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David Hume and the eighteenth-century conception of natural law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Philip Milton
Philip Milton*
Affiliation:
University of Leicester
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Extract

Natural law is discussed by almost every modern writer on jurisprudence; but with a few exceptions - of which John Finnis' Natural Law and Natural Rights is the most substantial - the impression given is that it is of historical interest only, that it has in some way been discredited, or at least superseded, by legal positivism. The implicit idea - and here legal positivism borrows from Comte - is that natural law represented some earlier ‘metaphysical’ stage which was then followed by ‘scientific’ legal positivism. This account requires the existence of a natural law theory that dominated juristic and philosophical thinking until the eighteenth century, when it was overthrown by Hume and Bentham. Hume, the story goes, found the decisive argument against the natural law theory; while Bentham created the new theory oflegal positivism. The argument Hume discovered was that ought cannot be derived from is; and this, it is widely supposed, is fatal to all varieties of natural law.

Type
Research Article
Information
Legal Studies , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , March 1982 , pp. 14 - 33
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Legal Scholars 1982

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References

1. Lord Lloyd of Hampstead, Introduction to Jurisprudence, (4th edn, London, 1979). p. 11. Of Moore's argument against the naturalistic fallacy I shall say nothing here; but it should not be too readily identified with Hume's. Some authors have even identified natural law and ethical naturalism -an example is Smith, J.C., Legal Obligation (London, 1976), p. 17 Google ScholarPubMed. For Moore's accounts of the naturalistic fallacy see Moore, G.E., Principia Ethica (Cambridge, 1903), pp. 10–20, 39–44, and 113–14Google Scholar. Anticipation of his arguments can be found in the writings of some of the seventeenth and eighteenth century Britain rationalists. For a very good account see Prior, Arthur N., Logic and the Basis of Ethics (Oxford, 1949)Google Scholar.

2. Ibid., p. 282.

3. Friedmann, W., Legal Theory, (5th edn, London, 1967), p. 129 Google Scholar.

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5. The Works of Jeremy Bentham, ed. Bowring, John, 11 vols (Edinburgh, 1843) V, p. 389 Google Scholar.

6. Ibid., VIII, p. 128 n.

7. Hume, David, A Treatise of Human Nature, III.i.1, ed. Selby-Bigge, L.A., 2nd edn rev. Nidditch, P.H. (Oxford, 1978), pp. 469–470 Google Scholar. Cited Subsequently as “Treatise’.

8. Perhaps the most striking example is that there was no mention of it in Norman Kemp Smith's massive The Philosophy of David Hume (London, 1941). An important article on the correct interpretation of Hume's argument was A.C. MacIntyre ‘Hume on “Is” and “Ought”’, Philosophical Review, 68 (1959), pp. 451–468. This and some of the many articles that followed are reprinted in Hume ed. V.C. Chappell (London, 1968) and The Is-Ought Question ed. W.D. Hudson (London, 1969). There is a good discussion of the passage, its possible interpretations and its connections with natural law in Finnis, John, Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford, 1980), pp. 33–48 Google Scholar.

9. ‘My own Life’ in The Letters of David Hume, ed. J.Y.T. Grieg, 2 vols (Oxford, 1932), 1,4.

10. Treatise, II.iii.3, p. 415.

11. Ibid., p. 416. John Finnis comments that ‘… Hume lacks any clear conception of, or systematic interest in the concept of, justifying reasons.’Natural Law and Natural Rights, p. 41. But Hume had very definite ideas about justifying reasons. He denied that there are or could be any such things.

14. Trans. W.D. Ross (Oxford, 1915), 1139a 35–36.

13. Trans. St. George Stock (Oxford, 1915), 1206b 17–22.

14. Treatise, III.i.1, p. 456.

15. Ibid., III.i.2, p. 479.

16. Ibid., III.i.1, p. 466. From this, as Hume was well aware, it follows that reason cannot discover causal relations: ‘all our reasonings concerning causes and effects are derived from nothing but custom …’Treatise, I.iv.i, p. 183.

17. An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, Appendix I, ed. Selby-Bigge, L.A., 2nd edn. rev. Nidditch, P.H. (Oxford, 1975), p. 289 Google Scholar. Cited subsequently as “Enquiry’.

18. Treatise, III.i.1, pp. 468–9.

19. Section I, pp. 169–170.

20. For Locke's interest in the variety of moral practices, see John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), 1.iii.8, ed. P.H. Nidditch (Oxford, 1975). Cited subsequently as “Essay’. An earlier and longer discussion can be found in the unpublished Essays on the Law of Nature (c. 1660-4), ed. W. von Leyden (Oxford, 1954), pp. 161–79. Locke's fascination with the bizarre extended also to the natural world, as witness his claim to have seen the issue of a cat and a rat (Essay, III.vi.23) and the extraordinary account of the rational parrot (ibid., II.xxvii.8).

21. Grundlegung zur Metphysik der Sitten (1785), trans. Paton, H.J. as The Moral Law (London, 1948), p. 88.Google Scholar

22. Enquiry, pp. 335–336.

23. Page xviin.

24. III.i.1, pp. 461–462. In fairness to Wollaston, his theory was not as preposterous as Hume made it appear. See Feinberg, Joel, ‘Wollaston and his Critics’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 38 (1977), pp. 345–352 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25. A Letter from a Gentleman to his friend in Edinburgh, eds. Mossner, E.C. and Price, J.V. (Edinburgh, 1967), p. 30.Google Scholar

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27. Mossner, E.C., ‘Hume's Early Memoranda, 1729-1740: The Complete Text’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 9 (1948). pp. 492–518 at p. 517CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28. Hume to Francis Hutcheson, 17 September 1739, Letter, 1, 34.

29. Appendix IV, p. 319.

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31. Ibid., section 225. For a more elaborate discussion of this passage, see Finnis. Natural Law and Natural Rights, pp. 39–42.

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33. The Works of Thomas Reid Sir William Hamilton, (8th edn, Edinburgh, 1895), 2 vols, II.645.

34. Active Powers, V.vii, Works, 11.675.

35. Ibid., Works, II.676.

36. Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1785), VII.iii, Works, 1.480.

37. Active Powers, V.ii, Works, II.640.

38. Treatise, III.ii.3–6.

39. Treatise, III.ii.8, p. 543.

40. Ibid., III.iii.6, p. 620.

41. Ibid., III.ii.1, p. 484.

42. Enquiry, Appendix III, p. 307n. See also Treatise, III.i.2, pp. 473–6.

43. Treatise, III.i.2, p. 475. In the Enquiry (Appendix III, p. 308n) these disputes are dismissed as ‘merely verbal’.

44. For example, Raphael, D.D., ‘Hume's Critique of Ethical Rationalism’. in Hume and the Enlightenment, ed. Todd, W.B. (Edinburgh, 1974). pp. 14–29 at p. 15Google Scholar.

45. Treatise, III.i.2, p. 471.

46. Ibid., III.i.1, p. 465.

47. Ibid., III.ii.2, p. 496.

48. Section III, Part II, p 197n. Appendix I, p. 292.

49. The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), eds. Raphael, D.D. and Macfie, A.L. (Oxford, 1976), VII.iii.2, pp. 318–321 Google Scholar.

50. Bentham, Jeremy, Of Laws in General, ed. Hart, H.L.A. (London, 1970), p. 3n Google Scholar.

51. SirMaine, Henry, Ancient Law, (15th edn, London, 1894), p. 3 Google Scholar.

52. For example, Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, 4 vols (Oxford, 1765), 1.41.

53. Passive Obedience (1712) section 15, in The Works of George Berkeley, eds. A.A. Luce and T.E. Jessop, 9 vols (London. 1918–57). vol. VI.

54. Ibid., section 33.

55. Robert Boyle, A Free Enquiry into the Vulgarly Received Notion of Nature (1686), in Selected Philosophical Paws of Robert Boyle, ed. M.A. Stewart (Manchester, 1979), p. 181.

56. Treatise, pp. 484, 509n, 520, 526, 533, 543, 567, 597. Enquiry, p. 305.

57. Active Powers, V.iii, Works II. 643. Paley made a similar point: ‘Moral Philosophy, Morality, Ethics, Casuistry, Natural Law, mean all the same thing…’ William Paley, The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785). (11th edn, London, 1796), p. 1.

58. Active Powers, IV.ix, Works, II.628.

59. J.S. Mill, ‘Nature’ in Three Essays on Religion, in Collected Works, Vol. X, Essays on Ethics Religion and Society, ed. J.M. Robson (Toronto, 1969), p. 378.

60. Essay, IV.xii.10.

61. Ibid., IV.xii.11.

64. Ibid., III.xi.16; IV.iii.18; IV.iv.7; IV.xii.8.

63. John Austin, Lectures on Jurisprudence, (4th edn, London, 1873), 2 vols 1.88.

64. Ibid., I.106.

65. Essay, II.xxviii.7.

66. Tyrrell to Locke, 27 July 1690; Locke to Tyrrell, 4 August 1690, Tyrrell to Locke, 30 August 1690. Correspondence Of John Locke, ed. E.S. De Beer. 8 vols (Oxford, 1976), IV.107–9; 110–13; 116–19.

67. Essay, II.xxviii.8. In the Essays on the law of Nature Locke stated that natural and divine positive law ‘differ only in method of promulgation and the way in which we know them …’ (p. 189).

68. Ibid., I.iii.13.

69. Lord King, The Life of John Locke, with Extracts from his Correspondence Journals and Commonplace Books, 2 vols (London, 1830), II.133.

70. A Treatise concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality, I.ii.6, in British Moralists, section 126.

71. On this question see John Passmore, Ralph Cudworth (Cambridge, 1951), pp. 90–6.

72. See, for example, the description of the eternal law in The Works of John Locke, 9 vols (London, 1824), VI.112.

73. Ibid., VI.140.

74. Molyneux to Locke, 27 August 1692,22 December 1692,2 March 1693,16 September 1693. Correspondence, IV.508, 602, 649, 729.

75. Some notes survive among Locke's papers: see Thomas Sargentich, ‘Locke and Ethical Theory: Two MS Pieces’, Locke Newsletter 5 (1974). pp. 24–31. The two examples of moral demonstration given in Essay, IV.iii.18 are not impressive. For Hume's comment see Treatise, III.i.1, p. 463. Reid discussed Locke's moral demonstrations in Intellectual Powers, VII.ii. See also G.W. Leibniz, New Essays on Human Understanding, IV.iii.18.

76. Locke to Molyneux, 20 September 1692, Correspondence, IV.524.

77. For Locke's view that physical laws depend on the ‘arbitrary Will and good Pleasure’ of God, see Essay, IV.iii.29.

78. On this point see Oakley, Francis, ‘Medieval Theories of Natural Law: William of Ockham and the significance of the Voluntarist Tradition’ (1961), 6 Natural Law Forum, pp. 65–83 Google Scholar. On the nominalist influence on Locke see Milton, J.R., ‘John Locke and the Nominalist Tradition’ in John Locke: symposium Wolfenbüttel 1979, ed. Brandt, Reinhard (Berlin, 1981). pp. 128–145 Google Scholar.

79. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (1651), Ch.16, ed. C.B. Macpherson (Harmondsworth, 1968). pp. 216–217. In a later chapter Hobbes made the same point: ‘For the Lawes of Nature, which consist in Equity, Justice, Gratitude and other moral virtues on these depending, in the condition of meer Nature …are not properly Lawes, but qualities that dispose men to peace, and to obedience. When a Commonwealth is once settled, then they are actually Lawes, and not before …’ Ch.26, p. 314.

80. Essay, II.xxviii.6.

81. Hart, H.L.A., The Concept of Law (Oxford, 1961). pp. 189–195 Google Scholar.

82. Critique of Pure Reason (1781), trans. Norman Kemp Smith (London, 1933), A 318-9 = B 375.