Toward a More Philosophical Philosophy of Common Life

Abstract

It should be clear that I oppose the very old, vulgar view that Hume abandoned philosophy for the study of history and for the pursuit of literary fame. Hume’s philosophic achievement lies in an articulation of the “mixed kind of life” to which human beings are consigned. The human condition is defined by inescapable oppositions between reasonableness and sentimentality, reason and the imagination, the need for action and the need for rest, the particular and the universal, sociality and individuality, and history and nature, among others. The proper political and ethical reaction to the paradoxes and contradictions defining human nature is best found in modern commercial republics, where the virtues of humanity, gentle political authority, and an easy-going tolerance find a home. Modern arrangements provide freedom for people to work out the contradictions in their nature in a manner consistent with their own character and inclinations. Hume has, to a large degree, brought about a de-mystified, disenchanted, moderately skeptical, humanist ethos. The philosophy of common life arises almost of itself in the modern commercial republic, though it sometimes needs to be maintained and restored by humanizing philosophers when excessively rationalist or excessively mystical ways of thinking emerge.