Francis Hutcheson (1694–1746) was an influential Britishmoralist, an advocate of moral sentimentalism, and a key figure of theScottish Enlightenment. While Hutcheson was educated, and completedhis career, at the University of Glasgow, he was Irish by birth, andreturned to Scotland only after his major writings (including theInquiry into the Original of our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue,theEssay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions, withIllustrations on the Moral Sense) had been published, and in somecases extensively revised. Nevertheless, he had a tremendous influenceon the Scottish intellectual scene, in part due to his interactionswith important Scottish figures of the day, including Adam Smith,Thomas Reid, and David Hume.

Leaving aside his influence on the Scottish enlightenment,Hutcheson’s contribution to the broader development of modernBritish moralism cannot be overstated. His chief philosophicalcontributions, upon which this entry will concentrate, include hisaforementionedsentimentalism, his complexmoralpsychology, hisproto-utilitarianism, his critique ofself-interest theorists (such as Hobbes and Mandeville), hiscritique ofrationalists (such as Clarke and Wollaston), andhis attemptedreconciliation of virtue and self-interest.

One brief note. Though this entry will concentrate onHutcheson’s contributions to moral philosophy, Hutcheson alsooffers views on the nature of human perception (broadly derived fromLocke’sEssay), first- and second-order theories ofaesthetics (see Kivy 1976 [2003]), logic (Hutcheson 1756),associationism about human cognition (cf. Gill 1995, 1996; Kallich1946), religion (Elton 2008; Harris 2008), and many other topics thatmust be foregone for lack of space.

This entry will proceed in two stages, the first focusing onHutcheson’s metaethics, including his sentimentalism and moralpsychology; the second concentrating on his normative ethics,including his anticipation of some strains in utilitarian thought, andhis argument that virtue and self-interest are aligned.

• 1. Hutcheson’s Metaethics
  • 1.1 The Senses
  • 1.2 Senses and Evaluative Modes
  • 1.3 Semantics and Moral Ontology
  • 1.4 Attack on Rationalism
• 2. Hutcheson’s Normative Ethics
  • 2.1 Self-Interest and Benevolence
  • 2.2 Virtue and Utility
  • 2.3 Virtue, Happiness, and Hedonism
• Bibliography
  • A. Primary Literature
  • B. Secondary Literature
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. Hutcheson’s Metaethics

Hutcheson’s most detailed statement of his sentimentalism andsubstantive moral and aesthetic theory is to be found in his 1725 (andsubsequently revised) work,An Inquiry into the Original of ourIdeas of Beauty and Virtue. Indeed, at least in early editions oftheInquiry, Hutcheson considered this essay an attempt todefend the (broadly considered) sentimentalist doctrines of LordShaftesbury, as expressed in theCharacteristiks of Men, Manners,Opinions, Times (1711). Indeed, the subtitle of the book’sfirst edition runs as follows:

In which the principles of the late Earl of Shaftesbury areExplain’d and Defended, against the Author of theFable ofthe Bees: and the Ideas of Moral Good and Evil areestablish’d, according to the Sentiments of the AntientMoralists. With an Attempt to introduce a Mathematical Calculation inSubjects of Morality. (Inquiry)

The reference to Mandeville is significant here. In theInquiry, Hutcheson considered it his task to defend, not theexact details of Shaftesbury’s scheme, but rather his generalsentimentalism against the “self-interest” theories ofMandeville and Thomas Hobbes. But leaving aside his rejection ofself-interest theorists for the moment (see§2.1), what is the nature of Hutcheson’s overall metaethic?

1.1 The Senses

In theEssay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions,Hutcheson defines his sentimentalism in the following terms:

“Objects, Actions, or Events obtain the Name ofGood,orEvil, according as they are Causes, or Occasions,mediately, or immediately, of a grateful, or ungratefulPerception to some sensitive Nature”. To understandtherefore the several Kinds ofGood, orEvil, wemust apprehend the severalSenses natural to us.(Essay, 15)

This passage reveals a number of features of Hutcheson’ssentimentalism. First, he admits of a wide variety of what might becalled evaluativemodes: there are several kinds of good orevil, according to Hutcheson, which arise given the “grateful orungrateful” perceptions in people, or other “sensitiveNatures”. These evaluative modes will correspond to the varioussenses that are apt to receive such perceptions.

But what, for Hutcheson, is a “sense”? (For a verythorough introduction, see Schmitter 2016.) In theEssay, hedefines this notion as follows:

every Determination of our Minds to receive Ideas independently onour Will, and to have Perceptions of Pleasure and Pain.(Essay, 17)

Now, this account of the nature of senses permits of a fairly broadrange—any “determination” of our mind to receiveideas involuntarily is to be understood as a sense. And, indeed,Hutcheson takes this breadth seriously. He recognizes not just the“five senses”—which he dubs “external”senses (Inquiry, I.X;Essay I.1)—but a broadrange of “internal” senses. Hutcheson writes:

In Musick we seem universally to acknowledge something like a distinctSense from the External one of Hearing, and call it a good Ear; andthe like distinction we should probably acknowledge in other Objects,had we also got distinct Names to denote these Powers of Perceptionby. (Inquiry, I.X)

For Hutcheson, the ideas, and pleasures, receivedvia the“good ear”—as opposed to the simple external senseof hearing—are the products of aninternal sense.

Indeed, in Hutcheson’s psychology, we get a very wide array ofinternal “senses”. While this is not an exhaustive list,he lists or at least suggests senses of:

1. Imagination (Essay, 17) or “Beauty andHarmony” (Inquiry, 23) (“thePleasantPerceptions arising fromregular, harmonious, uniformObjects; as also fromGrandeur andNovelty”;Essay, 17).
2. the “Publick Sense” (“our Determination to bepleased with theHappiness of others, and to be uneasy attheirMisery”;Essay, 17).
3. The Moral Sense (“by which we perceiveVirtue, orVice in our selves, or others”;Essay,17).
4. The “Sense of Honour” (“which makes theApprobation orGratitude of others, for any goodActions we have done, the necessary occasion of Pleasure; and theirDislike,Condemnation, orResentment ofInjuries done by us, the occasion of that uneasy Sensation calledShame, even when we fear no further evil from them”;Essay, 18).
5. The sense of “decency or dignity” (by which we takepleasure in actions or activities that are specifically adapted tohuman nature;System, 27–30;Essay, 18).

In Hutcheson’s psychology there is a key difference between theexternal and internal senses. According to Hutcheson, the externalsenses have the power to perceivesimple ideas—notes,colors, sounds, tastes, etc. (Inquiry, 23). But theinternal senses are those, according to Hutcheson, that arise“only upon someprevious Idea, orAssemblage,orComparison of Ideas” (Essay, 15–16).The internal senses, then, will proliferate under Hutcheson’sgeneral account—any capacity to generate pleasure or paininvoluntarily given the comparison of ideas will, on Hutcheson’sview, be a sense. And hence it should not at all be surprising thatHutcheson gives the diverse accounting of senses that he does.

However, despite there being a difference, in Hutcheson, between theexternal and internal senses concerning their operation on simple orcomplex ideas, they are nevertheless justly grouped togetheras senses:

Since then there are such different Powers of Perception, where whatare commonly called the External Senses are the same; since the mostaccurate Knowledge of what the External Senses discover, often doesnot give the Pleasure of Beauty or Harmony, which yet one of a goodTaste will enjoy at once without much Knowledge; we may justly useanother Name of these higher, and more delightful Perceptions ofBeauty and Harmony, and call the power of receiving such Impressions,an Internal Sense…This superior Power of Perception is justlycalled a Sense, because of its Affinity to other Senses in this, thatthe Pleasure does not arise from any Knowledge of Principles,Proportions, Causes or of the Usefulness of the Object; but strikes usat first with the Idea of Beauty: nor does the most accurate Knowledgeincrease this Pleasure of Beauty, however it may super-add a distinctrational Pleasure from prospects of Advantage, or from the Increase ofKnowledge. (Inquiry, 24–25)

Here Hutcheson appears to be defending his use of the term“sense” to describe the internal senses as well as theexternal. According to Hutcheson, the fundamental similarity is thegeneration of pleasures and ideasimmediately, withoutintervening cognitive work—the sense of taste “strikes usat first with the Idea of Beauty”, along with its accompanyingpleasure.

1.2 Senses and Evaluative Modes

According to Hutcheson’s metaethic, evaluations are specificallylinked to the senses, in particular the internal senses. So, forinstance, aesthetic goodness will be determined (in a sense to bediscussed in§1.3) by the operation of the sense of imagination. Honorable actions willbe determined by the operation of the sense of honor. Morally goodactions will be determined by the operation of the moral sense, and soon. But one might wonder whether there is such a ready distinctionbetween the internal senses. Given that we can form new ideas giventheir comparison, and derive pleasure from them, why believe thatthere is such a sharp distinction between, e.g., the sense ofimagination and the moral sense? Put another way, whatindividuates these senses, sufficient to distinguishevaluative modes?

Generally, Hutcheson appears to individuate senses by the sorts ofthings that generate the particular ideas/pleasures involved. Forinstance, he suggests that “Harmony” “denotes ourpleasant Ideas arising from Composition of Sounds”(Inquiry 23). Here we know it is the sense of harmony, ratherthan, e.g., the moral sense, because the pleasure we take is givenrise by the “composition of sounds”. The pleasures of thepublick sense arise as a result of the consideration of others’happiness and misery (Essay, 17). The pleasures of the senseof dignity arise from others’ assessment of us, and so on.

However, the moral sense has a further characteristic feature that theother internal senses, and hence other evaluative modes, do not.Hutcheson’s earliest reference to the moral sense runs asfollows:

[S]ome Actions have to Men an immediate Goodness; …by asuperior Sense, which I call a Moral one, we perceive pleasure in theContemplation of such Actions in others, and are determin’d tolove the Agent, (and much more do we perceive Pleasure in beingconscious of having done such Actions our selves) without any View offurther natural Advantage from them. (Inquiry, 88)

Here it appears that Hutcheson holds that the moral sense is thatwhich takes pleasurein actions. But it is also the case thatthe moral sense, aside from a distinctive input, as it were, maintainsa distinctiveoutput: love of the agent. Later editions oftheInquiry also identify this output as “the simpleideas of Approbation and Condemnation” (Inquiry,217n45) (see Darwall 1995: 210).

But it would appear that, for Hutcheson, the senses—and withthem the evaluative modes—are distinguished by the objectsortals to which they apply.

1.3 Semantics and Moral Ontology

Given Hutcheson’s insistence that the operation of our varioussenses “determines” the various evaluative modes,it’s clear that he is marked out as a sentimentalist in someform or other. But how should we understand Hutcheson’ssentimentalism more precisely? Several questions arise.

First, we might ask a semantic question. Can we take Hutcheson, inexpressing his view, to be a proto-non-cognitivist? In other words, isit the case that when people make moral utterances, they are simplyexpressing their attitudes? Second, we might ask an ontological ormetaphysical question. Can we take Hutcheson to regard his moralmetaphysics as response-dependent (i.e., that moral properties justare the properties of eliciting certain responses), or is his viewcompatible (or does it even express) some kind of realism about moralproperties?

Let’s begin with the question of whether Hutcheson is anon-cognitivist. Now, of course, much depends on what one means bythis. But for the purpose of fixing our discussion, treatnon-cognitivism as a sematic thesis, according to which moral terms donot refer to specific properties or objects, but are rather theexpression of a particular non-cognitive (such as conative, affective,and so on) attitude. And, indeed, there are some who read Hutcheson injust this way. Perhaps most famously, William Frankena writes:

As I read Hutcheson, then, his position is this: in passing moralapprobation as such on an action I am not cognizing and ascribing anyidentifiable property of goodness, etc., in or to the action, and I amnot cognizing or asserting any fact about the actual or possiblereactions of any spectators to the action. I am simply feeling aunique sort of pleasure in contemplating the action, and I amexpressing this feeling by my verbal utterance, perhaps alsoexpressing (but not asserting) a conviction that others will feel thispleasure if similarly situated, and almost certainly intending toevoke similar feelings in my hearers. That is, my moral approbation assuch is wholly non-cognitive, very much as it is on Ayer’s morerecent view, except that Ayer does not bring in a unique unacquiredmoral sense as the source of the feelings involved. (Frankena 1955:372)

Why think this? Frankena mentions that Hutcheson specifically notesthat our moral sense is a determination to “receivepleasure” independently of any further ideas:

We are not to imagine, that this moral Sense, more than the othersenses, supposes any innate Ideas, Knowledge, or practicalProposition: We mean by it only a Determination of our Minds toreceive amiable or disagreeable Ideas of Actions, when they occur toour Observation, antecedent to any Opinions of Advantage or loss toredound to our selves from them. (Inquiry, 100)

Here it would appear that Hutcheson identifies the “amiable ordisagreeable Ideas” as the “immediate Pleasure”gained as a result of the operation of the moral sense. If so, itwould make some sense to say that Hutcheson holds that when makingmoral judgments, one is simply expressing the affective attitudes,i.e., pleasure, that one gains as a result of the operation of themoral sense.

However, on balance Hutcheson’s text does not permit of this reading.(For a much more thorough rejection of such a reading, see Darwall1995: ch. 8; esp. 215–16; Kupperman 1985) Recall again hispassage from the opening of theEssay:

Objects, Actions, or Events obtain the Name ofGood, orEvil, according as they are the Causes, or Occasions,mediately, or immediately, of a grateful, or ungratefulPerception to some sensitive Nature.

Hutcheson does not claim that the property, say,“goodness”, or our expressions of such a property justare expressions of our sensitive responses to such objects.But, rather, the property of goodness identified in such objects isthe property of being a “Cause or Occasion” of suchreactions. A similar thought is expressed in the opening passages oftheInquiry:

The Word Moral Goodness, in this Treatise, denotes our Idea of someQuality apprehended in Actions, which procures Approbation, and Lovetoward the Actor, from those who receive no Advantage by the Action.(Inquiry, 85)

Frankena dismisses this passage by noting that Hutcheson, in the nextsentence, holds that these are “Imperfect Descriptions”(Frankena 1955: 368). But Hutcheson does not believe that they are“Imperfect” in the sense of beingincorrect—rather, he holds that these descriptions areimperfect in the sense requiring additional evidence and argument,i.e.,

until we discover whether we really have such Ideas, and what generalFoundation there is in Nature for this Difference of actions, asmorally Good or Evil.

Thus it seems that we shouldn’t accept that Hutcheson is anon-cognitivist in the sense meant by Frankena. For Hutcheson, moralgoodness (and, presumably, the other evaluative modes) refers toparticular properties. However, at this point we may wish to turn tothe nature of these properties. What sort of property is moralgoodness or evil? The key question is the manner in which the moralsense “determines” moral distinctions (Radcliffe 1986).Though this is a bit of a coarse-grained division, one coulddistinguish what we might call “constitutivesentimentalism”, according to which the property referred to bythe term “good” just is the property of causing therelevant sentiments in observers. Contrast this with “epistemicsentimentalism”, according to which the properties referred toby the term “good” are independent of the moral sense, butit is nevertheless the operation of the moral sense that allows us toascertain or recognize these properties (Raphael 1947).

Indeed, it is not immediately clear from theInquiry how weare to read Hutcheson on this matter. As already quoted, he holds thatthe moral sense is the source of theideas of moral good andbad (Inquiry 86). But this would appear to be neutralconcerning whether Hutcheson is a constitutive or epistemicsentimentalist. However, the passage from theEssay is lessambiguous. As noted, he holds that objects, actions, and so on“obtain the nameGood” insofar as they arecauses of the relevant perceptions (Essay, 15). Andhence this would appear to be a constitutive sentimentalism: moralproperties just are those properties that cause a particularsentimental reaction. On this reading (or so it would seem), if ourpsychology were different, then it may be that those things that“procure Approbation” would be substantially differentthan what they are now. This consequence was a key contemporarycriticism of Hutcheson. John Balguy, for instance, writes

In thefirst place, it seems an insuperable difficulty in ourauthor’s scheme, that virtue appears in it to be of an arbitraryand positive nature, as entirely depending uponinstincts,that might originally have been otherwise, or even contrary to whatthey now are, and may be at any time altered or inverted, if theCreator pleases. (Balguy 1728 [BM: 390])

However, there are two further points worth making here, as we come tounderstand Hutcheson’s moral ontology. First, even if it werethe case that Hutcheson accepted a kind of constitutivesentimentalism, Hutcheson nevertheless believes that the property ofgoodnesscould not have been otherwise. This is for tworeasons. First, Hutcheson believes that our capacity for approbation,and our capacity to take pleasure in particular actions given themoral sense is firmly rooted in the universal principles of humannature:

But if we call “thatState, thoseDispositionsandActions,natural, to which we are inclined bysome part of our Constitution, antecedently to anyVolition of ourown; or which flow from somePrinciples in our Nature,not brought upon us by our ownArt, or that of others;”then it may appear, from what has been said above, that “a StateofGood-will, Humanity, Compassion, mutual Aid, propagating andsupporting Offspring, Love of a Community or Country, Devotion, orLove and Gratitude to some governing Mind, is our naturalState”. (Essay, 130)

Furthermore, Hutcheson seems to believe that only the fundamentalprinciples of human nature maintain moral authority. He writes, in theInquiry:

All Men seem persuaded of some Excellency in the Possession of goodmoral Qualitys, which is superior to all other Enjoyments; and on thecontrary, look upon a State of moral Evil, as worse and more wretchedthan any other whatsoever. We must not form our Judgment in thismatter from the Actions of Men; for however they may beinfluenc’d by moral Sentiments, yet it is certain, thatSelf-interested Passions frequently overcome them, and partial Viewsof the Tendency of Actions, make us do what is really morally evil,apprehending it to be good. But let us examine the Sentiments whichMen universally form of the State of others, when they are no wayimmediately concern’d; for in these Sentiments human Nature iscalm and undisturb’d, and shews its true Face.(Inquiry, 163–4)

And the root of our moral sentiments in human nature is furtherevidence that morality is not, as suggested by Balguy, arbitrary. Thisis because, after all, we are created by a benevolent deity (Rauscher2003). And no benevolent deity would have chosen to impart adisposition to praise, e.g., ill-will, cruelty, pain, hatred, and soforth as principles of human nature (Essay 132). (Indeed,this passage reveals a key error in Frankena’s criticism of a“subjectivist”, rather than non-cognitivist, approach toHutcheson’s metaethics. According to Frankena, the subjectivistview is

incomplete. For it should include a statistical investigation into theactual or possible incidence of feelings of pleasure or pain atcontemplating the act in question among the preliminaries to a moraljudgment. (Frankena 1955: 371)

But Frankena fails to recognize that Hutchesondoes conductthis statistical inquiry. He holds that the sentiments he isdescribing are universal principles of human nature, implanted by abenevolent deity.) Of course, that’s not to say that the deitycouldn’t have made us different than we are(Inquiry, 80; Radcliffe 1986)—just that the deitywouldn’t have.

So if Hutcheson is a constitutive sentimentalist, it appears that hisbrand of constitutive sentimentalism has at least had some responsesto some common objections. After all, our responses are fixtures ofhuman nature, so there needn’t be any sort of problematiccontingency in the application of moral predicates.

However, there is one slight complication that can and should beraised for the constitutive interpretation of Hutcheson. (Further tothis discussion, see Kail 2001.) Recall how we distinguish senses,i.e.,via their subject matter. Now, as noted before, themoral sense takes pleasure in actions. But so does, e.g., the sense ofdignity or decency. Of course, this isn’t any particular problemfor his account of sense individuation. After all, Hutcheson holds, inthe latter case, that it is thesuitableness to human natureupon which the sense of dignity operates. This indicates that whetheran action is suitable to human nature is independent of the operationof the sense of dignity. But note that Hutcheson also (at leastoccasionally) refers to the moral sense as a quality that perceivesand operates uponvirtue and vice (Essay, 17). Now,were Hutcheson a constitutive sentimentalist, this would create aserious problem. After all, on a constitutive sentimentalist view,virtue and vice is logically posterior to the operation of the moralsense, rendering any attempt at individuating that particular sensecircular. It would appear a better reading to hold that, as aperceptive quality, the moral sense is perceiving and reactingtosomething, viz., virtue and vice, telling in favor of anepistemic rather than constitutive reading of Hutcheson’ssentimentalism.

In further support of an epistemic reading, consider the followingpassage from Hutcheson’sA System of Moral Philosophy.Here, Hutcheson writes the following:

Tho’ the approbation of moral excellence is a grateful action orsensation of the mind, ’tis plain the good approved is not thistendency to give us a grateful sensation. As, in approving a beautifulform, we refer to the beauty of the object; we do not say that it isbeautiful because we reap some little pleasure in viewing it, but weare pleased in viewing it because it is antecedently beautiful. Thus,when we admire the virtue of another, the whole excellence, or thatquality which by nature we are determined to approve, is conceived tobe in that other; we are pleased in the contemplation because theobject is excellent, and the object is not judged to be thereforeexcellent because it gives us pleasure. (System, 54; see alsoNorton 1985: 410)

Now, this seems to be a direct rejection of his view, expressed in theEssay, that goodness just is thecause or occasionof a “grateful Perception”. Rather, or so it would appearhere, Hutcheson seems to be holding that the goodness is a realproperty of the object, which we feel pleasure upon contemplating,just as beauty is a real property of a particular object, which wefeel pleasure upon seeing or appreciating. This clearly tells in favorof an epistemic rather than a constitutive sentimentalism.

One might hold that Hutcheson, by the time he wrote theSystem, had changed his view. Indeed, theEssay’s first edition was published in 1728, and theSystem was a much later book, left unpublished at the time ofhis death. A standard view is that Hutcheson’s thinking changedsubstantially once we reach theSystem (Carey 2005:v–vi; Scott 1900: 214). However, this explanation issomewhat unsatisfactory, for at least one reason. Hutcheson was aperennial tinkerer. TheEssay underwent no fewer than threeseparate revised editions during Hutcheson’s lifetime. Thefinal, third, edition of theEssay was completed andpublished in 1742. But theSystem, while it was not publisheduntil after Hutcheson’s death in 1755, was substantiallycomplete by 1737, five yearsearlier than the final revisededition of theEssay. And hence were Hutcheson to havechanged his view concerning the nature of the property of goodness,one would certainly expect to see this change reflected in the text oftheEssay, which was revised as of 1742. But onedoesn’t. (This is especially striking given that Hutcheson wasnot shy about making very substantive changes in later editions of hiswork; this is especially true of the four editions of theInquiry.)

This, therefore, is an exegetical puzzle. However, progress may be made by reconsidering Hutcheson’s passage from theEssay. He writesthat objects, etc.,“obtain the Name ofGood”given their capacity to cause pleasurable sensations. Notice the word“obtain”. We might read Hutcheson as saying not that theproperty of goodnessis the tendency to cause feelings ofapprobation or feelings of pleasure, but rather the property ofgoodness is one to which we have access given our feelings ofpleasure, just in the sense that beauty is a property to which we haveaccess given our feelings of pleasure in contemplation of thebeautiful object. Our feelings of pleasure, in this way, serve tofix the reference of the term “goodness”, but donot constitute thereferent of that term. In other words,moral goodness just is the property of XYZ, but we“apprehend” that property given our affective responsesand the operation of the moral sense. For Hutcheson, the pleasuregenerated by the moral sense operates in an analogous way that thedescription of an object operates in a causal theory of reference.“The author ofThe Shining” fixes the referenceof “Stephen King”, but the property ofbeing StephenKing is not the property of being the author ofTheShining. Similarly, that which has a tendency to causeapprobation fixes the reference of moral goodness, but being theproperty of moral goodness is not the same as being the disposition tocause approbation. For Hutcheson, the property is independent.

1.4 Attack on Rationalism

However we understand the ontological status of moral properties inHutcheson’s sentimentalism, it is clear that Hutcheson made ithis business to insist that the foundation of morality isnotto be found in our rational capacities, or capacities for thedetermination of truth and reason (see Gill 2006: ch. 12). This putHutcheson at odds with his rationalist contemporaries, mostimportantly John Balguy, Samuel Clarke, and William Wollaston. In theIllustrations on the Moral Sense (which was published withtheEssay), Hutcheson offers a sustained critique of theseauthors and other forms of rationalism (cf.Essay,137–155).

At this point, however, it woulddo to say a little bit about how rationalism is understood byHutcheson’s interlocutors. According to Clarke, the virtueand/or vice of particular actions is determined by the “eternalrelations” of “fitness and unfitness”. Morespecifically, Clarke writes:

there is a fitness or suitableness of certain circumstances to certainpersons, and an unsuitableness of others; founded in the nature ofthings and the qualifications of persons, antecedent to all positiveappointment whatsoever; also that from the different relations ofdifferent person one to another, there necessarily arises a fitness orunfitness of certain manners of behaviour of some persons towardsothers: it is as manifest, as that the properties which flow from theessences of different mathematical figures, have different congruitiesor incongruities between themselves; or that, in mechanics, certainweights or powers have very different forces…. (Clarke 1706[BM: 192–3])

One way in which this “fitness” seems to work, for Clarke,is that there is a “fitness” in humans worshiping God;there is a “fitness” in behaving benevolently towardothers, and so forth. But these “fitnesses” are not knownvia, nor are they the product of, any moralsense—theyare “eternal and immutable” and are discoverable byrational inquiry.

Balguy, another rationalist, takes a somewhat different approach.According to Balguy,

VIRTUE, ormoral goodness, is the conformity of our moralactions to the reasons of things. VICE the contrary…TheCONFORMITY of such actions to REASON, or the RECTITUDE of them, istheir agreeableness to the nature and circumstances of the agents andtheir objects.—Asocial action is thenright,when it is suitable to the nature and relations of the personconcerned. Thus a person obliged actsrightly andreasonably, when his actions are answerable to the relationof gratitude between him and his benefactor. (Balguy 1728 [BM:398])

Finally, Wollaston suggests a different variety of rationalism,according to which the rightness and wrongness of action is determinedby their interference or otherwise with “truth”. Wollastonwrites:

I lay this down then as as fundamental maxim,that whoever acts asif things were so, or not so, doth by his acts declare, that they areso, or not so; as plainly as he could by words, and with morereality…No act (whether word or deed)of anybeing, to whom moral good and evil are imputable, that interferes withany true proposition, or denies any thing to be as it is, can beright…Every act thereforeof such a being, asis before described, and all those omissions, which interfere withtruth (i.e., deny any proposition to be true, which is true; orsuppose any thing not to be what it is, in any regard) are morallyevil, in some degree or other: the forbearing such acts, and theacting in opposition to such omissions are morally good: and when anything may be either done, or not done, equally without the violationof true, that thing is indifferent. (Wollaston 1724 [BM: 243, 250])

In each case, the rationalist seems to suggest that there are certainactions that,antecedent to our approval of them, orsentiments toward them, have certain qualities, i.e., they arereasonable, fit, true, and so forth. However, Hutcheson believes thatall such positions are fundamentally confused. His general line ofattack on rationalism is to disambiguate a number of potentialreadings of rationalism, showing that each is either absurd on itsface, or else surreptitiously relies on the existence of a moral senseor sentiment. “But what”, asks Hutcheson, “is thisConformity of Actions to Reason?” (Here he clearly hasin mind the view championed by Balguy.) And here he provides twopossible answers.

When we ask the Reason of an Action we sometimes mean, “Whattruth shews a Quality in the Action, exciting the Agent to doit?” Thus, why does aLuxurious Man pursueWealth? The Reason is given by this Truth, “Wealth isuseful to purchase Pleasures”. (Essay, 138)

Alternatively, Hutcheson distinguishes another way an action might beconformable to reason:

Sometimes for a Reason of Actions we shew thetruth expressing aQuality, engaging our Approbation. Thus theReason ofhazarding Life in just War, is, that ‘it tends to preserve ourhonest Countrymen, or evidences publick Spirit…The former sortof Reasons we will callexciting, and the latterjustifying. (Essay, 138)

Here Hutcheson is making reference to the, now commonplace,distinction between explanatory reasons (i.e., why did a person dosuch a thing? what was her motivation?) and normative reasons (i.e.,why should this person have done that thing? what does this thing haveto say for itself?, and so on).

In examining the nature of exciting reasons, Hutcheson rejects theclaim that such reasons could be antecedent to our sentiments oraffections. For Hutcheson, our motivations must be a result of ouraffections, and cannot arise without them.

When it comes to justifying reasons, Hutcheson believes that onecannot genuinely justify an action without reference to a moral sense.As Hutcheson notes, one cannot justify an action simply by noting thatit conforms to a true proposition, as this would justify everypossible action (Essay, 144). Furthermore, even if we focuson particulartruths that may be said about particularactions (such as, e.g., “a Truth shewing an Action to be fit toattain an End”), these truths do not genuinely justifywithout some reference to the moral quality of the enditself. But for this we must advert to a moral sense. Simplydiscerning truths about particular ends will not tell us whether thoseends are morally justified:

We have got some strange Phrases, “that some things areantecedently reasonable in the Nature of the thing”, whichsome insist upon: “That otherwise, they say, if before Man wascreated, any Naturewithout a moral Sense had existed, thisNature would not have approved as morally good in the Deity, hisconstituting our Sense as it is as present”. Very true; and whatnext? If there had been nomoral Sense in that Nature, therewould have been noPerception of Morality. But “couldnot such Natures have seen somethingreasonable in oneConstitution more than in another?”…They would havereasoned aboutboth, and found outTruths:are both Constitutions alikereasonable to these Observers?No, they say, “thebenevolent one isreasonable, and themalicious unreasonable:”And yet these Observersreasoned anddiscoveredTruths about both: An Action then is called by usreasonable when ’tisbenevolent, andunreasonable whenmalicious. This is plainly makingthe Wordreasonable denote whatever isapproved byour moral Sense, without Relation totrue Propositions.(Essay, 153–4)

Hutcheson also spends considerable time examining the positions ofClarke and Wollaston in detail. For Clarke, moral distinctions derivefrom the relations of fitness and unfitness, which are themselveseternal. For Hutcheson, any construal of such relations as morallysignificant must presuppose a moral sense. As Hutcheson notes, we donot morally praise the relations between, e.g., the natural numbers asin mathematics, or the fitness of certain chemical compositions. Thefitness of a sword to end someone’s life is in and of itselfmorally neutral. And the fitness of an action to its end is alsomorally neutral—some actions are just as fit to human misery asother actions are fit to human happiness. Of course, one might holdthat the fitness relation is simply to be applied (in a morallyinteresting sense) to the ultimate end of action. Happiness, in otherwords, is “fit”; misery “unfit”. But,according to Hutcheson, what does this mean? It cannot be“fit” to, say, give rise to some otherthing—that’s what makes it anultimate end. Butany explication that would render some particular end as“fit” seems, according to Hutcheson to presuppose anindependent evaluation beyond its “fitness”.(Though for a reading of Hutcheson that suggests significantcontinuity between Hutcheson and Clarke, see Sheridan 2007.)

Hutcheson saves his most biting criticism for Wollaston’s view,however. According to Hutcheson, there is no plausibility to be hadthat moral distinctions can be derived by the tendencies of ouractions to signify truth or falsity. Depending upon what oneunderstands to be “significance”, or how one understandsWollaston’s “[acting] as if things were so, or notso”, we would declare as immoral such benign acts as leavingone’s lights on at night, or traveling, as a noble,“without Coronets”, or walking in plainclothes despitebeing clergy, or writing plays or “Epicks”(Essay, 164–66). In addition, according to Hutcheson,Wollaston’s system cannot distinguish between degrees of virtueor vice. Assuming it makes some sense to say that particular actionssignify truth or falsehood, this appears to be a binaryproperty—it either does or does not. But virtue is scalar: someactions are horribly vicious, others are heroic, others are relativelymorally insignificant (Essay, 170; see also§2.2). Ultimately, then, Hutcheson concludes that Wollaston (and every otherrationalist he considers) is really smuggling in some sort of moralsense in disguise, whether this is by means of a reference to the“reasonableness” of particular actions, a reference totheir “fitness” or reference to their “significanceof truth or falsity”.

2. Hutcheson’s Normative Ethics

Most of the scholarly attention paid to Hutcheson concerns hismetaethics—the nature of his moral psychology, his understandingof the ontological status of moral facts, his critique of rationalism,and so forth. But equally interesting is hisnormative ethics, which features a striking critique of“self-interest” theories, a unification of virtue andhappiness, and a view that clearly anticipates later Britishutilitarianism.

2.1 Self-Interest and Benevolence

To begin, Hutcheson believed that the most important contribution oftheInquiry was a rejection of the“self-interest” theories of Hobbes and Mandeville (seeGill 2006: ch. 11). Famously, Hobbes and Mandeville placed thefoundation of morality on the individual self-interest of every moralagent. Now, Hutcheson thinks that a crass reduction of morality toself-interest is thoroughly untenable—else we would assign moralproperties to “a fruitful Field, or commodious Habitation”(Inquiry, 89).

However—as Hutcheson clearly understands—the reductionmorality to self-interest proposed by the self-interest theorists isclearly more sophisticated than this. To see this, consider theargument connecting morality and self-interest from Hobbes. Hobbesbegins with a psychological claim. According to Hobbes, humans aremotivated by their own good. (Note that this is something of anoversimplification. Hobbes believes that individuals are motivated bywhatever they in fact desire—but that their desiresconstitute the nature of their good;Leviathan, VI,IX.) This leads them into conflict, as each person desires greaterpower to satisfy their desires, which inevitably interferes with thedesires of others. The result is violence, and “the life of man,solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” (Leviathan,XIII). Notice, however, that Hobbes thinks that these tendencies inpeople—their tendencies toward self-interest andself-preservation, resulting in violence—are not themselvesmorally problematic. He writes:

The desires, and other passions of man, are in themselves no sin. Nomore are the actions, that proceed from those passions, till they knowa law that forbids them: which till laws be made they cannot know: norany law be made, till they have agreed upon the person that shall makeit. (Leviathan, XIII)

Hobbes thus seems to think that moral normativity has an essentialconnection to the motivations of agents. But because the motivationsof agents are fundamentally self-directed, moral normativity cannotextend beyond what is in the fundamental interest of agents.

Hobbes, then, develops his self-interest theory by means of twopremises. The first,psychological, premise is that humanmotivation is essentially self-directed. The second,normative, premise is that moral obligation is determinedsimply given what agents will be motivated to do.

Hutcheson concentrates his attack on the first premise of thisargument (see Bishop 1996). According to Hutcheson, we are not simplyguided by our self-interest, but possess a form of“disinterested benevolence” toward others. His moststriking example of this comes from the following thoughtexperiment:

To make this yet clearer, suppose that the Deity should declare to agood Man that he should be suddenly annihilated, but at the Instant ofhis Exit it should be left to his Choice whether his Friend, hisChildren, or his Country should be made happy or miserable for theFuture, when he himself could have no Sense of either Pleasure or Painfrom their State. Pray would he be any more indifferent about theirState now, that he neither hoped or feared any thing to himself fromit, than he was in any prior Period of his Life? Nay, is it not apretty common Opinion among us, that after our Decease we know nothingof what befalls those who survive us? How comes it then that we do notlose, at the Approach of Death, all Concern for our Families, Friends,or Country? Can there be any Instance given of our desiring any Thingonly as the Means of private Good, as violently when we know that weshall not enjoy this Good many Minutes, as if we expected thePossession of this good for many Years? (Inquiry, 228n33)

Insofar as our self-interest is not affected by what happens after ourdeath, at least according to Hutcheson, it seems strange to say thatindividuals are concerned only for their self-interest. After all, weappear to be concerned not just with ourselves, but with, e.g., ourchildren, friends, and compatriots. (Note also that Hutcheson uses avery similar argument against Hume’s reliance on themotivational significance of sympathy. SeeSystem,48–49.)

Now, as Hutcheson argues here, we may have a certain form ofpartial benevolence toward others. But Hutcheson also arguesthat we in fact maintain “a universal Determination toBenevolence in Mankind, even toward the most distant parts of theSpecies” (Inquiry, 147;Essay, 34). Hewrites:

Every one at present rejoices in the Destruction of Pirates; and yetlet us suppose a Band of such Villains cast upon some desolate Island,and that we were assur’d some Fate would confine them thereperpetually, so that they should disturb Mankind no more. Now let uscalmly reflect that these Persons are capable of Knowledge andCounsel, may be happy, and joyful…[L]et us ask ourselves, whenSelf-Love or regard to the Safety of better Men, no longer makes usdesire their Destruction…whether we would wish them the Fate ofCadmus’s Army, by plunging their Swords in each othersBreast…or rather that they should recover the ordinaryAffections of Men, become Kind, Compassionate, and Friendly…andform an honest happy Society, with Marriages, and Relations dear, andall the Charities of Father, Son, and Brother—I fancy the latterwould be the Wish of every Mortal. (Inquiry,105–106)

Furthermore, it is crucial for Hutcheson that motivations ofself-interest should play no role in the esteem of actions asvirtuous. And hence According to Hutcheson, our moral sense approvesonly actions motivated by benevolence, not self-interest:

If we examine all the Actions which are counted amiable any where, andenquire into the Grounds upon which they are approv’d, we shallfind, that in the Opinion of the Person who approves them, they alwaysappear as Benevolent, or flowing from Love of others, and a Study oftheir Happiness, whether the Approver be one of the Personsbelov’d, or profited, or not; so that all those kind Affectionswhich incline us to make others happy, and all Actions suppos’dto flow from such Affections, appear morally Good, if while they arebenevolent toward some Persons, they be not pernicious to others.(Inquiry, 116)

Indeed, for Hutcheson,

the Perfection of Virtue consists in ‘having theuniversalcalm Benevolence, the prevalent Affection of the Mind, so as tolimit and counteract not only theselfish Passions, but eventheparticular kind Affections. (Essay, 8)

Indeed, evenif a particular action is beneficent in itseffects—that is, it benefits other people to some extent orother—Hutcheson holds that such an action cannot be esteemed asvirtuous if we presume that the action was motivatedbyself-interest:

Nor shall we find any thing amiable in any Action whatsoever, wherethere is no Benevolence imagin’d; nor in any Disposition, orCapacity, which is not suppos’d applicable to, anddesign’d for benevolent Purposes. Nay, as was beforeobserv’d, the Actions which in fact are exceedingly useful,shall appear void of moral Beauty, if we know they proceeded from nokind Intentions toward others; and yet an unsuccessful Attempt ofKindness, or of promoting publick Good, shall appear as amiable as themost successful, if it flow’d from as strong Benevolence.(Inquiry, 116)

2.2 Virtue and Utility

Hutcheson is often recognized as an early figure in the development ofcontemporary utilitarianism. Indeed, it was Hutcheson who first usedthe phrase, in identifying the nature of moral goodness, that actsshould promote “the greatest happiness for the greatestnumber”. He writes, in theInquiry, that

that Action is best, which procures the greatest Happiness for thegreatest Numbers; and that, worst, which, in like manner, occasionsMisery. (Inquiry, 125)

But is Hutcheson really a utilitarian? And if so, what sort ofutilitarian is he?

To begin, there are passages in Hutcheson that sound quiteutilitarian, indeed. In the early editions of theInquiry,Hutcheson suggests a quasi-mathematical principle by which to

compute the Morality of any Actions, with all their Circumstances,when we judge of the Actions done by our selves, or by others.(Inquiry, 128)

He holds that

The moral Importance of any Agent, or the Quantity of publick Goodproduced by him, is in a compound Ratio of his Benevolence andAbilitys: or (by substituting the Letters for the Words, as M = Momentof Good, and μ = Moment of Evil) M = B × A.(Inquiry, 128)

Deriving, then, that a person’s benevolence is determined byM/A, Hutcheson declares that

must be the Perfection of Virtue where M = A, or when the Being actsto the utmost of his Power for the public Good. (Inquiry,130)

(It should be noted that the fourth edition of theInquiryrefrains from this technical language, but the general idea remainsthe same. SeeInquiry, 234n56.)

Now this sounds as if Hutcheson is espousing a relativelystraightforward utilitarianism. After all, the morality of an actionis determined, on this view, by whether or not an agent produces thegreatest “publick Good” he or she can. In addition,“Publick Good”, here, is understood by Hutcheson to meanthe “natural Good of Mankind” (Inquiry, 91) where“natural good” (more on this later) is understood to meana person’s happiness, defined in hedonistic terms(Inquiry, 86;Essay, 87). Putting this all together,we get a standard, run-of-the-mill, hedonistic utilitarianism.

However, there are major deviations from a straightforwardutilitarianism as we might understand it from, e.g., Bentham orSidgwick (see Albee 1896: 32–35). First, Hutcheson appears tooffer us something like ascalar utilitarianism. On a scalarview, there is no absolute rightness or wrongness, but rather degreesof rightness or wrongness that an action may display (see Norcross2020). And while Hutcheson does discuss the notion of “perfectvirtue”—achieved when the good one has the ability to dois equal to the good one does—he admits that there will bedegrees of virtue (which simply follows given his mathematicalcalculations), and does not describe the perfection of virtue as anysort of absolute obligation (see Darwall 1997: 87–88). (Indeed,this point is essential to his critique of Wollaston,§1.4.)

Second, Hutcheson clearly intends his moral “calculation”to refer, at least in part, to themotivation of a givenaction. Only actions motivated by benevolence will be perfectlyvirtuous. If one is motivated by self-interest, or has a mixedmotivation, the extent to which the action was motivated byself-interest will be deducted from the overall moral character of anaction:

when the Moment of Good, in an Action partly intended for the Good ofthe Agent, is but equal to the Moment of Good in the Action of anotherAgent, influenc’d only by Benevolence, the former is lessvirtuous; and in this Case the Interest must be deducted to find hetrue Effect of the Benevolence. (Inquiry, 129)

So Hutcheson clearly means to hold that any “publick good”that is to be credited to the moral quality of an act must beintended.

Third, Hutcheson holds that the consequences of a particular act willhave no bearing on its moral quality not just if it is not intended,but also if it is notforeseen:

It is true indeed, that that publick Evil which I neither certainlyforesee, nor have actual Presumptions of, as the Consequence of myAction, does not make my present Action Criminal, or Odious; evenaltho I might have foreseen this Evil by a serious Examination of myown Actions; because such actions do not, at present, evidence eitherMalice, or want of Benevolence…In like manner, no good Effectwhich I did not actually foresee and intend, makes my Action morallyGood. (Inquiry, 131).

The second and third deviations from a standard utilitarianism mightbe expected given his affirmed belief that the motivation of virtuousactors is paramount in understanding the virtue of their action. Asalready noted, Hutcheson holds that the moral sense approves actionsinsofar as they are motivated by disinterested benevolence. Thus farone might state his version of utilitarianism as a kind ofscalarmotivational utilitarianism (which we should think of as clearlydistinct from a “motive” utilitarianism (see Adams 1976),according to which morally appropriate actions are motivated bydispositions the possession of which leads to the best consequences),according to which an act is virtuous insofar as the agentaims at the greatest overall good.

But there is one interesting twist that is briefly suggested byHutcheson that is also worth mentioning. Hutcheson holds that theperfectly benevolent, and hence perfectly virtuous, agent will aim atthe greatest public good they can achieve. But the “publickgood” here should not be understood as a straightforwardaggregate of happiness across persons. In describing his understandingof public good, Hutcheson says this:

In comparing the moral Qualitys of Actions, in order to regulate ourElection among various Actions propos’d, or to find which ofthem has the greatest moral Excellency, we are led by our moral Senseof Virtue to judge thus; that in equal Degrees of Happiness, expectedto proceed from the Action, the Virtue is in proportion to the Numberof Persons to whom the Happiness shall extend; (and here the Dignity,or moral Importance of Persons, may compensate Numbers) and in equalNumbers, the Virtue is as the Quantity of the Happiness, or naturalGood; or that the Virtue is in a compound Ratio of the Quantity ofGood, and Number of Enjoyers…Again, when the Consequences ofActions are of a mix’d Nature, partly Advantageous, and partlyPernicious; that Action is good, whose good Effects preponderate theevil, by being useful to many, and pernicious to few; and that, evil,which is otherwise. Here also the moral Importance of Characters, orDignity of Persons may compensate Numbers; as may also the Degrees ofHappiness or Misery: for to procure an inconsiderable Good to many,but an immense Evil to few, may be Evil; and an immense Good to few,may preponderate a small Evil to many. (Inquiry, 125)

Two things are worth noting here. First, and less interestingly, thephrase “compound Ratio of the Quantity of Good, and Number ofEnjoyers” suggests that Hutcheson is inclined toward a form ofaverage utilitarianism, rather thantotalutilitarianism (see Smart & Williams 1974: 27–28; Parfit1984: 420–421). Furthermore, and compatible with this form ofaverage utilitarianism, Hutcheson holds that small benefits spreadover many persons need not compensate for massive evils subjected tofew, and that small evils spread over many may be a price worth payingfor large benefits for a small number. All this is compatible withstandard forms of utilitarian aggregation.

But, more interestingly, Hutcheson suggests that the “Dignity,or moral Importance of Persons, may compensate Numbers”. How tounderstand this passage? One might interpret it as a proto version ofa view according to which the moral virtue of individuals isintrinsically significant, the happiness of two people, one of whom isvirtuous, the other vicious, are not of equal value. (One mightcompare this to a form of “luckism” as advocated by, e.g.,Richard Arneson [2004].) But Hutcheson explicitly denies this readingone paragraph earlier. He writes:

The moral Beauty, or Deformity of Actions, is not alter’d by themoral Qualitys of the Objects, any further than the Qualitys of theObjects increase or diminish the Benevolence of the Action, or thepublick Good intended by it. Thus Benevolence toward the worstCharacters, or the Study of their Good, may be as amiable as anywhatsoever; yea often more so than that toward the Good, since itargues such a strong Degree of Benevolence as can surmount thegreatest Obstacle, the moral Evil in the Object. (Inquiry,124)

For Hutcheson, any “compensation” the moral worth ofindividuals is allowed in comparison to numbers must be understood tobepragmatic:

Yet when our Benevolence to the Evil, encourages them in their badIntentions, or makes them more capable of Mischief; this diminishes ordestroyes the Beauty of the Action, or even makes it evil, as itbetrays a Neglect of the Good of others more valuable.(Inquiry, 124)

In addition, in theSystem, Hutcheson holds that it is moreimportant to benefit friends, family, and people “of eminentvirtue” in comparison to strangers, but notice that only whenall other circumstances are equal is one permitted to favor suchindividuals (seeSystem, 247–8).

But this is puzzling. It would appear that any attention we pay to themoral worth of the objects of our beneficence is simply given thegeneral consequences such beneficence may produce. And hence it wouldappear that the “moral Importance of Persons” is notactually “compensating” numbers at all. Rather, the moralimportance of persons is or perhaps could be an important causalfactor in the overall production of happiness or the overalldistribution of happiness, but is notitself a compensatoryaxiological variable. But this is also puzzling, insofar as Hutchesonseems to treat the moral importance of persons as such a variabletwice. At this point Hutcheson’s embrace, orlack thereof, of luckism must be left as an interpretive puzzle.

2.3 Virtue, Happiness, and Hedonism

The first sentence of Hutcheson’sSystem of MoralPhilosophy runs this way:

The intention of moral philosophy is to direct men to that course ofaction which tends most effectually to promote their greatesthappiness and perfection; as far as it can be done by observations andconclusions discoverable from the constitution of nature, without aidsof supernatural revelation. (System, 1)

Put another way, Hutcheson holds that his aim in discussing the verynature of virtue, benevolence, and the moral sense, is to persuadepeople to act in such a way as to develop “their greatesthappiness and perfection” (see Heydt 2009). And to this end, itis important to note that Hutcheson steadfastly maintains thatvirtuous behavior is in the interest of the virtuous. Of course, giventhat Hutcheson holds that behavior is virtuous insofar as it ismotivated by benevolence andnot self-interest, it isimpossible (on Hutcheson’s view) topursue one’sself-interest through virtuous behavior. To be motivated by self-lovediminishes, to that extent, the virtue of one’s action.

But it is nevertheless the case, for Hutcheson, that virtueis in one’s self-interest. Notice, however, thatHutcheson’s argument for this claim is not straightforward. Ashas already been indicated, Hutcheson is a hedonist:

Because we shall afterwards frequently use the Words Interest,Advantage, natural Good, it is necessary here to fix their Ideas. ThePleasure in our sensible Perceptions of any kind, gives us our firstIdea of natural Good, or Happiness; and then all Objects which are aptto excite this Pleasure are call’d immediately Good…OurSense of Pleasure is antecedent to Advantage or Interest, and is theFoundation of it. (Inquiry, 86)

But how could it be that ahedonist, of all things, believesthat benevolent acts—acts that are motivated for the good ofothers—are always in our self-interest? Surely such acts caninvolve sacrifice of our own pleasure, as when a father dutifully endures thepainful duration of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer: the LiveMusical!” for the sake of his daughter’s delight inwatching it.

The simple story, to be complicated shortly, runs this way. Hutchesonholds that the moral sense is a greater repository of pleasure thanthe other senses. He says, in many places, that the operation of themoral sense providesmore pleasure than the operation of theother senses, internal and external. Hutcheson states, in theInquiry, that the moral sense “gives us more Pleasureand Pain that all our other Facultys” (Inquiry, 163).In theEssay, Hutcheson writes:

Our moral Sense thus regulated, and constantly followed in ourActions, may be the most constant Source of the moststablePleasure. (Essay, 126)

Hutcheson offers a number of arguments for this, generally appealingto our own intuitions about the nature of happiness:

Now should we imagine a rational Creature in a sufficiently happyState, though his Mind was, without interruption, whollyoccupy’d with pleasant Sensations of Smell, Taste, Touch,&c., if at the same time all other Ideas were excluded? Should wenot thing the State low, mean and sordid, if there were no Society, noLove or Friendship, no good Offices? (Inquiry, 163)

So much for the external senses. But he goes on:

Would we ever wish to be in the same Condition with a wrathful,malicious, revengeful, or envious Being, tho we were at the same timeto enjoy all the Pleasures of the external and internalsenses?…What Castle-builder, who forms to himself imaginaryScenes of Life, in which he thinks he should be happy, ever madeacknowledg’d Treachery, Cruelty, or Ingratitude, the Steps bywhich he mounted to his wish’d for Elevation, or Parts of hisCharacter, when he had attain’d it? We always conduct our selvesin such Reveries, according to the Dictates of Honour, Faith,Generosity, Courage…. (Inquiry, 163–4)

Now, this is fine as far as it goes. But notice that Hutcheson doesnot explain why it should be that, e.g., our Castle-building friendstend to imagine that they are virtuous rather than vicious. And whyshould it be that in every case, the virtuous are better-off than thevicious?

A key mechanism here is the notion of a “reflex Act”. LordShaftesbury—borrowing Locke’s notion of“reflection”—introduces the idea this way (see Baier& Luntley 1995):

In a Creature capable of forming general Notions of Things, not onlythe outward Beings which offer themselves to the Sense, are theObjects of the Affection; but the veryActions themselves,and theAffections of Pity, Kindness, Gratitude, and theirContrarys, being brought into the Mind by Reflection, become Objects.So that, by means of this reflected Sense, there arises another kindof Affection towards those very Affections themselves, which have beenalready felt, and are now become the subject of new Liking or Dislike.(Shaftesbury 1711, v. 2, 16)

For Hutcheson, while we do not immediately receive pleasure from ourown virtuous actions, we nevertheless can take the part of a spectatorto ourselves. When we do this, our virtuous actions will trigger ourmoral sense, itself—as Hutcheson is insistent upon—thefount of the most valuable pleasures. (Hutcheson details this in the“D” (i.e., final, 1738) edition of theInquiry.)He writes:

every Spectator is persuaded that the reflex Acts of the virtuousAgent upon his own Temper will give him the highest pleasures.(Inquiry, 217n47)

Again, this is fine as far as it goes. But we may still wonder why itis that such “reflex Acts”, even if engaging the moralsense, necessarily produce the “highest pleasures?” Andwhat is exactly meant by such a phrase?

One solution to this puzzle, opted for by some commentators, holdsthat Hutcheson is a kind ofqualitative hedonist—a viewaccording to which some pleasures are of higher quality, and thereforemore valuable, pleasurableness held equal (Edwards 1979: 30; Riley2008: 275; Strasser 1987: 518; Crisp 2020: 124). And there are somevery tantalizing passages that suggest just this:

As to pleasures of the same kind, ’tis manifest their values arein a joint proportion of their intenseness and duration. In estimatingthe duration, we not only regard the constancy of the object, or itsremaining in our power, and the duration of the sensations it affords,but the constancy of our fancy or relish: for when this changes itputs an end to the enjoyment. In comparing pleasures of differentkinds, the value is as the duration and dignity of the kind jointly.We have an immediate sense of a dignity, a perfection, or beatifickquality in some kinds, which no intenseness of the lower kinds canequal, were they also as lasting as we could wish. No intenseness orduration of any external sensation gives it a dignity or worth equalto that of the improvement of the soul by knowledge, or the ingeniousarts; and much less is it equal to that of virtuous affections andactions. (System, 117)

Here it would seem that Hutcheson’s justification for treatingvirtuous conduct as in the interest of the virtuous is as plain asday. In conducting our “reflex Acts” concerning our ownvirtuous conduct, we trigger our “virtuous affections”,which themselves have a “worth” that no intenseness orduration of any external sensation could match. If we interpretHutcheson as a qualitative hedonist, the explanation of the benefitsone maintains as a result of virtue are straightforward.

What is less straightforward is whether or not Hutcheson genuinely isthis form of qualitative hedonist. And there is very good reason todoubt it. (Much more detailed argument for this point is available inDorsey 2010.) Nowhere in this passage is the “dignity” ofa pleasure thought an axiologically significant variable. In theEssay, Hutcheson writes explicitly that:

TheValue of any Pleasure, and theQuantity orMoment of any Pain, is in a compounded proportion of theIntenseness andDuration. (Essay, 87)

In theInquiry, he seems especially clear that thesuperiority of the moral sense is quantitative rather thanqualitative: it produces “more” pleasure than our othersenses (Inquiry, 162). Furthermore, while theSystempassage cited above is extremely suggestive when it comes tointerpreting Hutcheson as a qualitative hedonist, a mere chapterearlier in theSystem he seems to commit to a straightforwardquantitative hedonism:

supreme happiness must consist in the most constant enjoyment of themost intense and durable pleasures. (System, 100)

On a quantitative reading of Hutcheson’s hedonism, rather thanbeing an axiological guarantee that the pleasures of the moral senseare more valuable, it is simply a matter of psychological fact thathuman beings take more intense and durable pleasures from the moralsense, sufficient to override whatever joys may be taken in the lowroad.

Bibliography

A. Primary Literature

• [Inquiry] [A] 1725 ,An Inquiry into the Original ofOur Ideas of Beauty and Virtue, London; second edition [B] 1726,London; third edition [C] 1729, London; fourth edition [D] 1738,London. Page numbers are from the 2004 edition, Wolfgang Leidhold(ed.),An Inquiry into the Original of our Ideas of Beauty andVirtue, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. [Inquiry 1726 [2004] available online]
• [Essay] 1728,An Essay on the Nature and Conduct ofthe Passions, with Illustrations on the Moral Sense, London;second edition 1730, London; third edition 1742, London. Page numbersare from the 2002, Aaron Garret (ed.),An Essay on the Nature andConduct of the Passions and Affections, with Illustrations on theMoral Sense, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. [Essay 1742 [2002] available online]
• 1730,De naturali hominum socialitate, inaugural lectureas Professor of Moral Theology, Glasgow. Translated asOn theNatural Sociability of Mankind in Hutcheson 2006:189–216.
• 1742,Philosophiae Moralis Institutio Compendiaria.Translated asA Short Introduction to Moral Philosophy,1747.
• 1742,Synopsis metaphysicae, Glasgow; second edition1744; third edition 1749. Second edition translated asA Synopsisof Metaphysics in Hutcheson 2006: 57–188.
• [System] 1755,A System of Moral Philosophy,three volumes, London. Page numbers are from the 2005 edition, DanielCarey (ed.),A System of Moral Philosophy, two volumes,London: Continuum Publishing.
• 1756,Logicae Compendium, Glasgow; translated asACompend of Logic in Hutcheson 2006: 1–56.
• 2006,Logic, Metaphysics, and the Natural Sociability ofMankind, Michael Silverthorne (trans.), James Moore and MichaelSilverthorne (eds), Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Fund, 2006. [Hutcheson 2006 available online]

Note that there is not currently scholarly agreement on the methods bywhich to cite Hutcheson’s text. To eliminate confusion, then, Ihave simply cited the pagination of the editions here. While theInquiry andEssay’s pagination is notoriginal, the editions cited here are the most readily available andcomprehensive critical edition of his works. Insofar as there is nocritical edition of theSystem, the pagination of the 2005text is identical to the original.

B. Secondary Literature

• Albee, Ernest, 1896, “The Relation of Shaftesbury andHutcheson to Utilitarianism”,The Philosophical Review,5(1): 24–35. doi:10.2307/2176103
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aesthetic, concept of the |aesthetics: British, in the 18th century |Clarke, Samuel |emotion: 17th and 18th century theories of |Enlightenment |moral sentimentalism |Scottish Philosophy: in the 18th Century |Shaftesbury, Lord [Anthony Ashley Cooper, 3rd Earl of] |utilitarianism: history of

Acknowledgments

Large thanks are due to Si-won Song for invaluable researchassistance. I would also like to thank Mark Timmons for asking me towrite this entry.