A Treatise of Human Nature

Beginning with his A Treatise of Human Nature (1739), Hume strove to create a total naturalistic "science of man" that examined the psychological basis of human nature. In stark opposition to the rationalists who preceded him, most notably Descartes, he concluded that desire rather than reason governed human behaviour, saying:"Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions". A prominent figure in the sceptical philosophical tradition and a strong empiricist, he argued against the exi ...