Of Hume and Avarice - University of Arizona



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Title: Of Hume, Greed, and Passions

Date Submitted: November 1, 2004

Of Hume, Greed, and Passions

Abstract

In this era of Enron, Worldcom, and Oil-for-food scandals greed is a topic of major concern throughout the world. In the modern era greed is one of many vices used to illustrate discussions of character and motivation. However, greed is rarely defined or given a full treatment as to its nature and moral psychology. David Hume discusses the value of wealth and “riches” in his moral system. He also uses greed in the form of “avarice” in a list of vices and virtues when expounding on his theory of the passions. It is only in an essay “Of Avarice” that he attempts to treat acquisitive avarice and retentive avarice (miserliness) at some length. However, Hume never formally categorizes either avarice or miserliness into one of his passions. This paper looks at Hume’s discussion of avarice in his various major texts and attempts to assess where Hume might have placed it within his system of passions, recognizing that Hume has two types of passions, “inferior” and “mixt,” which he doesn’t sufficiently explicate. Ultimately I conclude that acquisitive avarice is a type of mixt passion and miserliness is an indirect passion. At the same time broader questions of Hume’s understanding of “mixt” and “inferior” passions are explored.

Of Hume, Greed, and Passions

It is through the hustle of commerce and the arts, through the greedy self-interest of profit, and through softness and love of amenities that personal services are replaced by money payments. Men surrender a part of their profits in order to have time to increase them at leisure. Make gifts of money, and you will not be long without chains.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Social Contract, Book III, Chapter 15

Greed is prominent in today’s headlines. From Enron to Worldcom to Alan Greenspan’s “infectious greed,” everyone is talking about it. Given the currency of this topic, it’s only natural to ask, “How does David Hume assess this vice?” For Hume greed is a core moral passion for the basis of society related to property rights, central to his discussion of the origin of justice and the state, and a critical component of his defense of commercialism. Yet Hume’s use of the term “avarice” makes it difficult for the reader to understand what Hume means by avarice, where it comes from, and how to cure it when it becomes excessive. Hume calls avarice a vice and a passion, but never tells us what type of passion it is, or how it fits into his moral schema. In this paper I show that Hume’s notion of avarice is complex and enigmatic. He conflates and differentiates avarice from miserliness, really two passions, the first of which I assess as a type of Hume’s “mixt” passion, and the second of which is an indirect passion. Only one of these passions is a motivating passion, and therefore a true morally blameworthy vice as defined by Hume.

In the eighteenth century “greed” as we use it today was generally called “avarice.”[1] There are several forms of greed, all of which have material goods as their object of desire or control. Those goods can include money or other material possessions. Avarice always indicates a condition that is a problem of “…self-regulating [and] of disproportion.”[2] In contemporary usage the term “greed” has multiple meanings: (a) we might say someone’s action is greedy by viewing an individual’s single act that is the pursuit of some material possession unfairly. (b) We might characterize someone as greedy by watching their actions over time, observing that they have certain habits of action that are consistently oriented toward the dogged, insatiable accumulation of material goods. It is this form of greed that I will call ”avarice” in this paper. (c) We might call someone greedy because they hoard their wealth[3] and don’t use it for the pursuit of pleasure for themselves or their loved ones, what I call “miserliness” herein.. (d) Or we might say a person is greedy when they don’t share their wealth (no matter how big or small their wealth may be) in charitable ways; that is, when they lack generosity; what I will term “stinginess.”

Greed of type (a) above may be an aberration of an individual’s normal temperaments. Indeed, in a reflective moment we generally could not say that someone has a greedy character if they perform only a single, time-limited act. Hume does not address this type of greed directly. Avarice according to Hume is the rabid pursuit of the accumulation of possessions. He mentions this type of greed only sporadically in his Treatise and Enquiries, but more systematically in his essay, “Of Avarice.”[4]

Stinginess Hume only sporadically addresses, as lack of generosity or charitableness. While I will briefly address type (a) greed below (and show how I agree with Hume that this is not really greed as a vice), for the most part in this paper I shall focus on avarice and miserliness, traits that Hume sometimes considers as components of a single “avarice,” and sometimes treats separately. In order to show how avarice and miserliness are truly different types of passions, I will first discuss Hume’s view of avarice and miserliness, then discuss his system of the passions, motives, and virtues/vices, and finally showing why avarice only is a motivating, mixt passion, while miserliness is a type of indirect passion.

I.

Hume’s characterization of avarice is closely related to what he calls “riches” – the pursuit or aggregation of material goods. In order to understand the underlying concern Hume has with avarice, we first need to view his understanding of riches in ordinary human life.

Riches are something to be admired and pursued. “The very essence of riches consists in the power of procuring the pleasures and conveniencies of life.” (2.1.10.10, 205) Hume states in EPM: “riches are desired for ourselves only as the means of gratifying our appetites, either at present or in some imaginary future period”. (EPM 6.33, 129) Owning possessions has a purpose: to gratify our appetites now or in the future. Possessions are instrumental in their value. They are to be used for a purpose, not as a pursuit in and of themselves.[5]

Luxury is beneficial for the enjoyment of life; the intrinsic good of luxury is valuable and cause for increasing happiness, though “when carried a degree too far, is a quality pernicious, though perhaps not the most pernicious, to political society.” (“Of Refinement in the Arts” EPML, 269) Though Hume does claim there is an upper limit to the love of money itself, he doesn’t seem to put an upper limit on riches per se, yet he describes the point at which luxury can be pursued “a degree too far”:

No gratification, however sensual, can of itself be esteemed vicious. A gratification is only vicious, when it engrosses all a man’s expence, and leaves no ability for such acts of duty and generosity as are required by his situation and fortune. (EPML, p279)

Furthermore, we can never possess enough goods to gratify our appetites, though to the ordinary person excessively pursuing possessions is frightening, requiring internal virtuous character traits and external social traits to restrain ourselves in that pursuit:

This avidity alone, of acquiring goods and possessions for ourselves and our nearest friends, is insatiable, perpetual, universal, and directly destructive of society. There scarce is any one, who is not actuated by it; and there is no one, who has not reason to fear from it, when it acts without any restraint, and gives way to its first and most natural movements. So that upon the whole, we are to esteem the difficulties in the establishment of society, to be greater or less, according to those we encounter in regulating and restraining this passion. (3.2.2.12, 316)

In other words, avarice type (b), the insatiable pursuit of wealth accumulation, is a natural tendency only controlled by artificial constraints imposed by society. To act on this tendency is to be human. To not act on this tendency must be a learned trait. This “avidity” to pursue wealth is the most dangerous of our tendencies, and therefore the most important purpose of society:

No one can doubt, that the convention for the distinction of property, and for the stability of possession, is of all circumstances the most necessary to the establishment of human society, and that after the agreement for the fixing and observing of this rule, there remains little or nothing to be done towards settling a perfect harmony and concord. (3.2.2.12, pp315-6)

We admire the rich and seem to take pleasure in their riches in several ways. Yet at the same time we envy them their possessions and luxuries which accrue from them. Thus from the third person perspective, riches provide conflicting emotions. If owned by others, according to Hume, we admire them. If not owned by us, we pursue them. Yet also Hume clearly states that riches, if owned by others, cause in us envy,[6] a painful passion, which may or may not motivate us to pursue riches for ourselves. When we reflect on our own condition and compare it to that of those with more than we have, whether it be wealth, power, or reputation, we feel a pleasure or pain depending on if we compare ourselves favorably or lesser off.[7] Hence envy is produced in us when we view another’s enjoyment, compare that enjoyment to our own, find our own wanting, and therefore feel the pain of our inadequacy. This can be quite useful in motivating us, if we are motivated in the right direction, in this case toward commerce.

For the most part, Hume has an entirely different take on the value of envy and avarice when it comes to commerce.[8] He states that avarice is a useful trait in commerce – perhaps even a virtue – particularly where it helps to build industry for society. In his essay “Of Commerce” [9] Hume states that commerce enhances the state by building tax revenues and egalitarianism, by improving the lot of all citizens without having to overly burden the lesser-off citizens with excessive taxes.

Every person, if possible, ought to enjoy the fruits of his labour, in a full possession of all the necessaries, and many of the conveniences of life […] an equality is most suitable to human nature, and diminishes much less from the happiness of the rich than it adds to that of the poor.” (EPML, p265)

This also makes taxation more palatable, as “[…] when the riches are dispersed among multitudes, the burthen feels light on every shoulder, and the taxes make not a very sensible difference on any one’s way of living.” (Ibid.)

As the art of agriculture improves, laborers are less needed for husbandry, freeing them up to increase the manufacturing labor pool for production of goods and services that go beyond subsistence requirements into “manufactures and commodities.” The laborer, having the ability to obtain goods beyond subsistence, is motivated to work harder, producing more goods, which can then be taxed for their value added.

One of Hume’s general tenets is that we work because of our passions: “Every thing in the world is purchased by labour; and our passions are the only causes of labour.” (EPML, 261) Rotwein points out that avarice is “linked not to the desire for pleasure but rather to the pursuit of ‘lucrative employment’ qua action.”[10] The state should use this source of motivation by using the passions “to govern men by other passions, and animate them with a spirit of avarice and industry, art and luxury.” (EPML, p263) In this regard, he is consistent with Mandeville, who goes farther than Hume and praises the vices of pride, avarice, and the avid pursuit of enjoyment as a way of helping nation-states increase their prosperity.[11] However Hume deviates from Mandeville in recommending moderation. As Frey states, “pursuit of self-interest in the marketplace is not the same as the reckless pursuit of it.”[12]

II.

The best excuse that can be made for avarice is, that it generally prevails in old men, or in men of cold tempers, where all the other affections are extinct, and the mind being incapable of remaining without some passion or pursuit, at last finds out this monstrously absurd one, which suits the coldness and inactivity of its temper. (EPML, p571)

In his essay “Of Avarice,” his longest treatment of avarice in any of his writings, Hume characterizes avarice as the most vicious of traits, the most “irreclaimable” vice. It is a passion that is so ingrained that it cannot be cured. Hume is so dismissive of avarice that he feels the only way to deal with the avaricious is through ridicule:

I am more apt to approve of those, who attack [avarice] with wit and humour, than of those who treat it in a serious manner. There being so little hopes of doing good to the people infected with this vice, I would have the rest of mankind, at least, diverted by our manner of exposing it… (EPML, pp571-2)

While elsewhere he seems to differentiate avarice from miserliness, in this essay Hume lumps them together as a compound vice: avaricious men are stereotyped as “…men of immense fortunes, without heirs, and on the very brink of the grave, who refuse themselves the most common necessaries of life, and go on heaping possessions on possessions, under all the real pressures of the severest poverty.” (EPML, p570) Hume characterizes avarice as an “inferior passion” that somehow has become a “predominant inclination.” (EPML, p571)[13] The avaricious person has no shame in his stinginess, and has no “…regard to the sentiments of mankind.” He doesn’t care about his reputation, friendships, or personal pleasures.

At the end of this essay Hume uses a parable of an individual, Avarice, being brought to judgment in front of Jupiter after having raped the bowels of Earth. Avarice is sentenced to restore what was “feloniously robbed…by ransacking [Earth’s] bosom” to return it back to Earth “without diminution or retention.” (EPML, p573) The implication by Hume is that the greatest punishment for the avaricious person is to be brought back to earth to see how his wealth is being used in instrumental ways, ways that would pain the greedy both in being contrary to his own nature, but also giving him the epiphany of how he could have enjoyed his wealth (either personally or charitably); that is, how his wealth might have brought him pleasure rather than such great concern and pain.

In the “Enquiries” Hume clearly states that avarice is a vice: “But these virtues were infinitely overbalanced by [Alexander the sixth’s] vices; no faith, no religion, insatiable avarice, exorbitant ambition, and a more than barbarous cruelty.” (EPM, Appendix 4.18, p182) Given that avarice is an insatiable quest for wealth, “insatiable avarice” seems redundant. This emphasis by Hume is curious and raises questions about his suggestion in “Of Avarice” that avarice is an “inferior passion.” It seems difficult to conceive how one can be insatiably insatiable and still be involved in a passion that is inferior, particularly because an inferior passion will be cancelled out by a superior one:

When two passions are already produc’d by their separate causes, and are both present in the mind, they readily mingle and unite, tho’ they have but one relation, and sometimes without any. The predominant passion swallows up the inferior, and converts it into itself. (2.3.4.2, p269)

What does this mean for avarice? On the one hand Hume tells us that avarice is such an irreclaimable vice that it cannot be cured. It is a natural tendency that is so strong that it is the basis for the establishment of society. On the other hand, avarice is a passion that is easily swallowed up by stronger, predominant, or more prevailing passions. Here he must be using avarice as a single motivating passion (type (a)) related to a single propensity toward acting that gets subsumed to some other, more “violent” passion that occurs en passant.

At the same time that Hume makes such strong claims about avarice as a moral vice, he lists avarice as one of the passions that does not fit into his moral system because there is not universal agreement about whether it is a blameworthy vice:

Avarice, ambition, vanity, and all passions vulgarly, though improperly, comprized under the denomination of self-love, are here excluded from our theory concerning the origin of morals, not because they are too weak, but because they have not a proper direction, for that purpose… The other passions produce, in every breast, many strong sentiments of desire and aversion, affection and hatred; but these neither are felt so much in common, nor are so comprehensive, as to be the foundation of any general system and established theory of blame or approbation. (EPM 9.5, p147-8)

Why is avarice, like ambition, not easily categorized as a vice in Hume’s system? Because avarice is something that only pleases the avaricious, not affecting the spectator.

…what serves my avarice or ambition pleases these passions in me alone, and affects not the avarice and ambition of the rest of mankind…But every man, so far removed as neither to cross nor serve my avarice and ambition, is regarded as wholly indifferent by those passions. (EPM 9.8, p149)

This is somewhat peculiar, because according to Hume’s moral system something cannot be a vice if it does not create a disagreeable feeling in the impartial third person observer, and clearly we do feel that excessive accumulation (or the pursuit of accumulation) of wealth with or without the enjoyment of it is a disagreeable sense in the average person. We tend to pity the unsuccessful avaricious person, and envy the successful one.[14]

It is clear that Hume prefers avarice and industriousness over indolence.[15] In his essay “Of Refinement of the Arts,” he argues, “Luxury, when excessive, is the source of many ills; but is in general preferable to sloth and idleness.” (EPML, p280) Elsewhere, he states,

If we ever give an indulgence to any quality, that disables a man from making a figure in life, `tis to that of indolence, which is not suppos'd to deprive one of his parts and capacity, but only suspends their exercise; and that without any inconvenience to the person himself, since `tis, in some measure, from his own choice. Yet indolence is always allow'd to be a fault, and a very great one, if extreme… (3.3.1.24, p375)

While avarice may not fit into Hume’s system of moral vices, indolence clearly does, as “[It]… immediately strikes our eye, and gives us the sentiment of pain and disapprobation.” (EPM 6.1, p119)

Hume has a high regard for appropriate conservation of one’s resources in order to plan and act in the future. It is in the nature of man to enjoy what he has, and to want to protect it:

Men generally fix their affections more on what they are possess’d of, than on what they never enjoy’d. For this reason, it wou’d be greater cruelty to dispossess a man of any thing, than not to give it to him. (3.2.1.14, p310)

The person who is excessively fixated on keeping what he has is a miser. Hume mentions the miser or miserly behavior just a few times in his works. We differentiate the avaricious from the miser in that the former may avidly pursue the accumulation of wealth and use that wealth for its instrumental value, whereas the miser accumulates or hoards wealth without the intent of using it for his own or his family’s luxury or convenience:

A miser receives delight from his money; that is, from the power it affords him of procuring all the pleasures and conveniences of life, tho' he knows he has enjoy'd his riches for forty years without ever employing them… (2.1.10.9, p204, italics added)

In essence, the miser turns the concept of pursued goods from something with instrumental value into something with intrinsic value (see above, p 3). Hume doesn't distinguish between whether he believes the Miser doesn't intend to use his wealth, or simply can never take action for fear of losing his wealth. The idea of hoarding his wealth produces in the miser a pleasure that is irrational.[16] The specter of losing his wealth causes the miser to experience the impression of pain which elicits fear. On the other hand, Hume thinks that the miserly person cannot be punished by removing his possessions in the act of public benevolence or justice: “What if he be a miser, and can make no use of what I wou’d deprive him of?” (3.2.1.13, p310) This seems to be a contradiction: the miser is fearful of losing his possessions, but you can’t adequately punish him by taking them away. Hume never seems to resolve this issue; perhaps another reason for calling avarice and miserliness “irreclaimable.”

Finally, while the miser may appear to be a person of social retreat, he is not the same as a hermit, in that there is a natural sympathy of a miser for another who is frugal:

A griping miser, for instance, praises extremely industry and frugality even in others, and sets them, in his estimation, above all the other virtues. He knows the good that results from them, and feels that species of happiness with a more lively sympathy, than any other you could represent to him; though perhaps he would not part with a shilling to make the fortune of the industrious man, whom he praises so highly. (EPM, footnote 16 from 6.3, p120)

This is not to say misers would likely form an association and congregate – this would require the expenditure of time and money that might be irrational in a miser’s mind.

To summarize the foregoing, Hume believes in the value of moderated wealth accumulation and wealth conservation for the motivation of industriousness in the case of the former, and for the future enjoyment of luxury and conveniences in the case of the latter. He believes that the pursuit and security of possessions is the natural state of nature and is unbounded, especially because of the scarcity of resources.[17] Such unbounded natural tendencies create conditions for injustice. For this reason people form social institutions to control their designs on each others’ possessions. However, un-moderated accumulation and conservation are pathological; in some way society’s moral forces do not sufficiently impact the avaricious or miserly person to control themselves. At the same time, from the avaricious or miserly person’s perspective, observing other’s with wealth can be both pleasurable through sympathy,[18] and painful through envy. This is a type of mixed emotion that may help to explain why Hume excludes avarice from his account of vices that are related to self-love.

From a practical perspective, though he lumps them together in his essay “Of Avarice,” Hume views avarice differently from miserliness, as is evident when he uses the terms independently as examples of problematic characteristics. And he uses them jointly when he claims that they are to be mocked, for there is no way the “avaritious” or miserly individual can be cured of his desires.

Then what type of passion is Hume’s concept of avarice and miserliness? Though these are not pleasant traits, are they moral vices, or pathological mental traits? Are avarice and miserliness motivating passions? To answer these questions we need a brief tour of Hume’s system for understanding passions, motives, and morals.

III.

Morality is based upon an individual’s ability to demonstrate in a consistent way a propensity toward acting from virtuous motives. Motives are derived from passions, either direct or indirect. To Hume the direct passions arise immediately from good or evil, pleasure or pain. They include desire and aversion, grief and joy, hope, fear, despair, and security. Hume is not completely consistent in his definition; at times good and evil are equated with pleasure and pain, at times good and evil arise from pleasure and pain, and some direct passions are simply unexplainable, not arising from pleasure or pain:

Beside good and evil, or in other words, pain and pleasure, the direct passions frequently arise from a natural impulse or instinct, which is perfectly unaccountable. Of this kind is the desire of punishment to our enemies, and of happiness to our friends; hunger, lust, and a few other bodily appetites. These passions, properly speaking, produce good and evil, and proceed not from them, like the other affections. (2.3.9.8, p281)

But this is not the end of the story - the concept of direct passions appears to be more complex than initially noted, as we will see in the discussion of “desire” below. Might avarice be one of these “unaccountable” passions?

Passions which arise not directly as impressions, but after some type of reflection (whether conscious or unconscious) creating “ideas” are indirect passions. These include “pride, humility, ambition, vanity, love, hatred, envy, pity, malice, generosity” (2.2.1.9, p216). These indirect passions arise from objects and causes. For example, the objects of pride are those that are related to us (country, family, relatives, possessions), that are part of our own body (beauty, strength, agility), or that are a “valuable quality of the mind” (wit, good-sense, learning, courage, justice, integrity) (2.1.2.5, p183). Simply having these characteristics or objects is not sufficient. There must be a quality to each subject. We wouldn’t be proud of just any house, but our beautiful house. And so a subject with a quality causes an impression within our mind which excites a passion producing an idea we call an indirect passion. It is this relation between impressions and ideas with the indirect passions that causes Hume to state that indirect passions arise from “double relations.”

Avarice could be an indirect passion. Like pride, avarice has an object, wealth, over which pleasure is evinced when contemplated. The “quality-type” for avarice tends to be “quantity”; that is, just as a man may show pride for the number of cattle he owns on his ranch, the avaricious may evince a pleasurable feeling at the thought of owning more (and more) wealth.

Is a desire different from a passion? Hume is not very clear on this point. Hume unequivocally states that desire is a direct passion.[19] But later he calls desires for different objects to be components of other indirect passions. For example, related to pride is vanity, which is the “desire for reputation.” (2.2.1.9, 215) And since the “same qualities and circumstances, which are the causes of pride or self-esteem, are also the causes of vanity” (2.2.1.9, p215), then it would appear that this desire (for reputation) is an indirect passion.[20] However, as a counterpoint related to the direct passions,[21] “Desire arises from the good consider’d simply, and Aversion is deriv’d from evil.” (2.3.9.7, 281)

Ardal has argued that passions are, of themselves, simple impressions, “…not [to] be constructed out of simpler elements.”[22] However, if this were true, then it might appear as if desires cannot be pure Humean passions per se, because they appear to be components of passions. Direct passions appear to have objects associated with desires as well. The bodily appetites are desires for specific items – hunger for food or lust for sex. Hence though some direct passions, whether created from good and evil or creating good and evil, are able to arise spontaneously without the need for an object, at least some other direct passions appear to be comprised of both a “natural impulse or instinct” (desires) and an object. This would make direct passions compound entities and reducible to simpler elements.

Hume never specifically states what kind of passion he believes avarice to be.[23] Nor does he ever characterize the components, objects, or qualities of avarice except very crudely – dealing with miserliness more specifically than avarice. He lumps avarice into lists of other passions from time-to-time as examples of one point or another, but usually in a vague way. Further he seems tacitly to differentiate having wealth (possession of property and “riches”) from the insatiable pursuit of wealth. Avarice is one of those passions that is also a vice, but, as we shall see later, a vice that doesn’t fit into his moral system.

IV.

“…virtue is distinguish’d by the pleasure, and vice by the pain, that any action, sentiment or character gives us by the mere view and contemplation.” (3.1.2.11, 305) To determine moral virtue or vice, the chain of events is as follows: a sentiment produces pleasure or pain, which when combined with character traits produces in the spectator the sense of good or evil. That which is “agreeable” is good, and which is “disagreeable” is evil. The character traits must evince in the spectator a sense that the individual acting has this trait as “durable principles of the mind” (3.3.1.4, 367). That is, we can determine whether someone is virtuous not from a single action (or perhaps several time-related actions) per se, but only if a stream of actions indicates through our sentiments that the individual possesses the character trait that is durable.[24]

The building blocks of Hume’s vices and virtues are passions and motives. An action cannot be evaluated as to its virtue or vice unless we know the motive for the action. Motives arise from the passions. Moral action cannot be judged without understanding moral motives:

…when we praise any actions, we regard only the motives that produc’d them, and consider the actions as signs or indications of certain principles in the mind and temper. The external performance has no merit. We must look within to find the moral quality…all virtuous actions derive their merit only from virtuous motives, and are consider’d merely as signs of those motives. (3.2.1.4, p307)

What work do motives do for us? Motives make actions morally explainable.[25] But we cannot identify motives with virtuousness or viciousness per se. Individuals perform acts which can only be categorized as virtuous or vicious when we look at their tendencies to act, a regularity and consistency of actions that arise from virtuous or vicious motives. There need to be patterns that are predictable in individuals to consider them to be virtuous or vicious. Of course, they can be mixed in their characters as well. For example, one person may be both charitable toward the downtrodden and unjust in commerce.

Penelhum states that Hume’s desires are “the most fundamental determinants of human conduct.”[26] He further agrees that it does not seem reasonable to call desires passions per se, “but Hume’s psychology depends on his being able to counter our resistance to doing this.” So desires may be only one form of direct passion, or passions may indeed be composed partly of desires. This might be why Hume doesn’t fully explain these complex notions, and says that some of these issues are “unaccountable.”

Of note, however, is that desires and actions can produce different passions in the actor than the audience. Pride arises from pleasure for the proud, yet it is disagreeable to the observer, and hence is considered a vice. To the contrary, humility arises from pain, yet may be agreeable to the observer and is considered a virtue. So it appears that for Hume virtue and vice are determined through external evaluation of passions and actions.[27]

All motives are passions, but not all passions are motives. In a 1999 article, Radcliffe paints the Humean theory of motivation as follows (Figure 1):

Figure 1 – Radcliffe’s depiction of how passions produce action[28]

[pic]

An impression makes an idea of a prospective pleasurable or painful object. The object need not be tangible/physical, but simply be an object constructed in the mind. When additional impressions are added to boost the vivacity of the initial idea, some belief in a matter of fact occurs. Add to this a quality of the believer that is part of his emotional constitution and a motivating passion results. The motivating passion taken together with a cause/effect belief produces an action. Note that a motivating passion does not have to lead to action, but an action won’t occur without it.

Avarice type (b), the insatiable accumulation of material goods, is clearly considered by Hume to be a motivating passion. His characterization of it as a force for society to encourage industry and effort by laborers makes this clear. The state can boost the vivacity of the impression of pleasurable objects of luxury and conveniences, while at the same time causing the belief that effort in labor will produce those luxuries (causing an inference in the belief of an external matter of fact). Coupled with an emotional disposition this existence belief becomes a motivating passion. Avarice type (c), or miserliness, on the other hand, usually leads to inaction, a trait of conservation. The initial passion cannot be boosted by any impression, only from a fear of loss: the miser thinks of pain at the loss of an object. His pain never gets boosted to the point of an existence belief, it remains as a pain associated with the idea of loss. So the passion does not graduate into a motivating passion. It is a kind of “inaction” passion.

Moral judgments, what is right or wrong, is detected from pleasure and pain: “the distinguishing impressions, by which moral good or evil is known, are nothing but particular pains or pleasures” (3.1.2.3, 303). Virtues are those things we do consistently right: we determine the virtue of an individual by perceiving the individual’s character and drawing from that perception the feeling of pleasure or pain.[29] From these comments it is clear that Hume felt that virtue or vice cannot exist without an external observer.[30]

Ardal argues that it is not the passion itself which is disagreeable or agreeable indicating vice or virtue, but the propensity to the passion. “A person’s character becomes disagreeable to us if he has a propensity to these passions, simply because these passions are communicated to us by sympathy...If I condemn anger as a motive, and say that a person ought not to be motivated by anger, I am not condemning the feeling as such, but only claiming that the person should control himself…”[31]

Hume develops four categories of virtues listed below. In parentheses are some of those virtues within each category that could have relevance to avarice:[32]

• those agreeable to others (gratitude, truthfulness, justice, generosity, charity, moderation)

• those agreeable to ourselves (frugality, economy, prudence, enterprise, industry, caution)

• those immediately agreeable to ourselves (perhaps delicacy of taste)

• those immediately agreeable to others (decency)

While Hume is detailed about the virtues, he is less so about the vices. In THN he doesn’t give a good account of vices related to these four categories. In EPM he mentions various vices under these categories, but one has to read carefully to extract the representative samples he provides. For example, injustice, miserliness, stinginess are vices related to being disagreeable to others. (EPM 6.1.5, 120 fn 26) Excessive risk taking, imprudence, indolence, profligacy are disagreeable to ourselves. At best Hume offers us his feeling that certain vices might morally (but inappropriately) exist under the category of self-love, yet are indeed not within his system, avarice included.

So, while we may have a nomenclature of virtues and vices that are presumed to be results of our agreeableness or disagreeableness with actions, sentiments, or characters, there are many times when virtues and vices cannot easily be classified as being pure; many are mixed.[33] While these types of mixed virtues and vices are clearly alleged by Hume, he doesn’t tell us what combinations make other combinations. If he were to do this he’d need to modify his system by creating classes of primary, and secondary, and perhaps even tertiary virtues and vices. He’d also need to tell us how to determine when one starts and others stop.

As we’ve seen, a single type of heinous act might be evil and elicit an unpleasant feeling, but it may not be sufficient to judge whether an individual has a virtuous or vicious character; a single act cannot show a “propensity” to act. While the act itself may bring an agreeable or disagreeable sentiment to us, we would need to see it (or some act related to it) that evokes the same category of disagreeable sentiment) repeated by the same individual to determine whether that individual can be judged to have the trait. Hence, as with any character trait, an individual cannot be called greedy by a single act unless we believe the action by that individual to be a part of his character through some other simultaneous or prior observation.[34] I will now attempt to draw some conclusions about avarice and miserliness based upon Hume’s categorization of them.

V.

What has been established so far? As noted just above, I have established that a single act of greed cannot be considered a vice per se, as it doesn’t necessarily indicate an enduring quality of the individual. Second, avarice type (b), insatiable accumulation of wealth, as directly addressed by Hume, is a vice, though I haven’t yet established the type of initial passion it is – direct or indirect. Third, I’ve made the case that avarice type (c), miserliness, is never directly addressed as a passion, and is even more difficult to characterize. In this section I shall address its nature as a passion. While Hume claims both types of avarice are vices, he does this by lumping them together and doesn’t address them separately. . Miserliness is a vice in the classic definition – it is a character trait that evokes in a third party a disagreeable sentiment. Yet we still have some questions to answer: (1) Are avarice and miserliness passions at all? (2) If so, what kind of passions? (3) Are avarice and miserliness motivating passions?

Avarice and miserliness have elements that could include them as either direct or indirect passions. Like a direct passion, avarice seems to be a hunger or lust for wealth, miserliness is a desire for conservation. Hume considers both avarice and miserliness incurable, which seems to suggest they are visceral, innate responses. Hume calls both the insatiable pursuit of wealth and the conservation of wealth natural tendencies, implying they don’t require any ideas to be formed prior to their impressions bringing pleasure or pain.

Alternatively, like an indirect passion, avarice and miserliness have wealth as objects of their affections, like ambition or pride; ambition has power and accomplishment as its object; pride an object with close relation and unique quality. Like avarice, ambition is a pursuit, like miserliness, pride is a self-glorification of something already attained. Avarice, ambition, and pride, all require reflection and double relations.

Note that to equate avarice and miserliness with hunger or lust is to equate them with the “unaccountable” direct passions. They clearly have a different tone to them than do the accountable passions of, for example, joy or grief.

However, there may be a third alternative to classifying avarice and miserliness as simple direct or indirect passions. This third alternative, broached by Hume in his discussion of how passions interact, is the idea of a “mixt” passion which operates from probability of fluctuation from one passion to the other. Hume says that we consider the idea of probability by understanding that something might happen or it might not. By vacillating between the two outcome conditions in our mind at the relative rates of the probable outcomes we get a sense of what probability means. Similarly, with passions we can observe an object which can produce in us a sense of pain or pleasure. So we might feel joy or grief about it as our mind vacillates in considering it. “So that as the understanding, in all probable questions, is divided betwixt the contrary points of view, the affections must in the same manner be divided betwixt opposite emotions.” (2.3.9.11, p282) This is, for Hume, the vacillation of two direct passions.

To some extent both avarice and miserliness work this way. For avarice, the individual takes pleasure in contemplating the objects he might possess, but this pleasure alternates with the pain he has in not yet actually possessing the object. Similarly, the miser takes pleasure in knowing he is flush with wealth, yet has great pain when contemplating its absence. Avarice and miserliness are mirror images of mixt passion contemplation. The first is concerned with getting, the second with keeping. Both getting and keeping fluctuate in the probability scale with how the individual, whether avaricious or miserly, view each component; the avaricious putting more weight on procurement and the miser putting more weight on retention. It is even possible for both pleasure and pain to be present simultaneously, producing “a third impression or affection by their union.” (2.3.9.16, p283) I believe it is justified to say that the union of the “contrary passions” of the pleasure of contemplating procurement with the pain of not having procured could be the Humean definition of avarice, while the pleasure of contemplating the retention in union with the pain of contemplating loss could be the Humean definition of miserliness.

A “mixt” direct passion is attractive in analyzing avarice, as it permits the trait of inherency to persist, and also removes the requirement of double relation – having an idea for wealth accumulation may not be necessary, just as having an idea for food may not be necessary for feeling hunger. One can have a hunger (for thirst, food, knowledge, air) without knowing for what the hunger is. Or I can feel hungry, without knowing initially if it is for steak, French fries, cookies, or fruit. How many times have we stood staring into the refrigerator asking ourselves, “What do I want to eat?”

When it comes to miserliness, however, we don’t think the miser desires conservation in the abstract, he desires conservation of his own resources. He must have immediate and intimate knowledge of what he desires to conserve. While with hunger or lust we can have a desire for a particular item because we have knowledge of that item, we also, as noted above, can have hunger or lust for the abstract principle of food or sex, not necessarily to have that steak or make love to that particular woman. In this respect it may seem as if such miserly desire for conservation seems beyond natural tendencies.[35] It would seem the miser would desire to want to conserve all his resources, knowing this would be whatever he currently has and whatever he might have in the future, as a general principle, not knowing if his urge for conservation at any particular moment was for his money or his rare stamp collection. In fact, the very concept of miserliness seems to preclude a differentiation of a desire only for conserving the rare stamp collection; that is, only for conserving one part of his resources. If it were otherwise he would then be willing to treat himself to the luxuries and conveniences of which Hume claims he never partakes while only conserving the stamp collection. This seems more of a preference than an excessive zeal for conservation.[36] Certainly Hume doesn’t provide a hint of a concept of miserliness where the miser might only want to conserve his rare stamp collection, while not caring what happens with the rest of his possessions. The miser needs to have an idea of what he is conserving, not simply an impression of a sensation or sentiment. If all of this is true, then miserliness is an indirect passion.

So I conclude that avarice fits the term “mixt” passion, and miserliness fits more closely into Hume’s definition of an indirect passion. This raises the interesting question, “If these are two different types of passions, why would Hume lump them together?” There are two possible reasons for this. The first is that he couldn’t easily tease them apart in the first place. If he could have, his essay “Of Avarice” might have differentiated the two. The second is that he found avarice to be more explainable as a vice than as a passion. I don’t believe the first possible reason is correct. Hume does have times when he differentiates avarice from miserliness.[37] So the answer probably arises more in the second possible reason - it is clear Hume considers both avarice and miserliness as vices. Avarice is an incurable vice that doesn’t fit his moral system related to self-love. Avarice is a useful vice when it comes to commerce and building the state. Where Hume uses miserliness directly as a term, or where he uses avarice to mean miserliness, it is clear he considers miserliness to be the more odious of the two types of avarice. He has no use for miserliness as a positive motivating force for commerce, as the avarice that motivates industry is of the type (b) variety. Miserliness seems to be vicious and without any redeeming social value.

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[1] The Oxford English Dictionary (1989 edition) shows the first use of the term “grædi” related to material goods in approximately 1000: “Sal. & Sat. 344 (Gr.) Sum to lyt hafa godes grædi” and the first use of the term avarice in about 1300: “Cursor M. 10112 be world has tuynne to his ascyse, bat es auaris, and couaytise.”

[2] Thomas Hurka. Virtue, Vice and Value. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001, p 97.

[3] While the term “wealth” often is used to reflect primarily on monetary goods, in this paper I use “wealth” to include the accumulation of any goods or possessions. Hume usually uses “riches” to mean the same thing in THN.

[4] “Of Avarice” EMPL pp 569-573. (This essay was originally published in Hume’s first edition of Essays, Moral and Political in 1741.)

The following is the convention used herein for citing quotes from David Hume’s works:

EMPL is Essays Moral Political and Literary, edited by Eugene F. Miller, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1995. Each individual essay used will be identified separately.

(2.1.2.5, 183) indicates the book, part, section, paragraph, and page number from the David Fate Norton and Mary J. Norton edited version of the Treatise of Human Nature, New York: Oxford University Press, 2001 (corrected edition from 2000). On occasion I will use THN where I am referring to some part of the Norton’s comments, as opposed to Hume’s text.

EPM is from An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, edited by Tom L. Beauchamp, New York: Oxford University Press, 2000 (paperback edition 2002 reprinted). The citation convention is (EPM 5.37, p112) indicating section, paragraph, and page number. If there is more than one part of a section the paragraphs are still numbered consecutively from the first paragraph of the section and I will only use paragraph numbers.

Normally I would show the place of the beginning (or ending) of a quote that does not begin (or end) a sentence with an ellipsis. But in this paper, I use ellipses only where material is skipped. Unless otherwise noted, all italics, emboldening, etc are Hume’s.

[5] Hume states in two places (2.2.8.8, 242 and 3.3.2.4, 379) that it is not the intrinsic value of riches that gives us pleasure or pain, it is in comparison with others that we apprise the happiness or unhappiness with our own riches (and power and merit); when we have more than others and we see their misery we feel ourselves more blessed and happier. Likewise in the reverse; if we have less than others we feel at greater unease.

[6] Envy arises from anger which arises from disappointment and grief. Envy produces malice, which returns to grief. (THN 2.1.4.3, p186)

[7] For sources, see footnote 5 above.

[8] I say, “For the most part…” because the prior quote on page 4 that begins “This avidity alone” clearly states that the insatiable avidity to accumulate goods requires societal regulation/restraint to preserve the peace. This is the foundation of Hume’s notion of justice – it is an artificial virtue designed primarily for the preservation of peace around possessions.

[9] In EPML, pp254-267.

[10] Eugene Rotwein. David Hume Writings on Economics. Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1970, p xlv.

[11] For a further discussion on this area of self-love and commerce, see R.G.Frey, “Virtue, commerce, and self-love. Hume Studies 1995; 21(2): 275-287. Frey claims that Mandeville goes much farther than Hume: “virtue and commerce are incompatible… [because] a virtuous society would undermine economic prosperity and the public good through failure to generate jobs…”

[12] Ibid, p280.

[13] The only reference to “inferior passions” can be found in THN 2.3.4, “Of the causes of the violent passions.” In this passage Hume differentiates “betwixt a calm and a weak passion; betwixt a violent and a strong one.” Nowhere else does Hume classify passions into superior or inferior, nor does he use the term with other passions, though he does illustrate his sense of how a prevailing passion “swallows up the inferior, and converts it into itself.” (2.3.4.2, 269-270).

[14] What we don’t have is sympathy for the avaricious, in the sense that Hume defines sympathy:

No quality of human nature is more remarkable, both in itself and in its consequences, than that propensity we have to sympathize with others, and to receive by communication their inclinations and sentiments, however different from, or even contrary to our own. (2.1.11.2, p206)

Pity is different from sympathy in that our passion of pity gives us concern for the misery of others, not the self-embodiment of the passion being conveyed, for example, by the avaricious person. For more on the difference between pity and sympathy in Hume’s system, see Pall S. Ardal, Passion and Value in Hume’s Treatise. Edinburgh, Scotland: University Press, 1966, pp 62-64.

[15] Hume calls indolence a vice in EPM 6.1, 119: “Indolence… [This quality was] never esteemed by any one indifferent to a character; much less, extolled as accomplishments or virtues. The prejudice, resulting from [it], immediately strikes our eye, and gives us the sentiment of pain and disapprobation.” As an aside, Hume says we perceive motives from actions. Yet indolence is an inaction; how do we ascertain the motive from laziness? What motivating passion could produce laziness?

[16] “…a passion must be accompany’d with some false judgment, in order to its being unreasonable; and even then ‘tis not the passion, properly speaking, which is unreasonable, but the judgment.” (2.2.3.6, 267)

[17] Sometimes it seems Hume may be of two minds on this issue. On the one hand he states, “The qualities of the mind are selfishness and limited generosity: And the situation of external objects is their easy change, join’d to their scarcity in comparison of the wants and desires of men.” (3.2.2.16, 317) On the other hand, Hume claims that commerce with strangers “rouses men from their indolence; and … raises in them a desire of a more splendid way of life than what their ancestors enjoyed.” (“Of Commerce” EPML, 264) In other words, Hume may believe that our desires are not limitless by nature, but as they “become acquainted with the pleasures of luxury and the profits of commerce; and their delicacy and industry, being once awakened, carry them on to farther improvements, in every branch of domestic as well as foreign trade.” (Ibid.)

[18] There are three ways our viewing “riches” can be pleasurable: through sympathy, through the thought that perhaps the wealthy will share their riches with us, and through the “sentiment of pleasure” we gain simply by viewing their riches. (2.2.5.2, p231) I have not commented on the “sharing” pleasure because I believe Hume would claim the miser would never himself consider sharing and therefore might not think that anyone else would share either.

[19] “And under the direct passions, desire, aversion, grief…” (2.1.1.4, 182.)

[20] Ardal characterizes desires as direct passions, but later uses the term desire to include calm passions, which can be both direct and indirect. See his p 10 and p 97.

[21] Direct passions “frequently arise from a natural impulse or instinct, which is perfectly unaccountable” (2.3.9.8, 281):

[22] Ibid, p11.

[23] Nor have I been able to find any Hume analysts as providing their own interpretation of this.

[24] This would permit an assessment of a single act of greed, type (a) mentioned in the introduction, but only in constellation with the assessment of other virtues, perhaps.

[25] David Fate Norton states in his essay “Hume, human nature, and the foundations of morality” that “distinctions of motive underlie, and give rise to, whatever genuine moral distinctions we may make.” The Cambridge Companion to Hume, edited by David Fate Norton, Cambridge University Press, 1993, p 161.

[26] Terence Penelhum. “Hume’s moral psychology.” In The Cambridge Companion to Hume, edited by David Fate Norton. NY: Cambridge University Press, 1993, pp117-147. These quotes are on p. 127.

[27] With the exception of the “selfish virtues”

[28] Elizabeth S. Radcliffe. Hume on the generation of motives: why beliefs alone never motivate. Hume Studies 1999:25(1 & 2): 101-122. This figure is on page 114.

[29] “To have the sense of virtue, is nothing but to feel a satisfaction of a particular kind from the contemplation of a character. The very feeling constitutes our praise or admiration.” (3.1.2.3, 303) Hume is more succinct in EPM (8, footnote 50, p139), wherein he states, “It is the nature, and, indeed, the definition of virtue, that it is a quality of the mind agreeable to or approved of by every one, who considers or contemplates it.”

[30] We suppose that this would mean one could not have a self-perception of vice or virtue, as the pleasure or pain of a single action or series of actions self-perceived may not be that which is perceived by others. Indeed, it could be to the contrary.

[31] Ardal, Ibid.

[32] These appear both in THN (3.3.1.30) and EPM (in the various sections 2-8).

[33] Hume states “that all kinds of vice and virtue run insensibly into each other, and may approach by such imperceptible degrees as will make it very difficult, if not absolutely impossible, to determine when the one ends and the other begins” (3.2.6.7, 339) He makes this comment in drawing contrast to the ownership of property, of which rights and obligations “admit of no such insensible gradation” (3.2.6.7, 339); man either owns a property or does not. With vices and virtues running insensibly into each other, we might also infer that the passions therefore also run insensibly into each other as well.

[34] It is unclear if Hume would consider a single act that was extremely “vivid or vivacious” to qualify here.

[35] We want to say “even if such conservation seems irrational” as we might in contemporary usage. But to do so would bring into play the idea that reason plays an important role here, which would be contrary to Hume’s system. In today’s lingo, however, we do tend to say that being a miser is irrational or at least is a manner of exhibiting significant aberrant behavior, or, in psychiatric terms, a generalized phobia disorder marked by persistent fear that is excessive or unreasonable.

[36] There are, of course, individuals who may have obsessions with only stamp collections or glass menageries. They may be called obsessive, or neurotic, or fetishist, but usually we don’t say they are misers.

[37] As avarice and miserliness can coexist in the same person it is not unreasonable for Hume to lump them together as well, though my own informal assessment of the situation is that avarice occurs much more frequently than miserliness.

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