Hume’s sceptical Enlightenment

The Scottish philosopher and historian David Hume (1711-1776) has often been regarded as a key Enlightenment thinker. However, his image has been long contested by those who consider him a conservative and those who see him as a key liberal thinker. Ryu Susato offers a new interpretation for such diverse images and demonstrates Hume's uniqueness as an Enlightenment thinker, illustrating how his 'spirit of scepticism' often leads him into seemingly paradoxical positions. Read more... David Hume (1711-1776) remains one of the most equivocal thinkers in eighteenth-century Europe. Some emphasise his conservatism because of his criticism of rationalism in morals and of the social contract theory in politics, while others deem him one of the most important liberal thinkers. He can also be characterised as a forerunner of utilitarianism or even postmodernism. How can these images be integrated? To address this issue, Hume’s Sceptical Enlightenment demonstrates the uniqueness and complexity of Hume as an Enlightenment thinker through an investigation of the ‘historical’ Hume. Based on a sceptical adaptation of Epicureanism, he delineates the variable and vulnerable nature of the workings of our imagination and opinions, and emphasises the essential instability of civilisation. In addition, he retains a positive assessment of such modern values as liberty, politeness and refinement, and carries the banner for secularisation. His ‘spirit of scepticism’, which permeates even his non-epistemological writings, enables these seemingly paradoxical positions. This book is not only for Hume specialists, but is also a contribution to the flourishing fields of the Enlightenment study. This intellectual history connects Hume’s early eighteenth-century Continental and British predecessors not only to Hume, but also to British philosophers writing up until the nineteenth century Demonstrates the uniqueness of Hume as an Enlightenment thinker, illustrating how his 'spirit of scepticism' often leads him into seemingly paradoxical positions. This book will be of interest to Hume scholars, intellectual historians of 17th- to 19th-century Europe and those interested in the Enlightenment more widely