232 HUME xi 



misplacing the objects of his contemplation : he needs only 

 enter into his own breast for a moment, and consider 

 whether he should or should not desire to have this or that 

 quality assigned to him, and whether such or such an impu- 

 tation would proceed from a friend or an enemy. The very 

 nature of language guides us almost infallibly in forming a 

 judgment of this nature ; and as every tongue possesses one 

 set of words which are taken in a good sense, and another 

 in the opposite, the least acquaintance with the idiom suf- 

 fices, without any reasoning, to direct us in collecting and 

 arranging the estimable or blamable qualities of men. The 

 only object of reasoning is to discover the circumstances on 

 both sides, which are common to these qualities ; to observe 

 that particular in which the estimable qualities agree on the 

 one hand, and the blamable on the other, and thence to 

 reach the foundation of ethics, and find their universal prin- 

 ciples, from which all censure or approbation is ultimately 

 derived. As this is a question of fact, not of abstract sci- 

 ence, we can only expect success by following the experi- 

 mental method, and deducing general maxims from a com- 

 parison of particular instances. The other scientifical 

 method, where a general abstract principle is first estab- 

 lished, and is afterwards branched out into a variety of 

 inferences and conclusions, may be more perfect in itself, 

 but suits less the imperfection of human nature, and is a 

 common source of illusion and mistake, in this as well as in 

 other subjects. Men are now cured of their passion for 

 hypotheses and systems in natural philosophy, and will 

 hearken to no arguments but those which are derived from 

 experience. It is full time they should attempt a like ref- 

 ormation in all moral disquisitions ; and reject every sys- 

 tem of ethics, however subtile or ingenious, which is not 

 founded on fact and observation." (IV. pp. 242-4.) 



No qualities give a man a greater claim to 

 personal merit than benevolence and justice; but 

 if we inquire why benevolence deserves so much 



