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Self-Love and Self-Liking in the Moral and Political Philosophy of Bernard Mandeville and David Hume

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Self-Love and Self-Liking in the Moral and Political Philosophy of Bernard Mandeville and David Hume Self-love and self-liking in the moral and political philosophy of Bernard Mandeville and David Hume MIKKO TOLONEN i ii MIKKO TOLONEN Self-love and self-liking in the moral and political philosophy of Bernard Mandeville and David Hume Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by due permission of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Helsinki in auditorium XII, on the 5th of January, 2010 at 12 o’clock. iii Helsinki 2009 Copyright: Mikko Tolonen ISBN: 978-952-92-6669-2 Hansaprint Oy iv CONTENTS Acknowledgements vi Abbreviations and conventions viii Introduction 1 PART I: INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT OF BERNARD MANDEVILLE 23 1. Mandeville and the publishing history of The Fable of the Bees 24 2. Early Mandeville and Pierre Nicole 93 3. Later Mandeville and the history of civil society 150 PART II: DAVID HUME AND GREATNESS OF MIND 191 4. Portrait of a gentleman 192 5. Social theory of A treatise of human nature 236 6. Politics and the science of man in Hume’s Essays 302 Epilogue: Hume’s mature position on greatness of mind 356 Bibliography 360 v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Markku Peltonen introduced me to intellectual history and suggested the study of David Hume for my master’s thesis in 2001. Three profound impacts have shaped my research since then. My involvement in the postgraduate studies network Meaning, Language and Changing Cultures at the University of Helsinki since 2003 steered my work into a philosophical direction thanks to the influence of Simo Knuuttila and Kari Saastamoinen. A turn toward book history, inspired by Noel Malcolm and Richard Serjeantson, occurred during my stay in Cambridge in 2005–2006. But the most important transformation concerned my attitude and it was solely influenced by Markku Peltonen’s example of a hardworking scholar. I am deeply grateful to all the people who have been involved in the process of writing this thesis. I am particularly thankful to Markku Peltonen for his supervision and support. He took an interest in my work early on, encouraged me to learn more and never slipped into unnecessary formalities. Kari Saastamoinen has read and commented on my work at different stages and provided not only moral but also financial support giving me a job as his research assistant when it was most needed. The pre- examiners John Robertson and Richard Serjeantson have gone through the extensive trouble of carefully reading the manuscript offering many invaluable suggestions on how to improve it. It is an honour that John Robertson agreed to act as the official opponent. I would like to thank Richard Serjeantson, too, for his amity and indispensable help. Thanks are also due to Mikko Saikku as the representative of the Faculty of Arts at the public defence of the dissertation. I thank the network Meaning, Language and Changing Cultures at the University of Helsinki and particularly Päivi Pahta, who coordinated the network during my funding period. More recently, I have become a member of the Philosophical Psychology, Morality and Politics Research Unit (PMP), a Centre of Excellence in research of the Academy of Finland. I am very grateful to Simo Knuuttila for the opportunity to be part of PMP. I would also like to thank Juha Sihvola, Virpi Mäkinen and extend my appreciation to the entire unit and the Early Modern Ethics and Politics Team in particular. In addition, generous grants from the Cultural Foundation (Ida Sabina Packalén Fund and Taru, Ilmari and Pentti Manninen Fund), the Ella and Georg Ehrnrooth Foundation and Academy of Finland grant for research abroad are gratefully acknowledged. A part of Chapter 5 has appeared in Hume Studies. The Renvall Institute has been my collegial home. I would like to thank the directors of the Institute, Tuomas M. S. Lehtonen for taking me on board and Lars-Folke Landgrén for letting me stay. I am also grateful to all the members of the Institute, especially my former and present colleagues in the Prussian Room for tolerating my occasional unsociability. In addition ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS to comradeship, I thank Jani Marjanen for his help in preparing this dissertation for printing. At the Department of History, Erkki Kouri has always supported my aspirations. I would like to thank the members of Kouri’s and Peltonen’s research seminars. I have had the opportunity to test and develop the arguments of this dissertation in front of international audiences. Of all the valuable gatherings, I would like to mention the 32nd Annual Hume Conference in Toronto in July 2005 and the Hont-Robertson Intellectual History Symposium organised by Knud Haakonssen in Sussex in May 2006. I would also like to thank Donald Ainslie, Hans Blom, Rachel Cohon, Harold J. Cook, Michael B. Gill, Edward Hundert, Roger Emerson, Giles Mandelbrote, James Moore, Irwin Primer, M. A. Stewart, John P. Wright and, in particular, Noel Malcolm for discussing different aspects of this work with me. Furthermore, I would like to thank the staff of the British Library; University Library, Cambridge; the Wren Library; King’s College Library, Cambridge; The Bodleian Library; Amherst College Library; The National Library of Finland; the Wellcome Library; the National Library of Scotland and the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Friendship and scholarship may go hand in hand. I would like to acknowledge the History of Philosophy Research Seminar at the University of Helsinki and the former Pengerkadun Koulukunta in Kallio. While it would be impossible to thank all the individuals who have helped this process, I would like to mention my debts of gratitude to Doohwan Ahn, Jani Hakkarainen, Marc Hanvelt, Jan Hartman, Pirkko Hautamäki, Felicity Henderson, Petter Korkman, Juhana Lemetti, Vili Lähteenmäki, Antti Matikkala, Heikki Mikkeli, Ville Paukkonen, Martina Reuter, Sami-Juhani Savonius-Wroth, Koen Stapelbroek, Jaakko Tahkokallio and Antti Tahvanainen. I am privileged to have friends I have known since we were little boys. They decided to pursue careers in fields other than the Humanities, but it would be scurrilous of me not to express my unreserved gratitude to Riku, Tommi, Otto and Samu. My ever-supporting parents Mai and Pauli, my brother Otto and my in- laws in Argentina have been a crucial source of help and support. My son Maximo has brightened my days since my work on Hume began in 2001. He will make a tremendous older brother when Minimo is born next spring. My wife Laura has been with me since we were 17-year-old high-school exchange students on a strange North American continent back in 1993. Laura has not only shared most of her life with me, she also came to the rescue and corrected the language of this thesis – and like the first day I met her, she still has black hair. Espoo, December 2009 MT vii ABBREVIATIONS AND CONVENTIONS The following abbreviations and short-title references are used throughout the dissertation. BL British Library, London Bodl. Bodleian Library, Oxford CUL University Library, Cambridge EHU David Hume, An enquiry concerning human understanding, Tom L. Beauchamp, ed., Oxford University Press, 2000. EPM David Hume, An enquiry concerning the principles of morals, Tom L. Beauchamp, ed., Oxford University Press, 1998. Hume, ‘Essay on David Hume, ‘A historical essay on chivalry and chivalry and modern modern honour’, Ernest Campbell Mossner, ed., honour’ Modern philology, 45, 1947, pp. 57–60. Hume, Essays David Hume, Essays: moral, political and literary, Eugene F. Miller, ed., 2nd ed., Liberty Classics, 1987. Hume, History David Hume, The history of England. From the invasion of Julius Caesar to the revolution in 1688, William B. Todd, ed., 6 vols., Liberty Fund, 1983. Hume, Letters David Hume, The letters of David Hume, J. Y. T. Greig, ed., 2 vols., Oxford, 1932. Hume, New letters David Hume, New letters of David Hume, Raymond Klibansky and Ernest C. Mossner, eds., Oxford Clarendon Press, 1954. Mandeville, The Fable Bernard Mandeville, The fable of the bees, or private of the Bees vices, publick benefits, with a commentary critical, historical, and explanatory by F. B. Kaye, 2 vols., Liberty Fund, [1924], 1988, volume I. ABBREVIATIONS AND CONVENTIONS Mandeville, Part II Bernard Mandeville, The fable of the bees, or private vices, publick benefits, with a commentary critical, historical, and explanatory by F. B. Kaye, 2 vols., Liberty Fund, [1924], 1988, volume II. T David Hume, A treatise of human nature, David Fate Norton and Mary J. Norton, eds., Oxford University Press, 2007. References to Hume’s works follow the standard method of the Hume Society. I am citing the Treatise according to the policy where one cites both the Clarendon Edition of the Works of David Hume and the older Selby- Bigge/Nidditch (SBN) edition. The editors of the Clarendon edition of the works of David Hume have attached a number to every paragraph, and refer to particular pages by a series of Arabic numerals. Thus, “T 3.1.1.9” refers to the Treatise III i 1, at SBN 458. (My citing of the previous example would be T 3.1.1.9; SBN 458.) When I refer to this work in the text, I use either A treatise of human nature or the Treatise. I cite Enquiry concerning the principles of morals following a similar principle, citing the paragraph from the Clarendon edition and indicating the corresponding page in the Selby- Bigge/Nidditch (SBN) edition. When I have seen it necessary to modify the use of standard editions of Hume’s works (including his Essays), I refer to the original edition in the footnote. When I specifically refer to an editor’s commentary of a particular work, I refer to him instead of the author. For example, F. B. Kaye’s introduction to his edition of The Fable of the Bees would be cited: Kaye, The Fable of the Bees, pp.
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