Mandeville, Hutcheson, and Hume on pride and honour

Abstract

Pride has been a problematic passion in many moral systems for it has been seen as having harmful consequences at an individual and political level. This thesis will argue that is a philosophical tradition that has seen self-love and its manifestation, pride, can be useful in society. This been said, each and every author that speaks about pride considers the conditions under which the love that we feel towards ourselves and the desire to be esteemed by others are justified. In other words, pride can be given under circumstances and in degrees that make it due or undue. Mandeville and Hume saw self-love and due pride, respectively, as supplementing moral duty, prudence and reason in guiding us to moral ends. Hutcheson too, allowed for a sense of honour that displays pride to naturally accompany the attitudes that are approved of by the moral sense. Therefore, what had been a neglected passion in most accounts of morals, became an important means of transforming our passions into social standards. This introduction will first explain the idea that the anatomy of the passions became paramount for the study of human nature. The idea behind this is that the passions transform and substitute each other as motivations. Second, I shall provide insight into the attitudes towards pride that shaped Mandeville, Hume, Hutcheson's theories, paying special attention to the French Neo-Augustinians and Protestants.