A ‘Sensible Knave’? Hume, Jane Austen and Mr Elliot

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Notes

¹D. Hume, Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding and Concerning the Principles of Morals, edited by L. A. Selby-Bigge and P.H. Nidditch, third edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978). Subsequent references in the text to the Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals use a slightly modified version of the Hume Studies convention: the initials EPM precede the section, part and paragraph numbers with the Selby-Bigge/Nidditch page numbers following a forward slash. Thus the reference for Hume's discussion of the ‘sensible knave’ is EPM, 9.2.22–4/282–3.

²J. Austen, Persuasion, edited by J. Kinsley, notes by D.S. Lynch (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Subsequent references to Persuasion will be made in the text with the letter P preceding volume and chapter numbers with the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash.

³What ‘sensible’ mostly means in connection with both Austen's Mr Elliot and Hume's sensible knave is ‘intelligent’, ‘level-headed’ or ‘rational’. In the eighteenth century ‘sensible’ could also mean ‘aware’ as in ‘I was sensible of his unfriendly feelings though he endeavored to conceal them’. Both the knave and Mr Elliot are ‘sensible’ in this sense since they are both supposed to be good at reading people and at knowing what to say to keep them sweet. ‘Sensible’ could also mean ‘aware of in a morally appropriate way’. Thus an eighteenth-century person might say ‘I am deeply sensible of your good offices in this matter,’ meaning by this ‘I am both aware of your good offices and appropriately grateful’. Mr Elliot is not sensible of the Smith's former kindness in this sense nor is the knave fully sensible of the injustice of his actions.

⁴J. Austen, Pride and Prejudice, edited by J. Kinsley, notes by F. Stafford (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Subsequent references to Pride and Prejudice will be made in the text with the letters P&P preceding volume and chapter numbers with the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash.

⁵J. Austen, Sense and Sensibility, edited by J. Kinsley, introduction by M.A. Doody and notes by C. Lamont (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Subsequent references to Sense and Sensibility will be made in the text with the letters S&S preceding volume and chapter numbers with the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash.

⁶Of course we would not enjoy the ponderous servilities of Mr Collins. But then Lady Catharine is a Jane Austen character not a Jane Austen reader. She lacks the refined moral sensibility that Austen both expects and elicits in her audience.

⁷J. Austen, Mansfield Park, edited by J. Kinsley, notes by J. Stabler (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). Subsequent references to Mansfield Park will be made in the text with the letters MP preceding volume and chapter numbers with the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash.

⁸Hume, ‘Of The Independency of Parliament’, in Essays, Moral Political and Literary, edited by E.V. Miller, revised edition (Indianopolis: Liberty Fund, 1987), 42–3.

⁹R. Harrison, Bentham (London: Routledge, 1983), Chapter 5.

¹⁰J. Austen, Northanger Abbey, Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon, edited by J. Kinsley, introduction by J. Davie and notes by C.L. Johnson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). Subsequent references to Northanger Abbey will be made in the text with the letters NA preceding volume and chapter numbers with the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash. For references to the other works I will use the abbreviation NA etc. followed by the Oxford Classics page numbers.

¹¹J. Austen, Emma, edited by J. Kinsley and A. Pinch (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2003). Subsequent references to Emma will be made in the text with the letter E preceding volume and chapter numbers and the Oxford Classics page numbers following a forward slash.

¹²Compare Lady Susan's letters to her friend Alicia with Mme de Merteuil's letters to Valmont in P. Choderlos de Laclos, Dangerous Liaisons, translated and edited by Douglas Parmee (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), especially Letter 81. Both Lady Susan and Mme de Merteuil enjoy exerting power over men by means of their sexuality and both are consummate actresses who are constantly playing a part. But whereas Lady Susan is merely a power-loving flirt, Mme de Merteuil is a power-loving seductress. Lady Susan is also much less cruel than Mme de Merteuil. No naive young girls get seduced and ruined at her command.

¹⁴F. Hutcheson, An Inquiry into the Originals of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue, edited by W. Leidhold (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2004), 85.

¹³D. Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, edited by L.A. Selby-Bigge and P.H. Nidditch, second edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978). Subsequent references to the Treatise are made in the text using a slightly modified version of the Hume Studies convention: the initial T precedes the book, section, part and paragraph numbers with the Selby-Bigge/Nidditch page numbers following a forward slash.

¹⁵F. Hutcheson, An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections with Illustrations on the Moral Sense, edited by A. Garrett (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2002), 138–9.

¹⁶See C.R. Pigden, ‘If Not Non-cognitivism Then What?’, in Hume on Motivation and Virtue (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 80–104.

¹⁷Pigden, ‘Introduction’, in Hume on Motivation and Virtue, 1–29.

¹⁸J. Balguy, The Foundations of Moral Goodness, third edition (London, 1733) excerpted in The British Moralists, vol. 1, Hobbes to Gay, edited by D.D. Raphael (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1991).

¹⁹G. Gleig, ‘Moral Philosophy’ (1797), originally published in the Encyclopedia Britannica, excerpted in Early Responses to Hume's Moral, Literary and Political Writings, second edition, edited by James Fieser (Bristol: Thoemmes Continuum, 2005), vol. 1, 295–8 (298).

²⁰W. Paley, The Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy (1785) excerpted in Early Responses to Hume, vol. 1, 170–9 (173–4).

²¹W. Belsham, Essays, Philosophical, Historical and Literary (1789), excerpted in Early Responses to Hume, vol. 1, 251–72 (257).

²²J. Austen, Selected Letters, edited with an introduction and notes by V. Jones (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Subsequent references in the text as SL followed by the letter number and the page number after a forward slash.

²³J.E. Austen-Leigh, A Memoir of Jane Austen and Other Family Recollections, edited by K. Sutherland (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 95n.

²⁴J. Austen, Catherine and Other Writings, edited by M.A. Doody (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 230–32.

²⁵C. Tomalin, Jane Austen: A Life (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1998).

²⁶D. Hume, The History of England, edited by W. Todd, 6 vols (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1983).

²⁷P. Knox-Shaw, Jane Austen and the Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).

²⁸E. M. Dadlez, Mirrors to One Another: Emotion and Value in Jane Austen and David Hume, (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), viii–viii.

²⁹J. Boswell, Life of Johnson, edited by R. W. Chapman, introduction by P. Rogers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980).

³⁰O. Wilde, The Major Works, edited by I. Murray (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 501.