Where the deity is represented as infinitely superior to mankind, this belief, though altogether just, is apt, when joined with superstitious terrors, to sink the human mind into the lowest submission and abasement, and to represent the monkish virtues of mortification, penance, humility, and passive suffering, as the only qualities which are acceptable to him. But where the Gods are conceived to be only a little superior to mankind, and to have been, many of them, advanced from that inferior rank, we are more at our ease in our addresses to them, and may even, without profaneness, aspire sometimes to a rivalship and emulation of them. Hence activity, spirit, courage, magnanimity, love of liberty, and all the virtues which aggrandise a people.
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This gave rise to the observation of Machiavel,3 that the doctrines of the Christian religion (meaning the Catholic; for he knew no other) which recommend only passive courage and suffering, had subdued the spirit of mankind, and had fitted them for slavery and subjection. An observation which would certainly be just, were there not many other circumstances in human society which control the genius and character of a religion.--David Hume, Section X, The Natural History of Religion.
Inspired by a fine session featuring Liz Goodnick and Andre Willis at the Hume Society on Hume's The Natural History of Religion (NHR), I reread the work. Section X is very brief. (The quoted passages gives the gist.) It is part of a series of sections in which Hume criticizes the political consequences of Christianity. (This is compatible with the more descriptive and explanatory features of the work.)
The section echoes Hume's general critical attitude toward the s0-called "monkish virtues;" but he draws out a further consequence of them that goes beyond the (earlier) second Enquiry. There he had said the virtues "neither advance a man’s fortune in the world, nor render him a more valuable member of society; neither qualify him for the entertainment of company, nor encrease his power of self-enjoyment about his view that these virtues are not just bad." (EPM 9.3) In NHR Hume claims, in addition to the earlier treatment, that the monkish virtues undermine the political order, especially those social virtues needed for (i) war-making and those (ii) that preserve freedom.On (i): Hume's use of "aggrandise" signals his concern with the great power status in international affairs. (Hume is no pacifist.)
Hume here (NHR X) comes very close to sounding like a Republican political theorist (even if he disapproves of lots of features of Republicanism elsewhere), and it is no surprise that he approves of Machiavelli in context. His criticism of Machiavelli implies that according to Hume religion is shaped not so much by its doctrinal commitments but by other institutions of society (leaving aside the role of revelation). In turn, religion, shapes the dispositions of a people which, alongside other social causes (including the role of sympathy), creates a national character. (Hume fleshes out the story in his essay, Of National Characters, -- "The genius of a particular sect or religion is also apt to mould the manners of a people.")
It also follows from Hume's position (a) that the right sort of religion can be politically useful by aiding in the development of the right sort of (to use an anachronistic term) social psychology (i.e., one that incentive-izes emulation of the Gods). Moreover, (b) while a particular religion has, shall we say, a regular impact, or tendency, on political life, (b*) the way a particular religion is politically useful (or not) will depend on other social institutions (and the international context). As should be evident, (c) one's evaluation of the consequences of a particular religion also depends on the aims of a polity one is willing to endorse/pursue. If (as I read NHR) the psychological impulses that give rise to religion as such cannot be eradicated -- at least among the majority --, then we should expect to find in Hume a program for the reform of or a new religion. That is, by his own lights, Hume ought to be a philosophical legislator (or a philosophical prophet in my sense) of religion.
When Hume claims that the monkish virtues undermine the political order, does that imply that reason of state is a normative claim that we can go against by practicing those virtues? It is also interesting that given the descriptive claim about the religion as shaping people, he somehow sees the goal of the polity as cut off from them. As if they could cut themselves off from history at will. I wonder if this is an element of him trying to conceptualize of a break of English State authority from Apostolic Succession and carve a political space for it.
Posted by: Aaron Alvarez | 07/25/2015 at 09:03 PM