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David Hume vs Immanuel Kant on Virtue

Hume's account of virtue is naturalistic and sentimentalist: the virtues are character traits that please the impartial observer, grounded in sympathy with their effects on human welfare. Kant rejects sentiment as the basis of morality: virtue is the will's strength in acting from duty against inclination, and only actions performed from respect for the moral law have genuine moral worth. The Humean virtuous person is well-disposed; the Kantian virtuous person acts from principle.

About this topic

Virtue has been a central category of ethics since the Greeks treated it as the excellence proper to a human being. Plato analyzed the cardinal virtues, Aristotle developed virtue ethics as habituated dispositions of character, and Confucian and Buddhist traditions parallel this concern with cultivated moral excellence. Medieval thinkers added the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity to the classical inheritance. The modern revival of virtue ethics in the twentieth century returned attention to character and practical wisdom as the ground of moral life.

For a side-by-side overview of the two philosophers more broadly, see the full David Hume vs Immanuel Kant comparison. To browse philosophy more widely on this theme, see the Virtue quotes hub.

Representative quotes on virtue

David Hume on virtue

  • “He is happy whom circumstances suit his temper; but he is more excellent who suits his temper to any circumstances.”

    § 6.9 : Of Qualities Useful to Ourselves, Pt. 1

  • “When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken.”

    § 9.13 : Conclusion, Pt. 1

  • “The corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.”

    Part X - With regard to courage or abasement

  • “Playfully ironic letter to Adam Smith regarding the positive reception of "The Theory of Moral Sentiments”

    A wise man's kingdom is his own breast: or, if he ever looks farther, it will only be to the judgment of a select few, who are free from prejudices , and capable of examining his work . Nothing indeed can be a stronger presumption of falsehood than the approbation of the multitude; and Phocion, you know, always suspected himself of some blunder when he was attended with the applauses of the popula

  • “Heaven and Hell suppose two distinct species of men, the good and the bad; but the greatest part of mankind float betwixt vice and virtue. -- Were one to go round the world with an intention of giving a good supper to the righteous, and a sound drubbing to the wicked, he would frequently be embarrassed in his choice, and would find that the merits and the demerits of most men and women scarcely amount to the value of either.”

    Essay on the Immortality of the Soul

Immanuel Kant on virtue

  • “Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.”

    Two things fill the mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe, the more often and the more intensely the mind of thought is drawn to them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.

  • “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”

    Der kategorische Imperativ, der überhaupt nur aussagt, was Verbindlichkeit sei, ist: handle nach einer Maxime, welche zugleich als ein allgemeines Gesetz gelten kann.

  • “Moral Teleology supplies the deficiency in physical Teleology , and first establishes a Theology ; because the latter, if it did not borrow from the former without being observed, but were to proceed consistently, could only found a Demonology , which is incapable of any definite concept.”

    Immanuel Kant , Kant's Critique of Judgment (1892) Tr. J.H. Bernard

  • Attributed to Immanuel Kant:

    “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means.”

  • Attributed to Immanuel Kant:

    “He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men.”

All 6 Immanuel Kant quotes on virtue →

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