Being and Necessity

Abstract

The terms ‘ontological argument’ and ‘cosmological argument’ are anachronistic when applied to Hume and tend to set one in search of more sharply differentiated subject-matter than is to be found in his work. As such he never discusses the ontological argument. But he has things to say, particularly of the sort ‘Whatever is may not be’ (Enquiry, 164: 171; Dialogues, 189 et al.) which are highly relevant to it. These convey the idea that he must have had in mind something like Descartes’ ontological argument in Meditations V¹ (if not actually Anselm’s original in the Proslogion). It is, however much more likely that in these passages he is concerned with the ‘necessarily existent being’ which also figures in the cosmological argument: that ‘simple and sublime argument a priori’ set out by Demea in Dialogues IX.

Mr Panscope: You seem desirous, by the futile process of analytical dialectics, to subvert the pyramidal structure of synthetically deduced opinions, which have withstood the secular revolutions of physiological disquisition, and which I maintain to be transcendentally self-evident, categorically certain and syllo-gistically demonstrable.

Squire Headlong: Bravo! Pass the bottle. The very best speech that ever was made.

Mr Escot: It has only the slight disadvantage of being unintelligible.

Peacock, Headlong Hall