Greeks.

1. Hume states that ‘the epithets [labels] sociable, good-

natured, humane, merciful, grateful, friendly,
generous, beneficent, or their equivalents…
universally express the highest merit which human
nature is capable of attaining (II.1).’

2. Benevolence is a quality the exercise of which

promotes the happiness or well-being of people in
general, and because, through sympathy, we take
pleasure in this general happiness or well-being, we
are led to admire the quality which promotes it.
 11. Differences:
3. Since Hume disagrees with Plato and Aristotle’s
metaphysics and believes these virtues are sourced in
man’s constitution we understand why he would
regard benevolence the highest merit.

4. In fact, Hume’s notion of sympathy sets him apart from

the egoistic perspective of Plato and Aristotle though he
does abandon his reliance on sympathy and revert to
self-love in part II of Enquiry’s conclusion.
 11. Differences:
B. Hobbes:

1. Hume rejects Hobbes harsh egoistic depiction of human

psychology and strong authoritarianism and states
(Hume) that we are not wholly self-seeking; we can take
immediate pleasure in the flourishing of others.

2. Virtue of justice develops out of the self-regulation of

our desire for possessions, in an implicit denial of
Hobbes’ view that there can be no justice without
external regulations by a stronger ruler. Life in a secular
world need not be grim; it can be both enjoyable and
free.