Monsieur Thomas Reid (1710-1796) d'Aberdeen se moquant amicalement de son contemporain David Hume (1711-1776) d'Edinburgh :
It seems to be a peculiar strain of humour in this author, to set out in his introduction, by promising, with a grave face, no less than a complete system of the sciences, upon a foundation entirely new, to wit, that of human nature ; when the intention of the whole work is to show that there is neither human nature nor science in the world.
It may perhaps be unreasonable to complain of this conduct in an author, who neither believes his own existence nor that of his reader; and therefore could not mean to disappoint him or to laugh at his credulity. Yet I cannot imagine, that the author of the Treatise of Human Nature is so sceptical as to plead this apology. He believed, against his principles, that he should be read, and that he should retain his personal identity till he reaped the honour and reputation justly due to his metaphysical acumen. Indeed, he ingenuously acknowledges, that it was only in solitude and retirement that he could yield any assent to his own philosophy ; society, like daylight, dispelled the darkness and fogs of scepticism, and made him yield to the dominion of Common Sense. Nor did I ever hear him charged with doing any thing, even in solitude, that argued such a degree of scepticism as his principles maintained. Surely if his friends apprehended this, they would have the charity never to leave him alone. (...)
It is a bold philosophy that rejects, without ceremony, principles which irresistibly govern the belief and the conduct of all mankind in the common concerns of life ; and to which the philosopher himself must yield, after he imagines he hath confuted them. Such principles are older and of more authority than Philosophy: she rests upon them as her basis, not they upon her. If she could overturn them, she must be buried in their ruins ; but all the engines of philosophical subtilty are too weak for this purpose ; and the attempt is no less ridiculous than if a mechanic should contrive an axis in peritrochio to remove the earth out of its place ; or if a mathematician should pretend to demonstrate, that things equal to the same thing are not equal to one another.
Zeno endeavoured to demonstrate the impossibility of motion ; Hobbes, that there was no difference between right and wrong ; and this author [Hume], that no credit is to be given to our senses, to our memory, or even to demonstration. Such philosophy is justly ridiculous, even to those who cannot detect the fallacy of it. It can have no other tendency than to show the acuteness of the sophist,at the expense of disgracing reason and human nature, and making mankind Yahoos.
Thomas Reid, An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense, 1764, Chapitre I Introduction, sect. 5 De l'évêque Berkeley, du Traité de la Nature humaine et du scepticisme
Bien sûr, Reid exagère complètement le scepticisme de Hume alors que ce dernier n'avait cessé de se défendre d'un pyrrhonisme extravagant sur nos impressions. Reid l'accuse de douter même du raisonnement alors que Hume est un logiciste en même temps qu'un empiriste.
Mais c'est écrit dans un style assez délicieux, qui évoque déjà celui de Bertrand Russell par la suite. Cette première phrase est un trait d'esprit piquant mais assez frappante sur l'étrangeté du naturalisme humien (prétendre fonder toutes les sciences sur la nature humaine tout en réduisant toute nature à une régularité contingente).
On remarque que Reid n'utilise jamais dans ce chapitre le nom de Hume mais seulement la description définie "l'auteur du Traité de la nature humaine" (ouvrage dont Reid disait aussi avec admiration comme un certain Prussien qu'il l'avait sorti de son propre sommeil dogmatique). Il le cite quand même dans la dédicace, dans les chapitres VI et VII. Cette réticence est-elle une sorte de convention sur un contemporain encore vivant ? Reid est Professeur à Aberdeen (et ancien Pasteur) alors que Hume a été refusé à Edinburgh pour son athéisme. Ou est-ce une sorte de courtoisie parce que Hume est chargé d'affaires à l'ambassade du Royaume-Uni à Paris à cette période ?
En tout cas, dès 1760, Reid a déjà une histoire de la philosophie qui est la même que celle qui nous vient ensuite de Victor Cousin, une généalogie rationaliste-empiriste où l'occasionnalisme de Malebranche conduit à l'idéalisme empirique de Berkeley et celui-ci à l'empirisme radical de Hume.
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire