IDLENESS AND THE VERY SPARING HAND OF GOD: THE INVISIBLE TIE BETWEEN HUME’SDIALOGUES CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGIONAND SMITH’SWEALTH OF NATIONS

Abstract

In the eighteenth-century Scottish and British cultural context, idleness was a central issue for religion, literature, art, and philosophy. This paper analyzes the reflections of David Hume and Adam Smith on idleness and commercial society. Hume advanced his most provocative view on the subject in hisDialogues Concerning Natural Religion(1779), where idleness is represented as the endowment made by the “very sparing hand” of the “author of nature” to humanity. My argument is that Smith’s view on idleness that was advanced in theWealth of Nations(1776) is connected to Hume’sDialogues, as Smith’s invisible hand defeats idleness through a combination of self-interest, the propensity to exchange, and the division of labor. The broader aim of this study is to add to the philosophical relationship between the Scottish philosophers.