Chapter 11 - Hume on Religion in the Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals

Summary

In this chapter I argue that despite Hume’s explicit criticisms of enthusiasm and superstition in the Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals (EPM), his more important targets are the orthodox and moderate Protestants of his time who would also scorn enthusiasm and superstition, and those philosophers who mixed Protestant accounts of virtue and duty with their philosophy. I show that Hume rejects central aspects of two prominent Protestant texts, The Whole Duty of Man and the Westminster Confession of Faith, but also borrows some of their language and mimics their style. Hume rejects The Whole Duty of Man’s catalog of duties limited to voluntary traits, and the Confession’s account of the sole purpose of man as well as its view of human nature. Still, in EPM Hume seems to use the style and language of these texts in order to be equally influential, to push religion back into the temple (and out of the public space), and to bring his moral philosophy out of the closet into common life in order to give it more extensive recognition as the accurate description of virtue and vice. EPM, therefore, is Hume’s own secular but religiously styled credo on duty and virtue.