Dialogues concerning Natural Religion
Overview
In Dialogues concerning Natural Religion, Hume creates a dialogue between Demea, Philo, and Cleanthes to discuss the existence and nature of God. As all three characters acknowledge the nature of God, their discussion focuses on the ability of human reason to know about God using the evidence available in nature. Demea is the Orthodox Christian, arguing that it is impossible to know God’s nature at all, especially through nature. Philo, the skeptic, largely agrees with Demea. Cleanthes, the Humean character, argues the empirical theist position. He uses various arguments, including an argument from design, to claim that it is possible to know about God’s nature by applying reason to the evidence of the natural world.
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- Creates a dialogue to discuss the existence and nature of God through three different viewpoints
- Focuses on human reason and the ability to know of God through nature
Top Highlights
“I shall begin with observing, that there is an evident absurdity in pretending to demonstrate a matter of fact, or to prove it by any arguments a priori. Nothing is demonstrable, unless the contrary implies a contradiction. Nothing, that is distinctly conceivable, implies a contradiction. Whatever we conceive as existent, we can also conceive as non-existent. There is no being, therefore, whose non-existence implies a contradiction. Consequently there is no being, whose existence is demonstrable. I propose this argument as entirely decisive, and am willing to rest the whole controversy upon it.” (Page 117)
“The essence of that supreme mind, his attributes, the manner of his existence, the very nature of his duration; these and every particular, which regards so divine a Being, are mysterious to men. Finite, weak, and blind creatures, we ought to humble ourselves in his august presence, and, conscious of our frailties, adore in silence his infinite perfections, which eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive them.” (Pages 26–27)
“It is my opinion, I own, replied Demea, that each man feels, in a manner, the truth of religion within his own breast; and from a consciousness of his imbecility and misery, rather than from any reasoning, is led to seek protection from that Being, on whom he and all nature is dependent.” (Page 123)
“All our ideas, derived from the senses, are confusedly false and illusive; and cannot, therefore, be supposed to have place in a supreme intelligence: And as the ideas of internal sentiment, added to those of the external senses, compose the whole furniture of human understanding, we may conclude, that none of the materials of thought are in any respect similar in the human and in the divine intelligence.” (Page 58)
- Title: Dialogues concerning Natural Religion
- Author: David Hume
- Editor: Bruce M’Ewen
- Publisher: William Blackwood and Sons
- Publication Date: 1907
- Pages: 191
- Resource Type: Topical
- Topic: Empirical Philosophy
David Hume (1711–1776) was born in Berwickshire, near Edinburgh, in Scotland. Hume was a philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist. He attended the University of Edinburgh from the age of 11 but left at 15 to pursue private study. His skepticism concerning religion kept him from getting the Chair of Ethics and Pnuematical Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. When he failed to get the position, he accompanied his cousin as a secretary on a military mission against the French in Canada. After his trip to Canada, Hume travelled with his cousin to Vienna and Turin. He wrote at least one important philosophical treatise during this trip. When he returned to Scotland he accepted a position as a librarian and completed the six-volume History of England, which became a best seller. Hume lived in Paris as secretary to the British ambassador to France for three years. A fleeing Jean-Jacques Rousseau accompanied Hume on his return trip to England. Hume lived in London for a year, serving as under-secretary of state. Returning to Edinburgh, he built a house where he remained for the rest of his life.
Hume’s empiricist philosophy centered on his assertion that the science of man is the basis for all other sciences. In other words, one must understand how the human mind works in order to properly understand other sciences. Hume believed that there was no constant, permanent self. Rather, the self is always the sum of one’s sensations and reflections. Knowledge, likewise, is derived from sensations and reflections on those sensations. Consequently, propositions about objects are semantically equivalent to propositions about one’s experiences. While we can have belief in something that is not directly observable, we cannot have knowledge about that thing. Hume taught that “cause” and “effect” were qualities of human perception, not necessarily of the object itself. For example, we see ball A strike ball B; following that, ball B moves. Hume argued that while we perceive ball A to have caused the effect of ball B moving, those qualities might not exist in the balls themselves. The habit of seeing a ball strike another ball, followed by the movement of the second ball, leads us to perceive that ball A caused ball B to move. Hume wasn’t saying that ball A didn’t cause ball B to move; just that we cannot empirically observe the mechanism for the movement, and thus we cannot have knowledge of it.