• I. Methodological Preliminaries


• 1. Introduction: Principles of Interpretation


• 2. Why the Treatise? Why Book II? Why Custom?


• II. Book II: The Psychological Foundations


• 3. The Passions: Some Basic Distinctions


• 4. The Passions and Human Nature


• 5. Book II: Hume's Moral Psychology


• III. Books I and III: The Skeptical Framework Deployed


• 6. Book I: Epistemological Foundations


• 7. Book I: Causality


• 8. Book I: Skepticism with Regard to Reason


• 9. Book I: Skepticism with Regard to the Senses


• 10. Book I: Personal Identity and Philosophical Method


• 11. Book III: Ethics


• IV. Living Carelessly


• 12. The Appendix: Second Thoughts about Second Thoughts


• 13. Persons as Customary Creatures


• References

Jay L. Garfield is Doris Silbert Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, Logic and Buddhist Studies and Chair of the Philosophy department at Smith College. He is also Visiting Professor of Buddhist Philosophy at Harvard Divinity School, Professor of Philosophy at Melbourne University and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies. He has taught in Australia, Singapore, Japan and Germany and is a regular lecturer at major universities, Buddhist Studies centers and research institutions around the world. Professor Garfield is author or editor of 27 books and over 150 articles and book reviews.

Jay L. Garfield defends two exegetical theses regarding Hume's Treatise on Human Nature. The first is that Book II is the theoretical foundation of the Treatise. Second, Garfield argues that we cannot understand Hume's project without an appreciation of his own understanding of custom, and in particular, without an appreciation of the grounding of his thought about custom in the legal theory and debates of his time.