Private Vices, Public Benefits: Bernard Mandeville's Social and Political Thought

Abstract

This book examines the social and political thought of Bernard Mandeville, whose works, although notorious, had a significant impact on such thinkers as Voltaire, Hume, and Adam Smith. Professor Goldsmith sets out to show how Mandeville's views resulted from his rejection of the ideology of his time, which subordinated private interests to the claims of society or God. Instead, Mandeville proposed self-love as the mechanism of social development and attributed civilisation and the amenities of life to selfishness. Although he did not develop a theory of the free market, his views, by exalting 'private vices' and ridiculing the classical and aristocratic virtues, legitimated the pursuit of gain and the 'spirit of capitalism'.