Honestum is as Honestum Does: Reid, Hume – and Mandeville?!. Issue 1 (March 2014)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Edwards, Jeffrey
• Is Part Of: Journal of Scottish philosophy. Volume 12:Issue 1(2014)
• Page Start: 121
• Page End: 143
• Publication Date: 2014-03
• Subjects: Philosophy, Scottish -- Periodicals; Periodicals; 192
• DOI: 10.3366/jsp.2014.0065
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1479-6651

Abstract

<abstract xml:lang="en"> <title> <x xml:space="preserve">Abstract</x> </title> <p>How are we to understand Thomas Reid in relation to Bernard de Mandeville? I answer this question by considering two components of the assessment of Hume's theory of morals that Reid provides in his <italic>Essays on the Active Powers of Man</italic>: first, Reid's claim that Hume's system of morals cannot accommodate the Stoic conception of moral worth (<italic>honestum</italic>); second, Reid's charge that Hume's account of morally meritorious action leads to an inflated and incoherent version of Epicurean virtue theory. I thus determine the character of Reid's relation to Mandeville by examining the Stoic and anti-Epicurean assumptions involved in Reid's criticism of Hume's ethics.</p> </abstract>