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From: dcs2e@darwin.clas.Virginia.EDU (David Christopher Swanson)
Subject: Hume's Wisdom
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Date: Mon, 7 Nov 1994 04:51:47 GMT
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A passage from David Hume well worth considering:


        In my opinion, there are two things which have led
astray those 
philosophers that have insisted so much on the selfishness of
man.  In the 
first place, they found that every act of virtue or friendship
was attended 
with a secret pleasure; whence they concluded, that friendship
and virtue could 
not be disinterested.  But the fallacy of this is obvious.  The
virtuous 
sentiment or passion produces the pleasure, and does not arise
from it.  I feel 
a pleasure in doing good to my friend, because I love him; but
do not love him 
for the sake of that pleasure.
        In the second place, it has always been found, that the
virtuous are 
far from being indifferent to praise; and therefore they have
been represented 
as a set of vainglorious men, who had nothing in view but the
applauses of 
others.  But this also is a fallacy.  It is very unjust in the
world, when they 
find any tincture of vanity in a laudable action, to depreciate
it upon that 
account, or ascribe it entirely to that motive.  The case is
not the same with 
vanity, as with other passions.  Where avarice or revenge
enters into any 
seemingly virtuous action, it is difficult for us to determine
how far it 
enters, and it is natural to suppose it the sole actuating
principle.  But 
vanity is so closely allied to virtue, and to love the fame of
laudable actions 
approaches so near the love of laudable actions for their own
sake, that these 
passions are more capable of mixture, than any other kinds of
affection; and it 
is almost impossible to have the latter without some degree of
the former.  
Accordingly we find, that this passion for glory is always
warped and varied 
according to the particular taste or disposition of the mind on
which it falls. 
 Nero had the same vanity in driving a chariot, that Trajan had
in governing 
the empire with justice and ability.  To love the glory of
virtuous deeds is a 
sure proof of the love of virtue.

David Hume
