From Cudworth to Hume: Cambridge Platonism and the Scottish Enlightenment

Abstract

This paper argues that the Cambridge Platonists had stronger philosophical links to Scottish moral philosophy than the received history allows. Building on the work of Michael Gill who has demonstrated links between ethical thought of More, Cudworth and Smith and moral sentimentalism, I outline some links between the Cambridge Platonists and Scottish thinkers in both the seventeenth century (e.g., James Nairn, Henry Scougal) and the eighteenth century (e.g., Smith, Blair, Stewart). I then discuss Hume's knowledge of Cudworth, in Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, Enquiry concerning Human Understanding, The Natural History of Religion and Dialogues concerning Natural Religion.

Keywords::

• Cambridge Platonism
• Hume
• ethics
• Scotland

Acknowledgements

I thank the organizing committee of the 2012 Hume Society Conference in Calgary for inviting me to speak at the conference, and members of the audience for their comments.

Notes

^1. In his assessment of Cudworth, however, Gill does not take of account his unpublished writings. He also argues that Cudworth's position changed in the course of his career – not in my view a tenable position. See also Hutton (forthcoming).

^2. Dugald Stewart was not acquainted with these manuscripts, though he did report their discovery and urged work be done on them.

^3. In 1696 George Skene (King's College, Aberdeen) warns against over reliance on confidence in reason in philosophy, citing Burnet's Archaeologia sacra (i.e., Telluris theoria sacra) as example, and condemning Spinoza.

^4. That Nairn did not own Cudworth's The True Intellectual System of the Universe is to be explained by the fact that he died before it was published.

^5. Reprinted in 1691 and many times thereafter, with a preface by Gilbert Burnet.

^6. Scougal's work exists only in manuscript and I have not yet had the chance to look at it. On Scougal, see Rivers (2012).

^7. Apparently, there was a rumour that reading the book had been instrumental in Keith's conversion to Quakerism. Keith also knew More's Enchiridion Metaphysicum and his Philosophical Poems.

^8. Henry More to William Penn, printed in Ward ([1710] 2000, 189).

^9. More to Anne Conway, 10th January 1676 (Nicolson and Hutton 1992, 417–419).

^10. The exception is Culverwell's Elegant and Learned Discourse on the Light of Nature, but it was swiftly superseded by Cumberland and Locke.

^11. I have not examined university records, so cannot comment on whether the Cambridge Platonists continued to appear on student reading lists. There are enough references to them among Scottish thinkers to suggest that this was the case.

^12. Reid quotes a passage from Cudworth's A Treatise concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality (Cudworth 1996, 172).

^13. See Hume 2007, 429–30. See also the reference to Cudworth in Hume's discussion of occasionalism (2007, 429).

^14. London, British Library, Additional MS, 4979, fols. 244 and 6.

^15. London, British Library, Additional MS, 4979, fol. 243.

^16. London, British Library, Additional MS, 4979, fol. 5.

^17. There is, however, a possibility that Locke may have read these papers.

^18. The Divine Legation of Moses Demonstrated, on the Principles of a Religious Deist, from the Omission of the Doctrine of a Future State of Reward and Punishment in the Jewish Dispensation, ‘Preface to first edition Preface to books IV, V VI. Edition cited London 1837, 650. Cf. John Dryden, who in his Preface to the second volume of Virgil's Aeneid, remarks that ‘Cudworth raised such strong objections against the being of a God and providence, that they think he has not answered them’ (As cited in Birch's Preface to Cudworth (1743, 1: 21)).

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Notes on contributors

Sarah Hutton

Sarah Hutton studied at New Hall, Cambridge and The Warburg Institute, London. Until recently she held a chair at Aberystwyth University in Wales. Her research specialism is Early Modern and Intellectual History, with special interests in the Cambridge Platonists and Women and Science and Philosophy. Her publications include Anne Conway: A Woman Philosopher (2004); Studies on Locke: Sources, Contemporaries and Legacy (edited with Paul Schuurman, 2008); Platonism at the Origins of Modernity (edited with Douglas Hedley, 2008). She is Director of the series International Archives in the History of Ideas.