The Lady Mary Shepherd Philosophy Salon: Shepherd vol 2 ebook: Chapter 5: Shepherd, Brown and historical, contextual considerations surrounding scholarly responses to Hume

Chapter 5: Shepherd, Brown and historical, contextual considerations surrounding scholarly responses to Hume

Unlike many contemporary philosophers, Shepherd did not find the topic of causation dry and heavy-going in the least. She states in her 1827 treatise: 'Essays on the Perception of an External Universe: And Other Subjects Connected with the Doctrine of Causation'¹, that she thinks causation is a burning issue that impacts on every aspect of life and is of great academic importance, from improving our practical knowledge and general scientific knowledge to assisting us to attain more accurate, reliable and detailed knowledge of health and chemical reactions:

"It bears immediately upon every part of physiology, and very materially upon the treatment of mental and bodily disorders, upon the nature of chemical actions,&c. as it opens a different view of the nature of the action which goes on between matter, (as it is termed,) and mind."²

I maintain that this passage I have quoted³ shows us Shepherd's main motivations behind her passion for the topic of causation. It provides textual support to my claim that Shepherd’s philosophical priority, interest and focus is on scientific understanding, not religious creed. In this passage⁴, we see that Shepherd has listed various fields of science as her interests, not religion or theological arguments trying to prove the existence of God, as spurring her on to gain a fuller understanding of how causation fundamentally works. She cites scientific men as agreeing with her theory of causation⁵. So, I suggest, her philosophical theory must work well scientifically, perhaps more than religiously. I also argue that her contras against Hume's causation were not religiously motivated but rather scientifically and logically motivated.

Shepherd aimed to improve upon the common, relatively simplistic understanding of causation, which is that A caused B. This standard view of causation is mostly based on the following principle that:

One: A came before B;

and

Two: they seem to appear together and in conjunction with each other in a regular, patterned way

Therefore: Conclusion: so this must be revealing a possible law of nature and scientific laws.

This view of causation was advocated by Hume and Brown and seemed to remain the mainstream understanding of causation, despite Shepherd's efforts.

It is also perhaps vital to note that, in this quote, Shepherd sees materialistic topics such as disorders, and the term ‘matter’, as core areas of interest and enquiry for her⁶. This is why I argue that it can be academically insightful and interpretatively helpful to contextualise Shepherd's views by expanding on Materialists and thinkers who were also physicians or surgeons.

Brown fits into those thinkers that Shepherd refers to who were physicians. In Brown's case, he was considered talented at medicine and Latin but, unlike Mr Lawrence, he was also a philosopher and a poet. Indeed, I suggest both Brown and Lawrence are vital thinkers to intellectually grasp, given that Shepherd herself sees them as so key to her 1824 treatise that she specifically refers to them in the full title of the whole book: 'An Essay upon the Relation of Cause and Effect: Controverting the Doctrine of Mr. Hume, Concerning the Nature of that Relation; with Observations upon the Opinions of Dr. Brown and Mr Lawrence Connected with the Same Subject'⁷. Sometimes you see this title shortened so her observations on Brown and Lawrence are omitted, which is unhelpful because it could make readers underestimate the relevance of these thinkers to Shepherd's philosophy.

Shepherd would have perhaps been aware that Thomas Brown became rather disgruntled with religion and the clergy, after he discovered that clergy within a university were constantly favoured over him for the academic jobs he applied for, despite having his friends’ support⁸. This blocked him from gaining academic positions such as Chair of Rhetoric, despite being the best candidate for the job as well as being well-known for his extraordinary abilities in the skill of rhetoric⁹.

So, when Brown again heard about this flagrant religious bias, this time for the job of Chair of Mathematics, he was furious and decided to boldly enter the academic debate¹⁰. Yet again, a clergy candidate was trying to deprive a strong intellectual, in this case, the outstanding physicist and mathematician Mr Leslie, of an academic position, through the deceitful means of viciously and publicly attacking Leslie's work as heretical¹¹ simply because he agreed with Hume's causation¹². Mr Leslie was no ordinary mathematician. He is still remembered in science for his groundbreaking experiments and important discoveries about ice, heat¹³ and radiation¹⁴. There's even a piece of scientific equipment that he invented that's named after him, called Leslie's Cube¹⁵.

So that is the background as to how Brown came to passionately, philosophically argue in favour of Hume's causation and why he wrote a book on it.

Mary Shepherd was not in the middle of this problem of clergy unfairly dominating academia, so I suggest that she need not approach causation in the same manner as Brown and Hume. As a woman outside of the Christian university system, I argue that she could assess metaphysical and scientific questions about causation from a different standpoint, perhaps allowing her to reach more objective, convoluted conclusions to assist scientific advancements, in keeping with her stated objectives.

Brown maintained that Hume's causation was not irreligious in an essay which he then later expanded into a book on causation¹⁶. So, I maintain, there is clear textual evidence which shows that not all philosophers in that era saw Hume as being quite as atheistic or anti-religion as people tend to interpret him today.

In this chapter, I am not assessing what I consider a stronger or weaker contemporary interpretation of Hume on religion, that's not the task at hand here. What I am suggesting, is that I think one needs to factor in differences between how philosophers in the long Early Modern period viewed Hume on religion and how one now views Hume's perspective on religion. If scholars do not, then one is prone to analysing debates between Hume and other philosophers in the history of philosophy through the tinted lens of our modern day preconceptions. This is especially problematic when one assumes that contemporary views are much more liberal and tolerant than they were in Hume's day. I argue that history is simply not that neat and linear. I argue that some people express more narrow-minded views these days than certain other people, centuries earlier.

I also argue that present day biases can also result in cherry picking examples from the past that suit present purposes over historical evidence that is inconvenient for their ideology or claims. Hence, one is more likely to hear about certain Christians or clergy arguing fiercely against Hume's views of religion than one is to hear about Thomas Brown's dismissal of such so-called religious concerns that Hume was expounding heresies. As one observes with Mr Leslie, some of these religious outcries had ulterior motives, such as religious men attempting to attack the reputation of their talented and better qualified opposition¹⁷. This in order to gain employment and academic university jobs unfairly and unjustly¹⁸.

Thus, I suggest that we learn two things: one: we cannot take all religious objections and claims of heresy seriously, their motivations for such outbursts are often not even religious; Two: we have to assess the philosophical debates in history in an objective, rational manner and accept that there may be all sorts of intellectual reasons for a philosopher in history putting forward a counterargument, we cannot assume it is religiously motivated simply because one assumes that all philosophers of that era only saw Hume as an atheist to overcome with religious arguments. Everything is not about religion, although major religions would like it to be so. This is especially true of Christianity which carries with it a dark history of persecution, fear, terror, torture and forced conversions of different stripes. Consequently, I argue that the religious and historical considerations I outline here need to inform scholarly interpretation of both Hume and Shepherd.

References:

¹Shepherd, Mary. Essays on the Perception of an External Universe and Other Subjects Connected with the Doctrine of Causation, 1st edition (Piccadilly, London, United Kingdom : J. Hatchard and son, 1827), http://archive.org/details/essaysonpercepti00shep.

²Ibid p307

³Ibid

⁴Ibid

⁵Ibid

⁶Ibid

⁷Shepherd, Mary. An Essay upon the Relation of Cause and Effect : Controverting the Doctrine of Mr. Hume, Concerning the Nature of That Relation, with Observations upon the Opinions of Dr. Brown and Mr. Lawrence Connected with the Same Subject (London, United Kingdom: Printed for T. Hookham, 1824), http://archive.org/details/essayuponrelatio00shepiala

⁸‘Thomas Brown’,

last accessed: 20 September 2024,