My favorite passage from David Hume's work `An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding`
“Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return? ... I am confounded with all these questions, and begin to fancy myself in the most deplorable condition imaginable, environed with the deepest darkness, and utterly deprived of the use of every member and faculty.
Most fortunately it happens, that since Reason is incapable of dispelling these clouds, Nature herself suffices to that purpose, and cures me of this philosophical melancholy and delirium, either by relaxing this bent of mind, or by some avocation, and lively impression of my senses, which obliterate all these chimeras. I dine, I play a game of backgammon, I converse, and am merry with my friends. And when, after three or four hours' amusement, I would return to these speculations, they appear so cold, and strained, and ridiculous, that I cannot find in my heart to enter into them any farther.”
One of the saddest things about modern college/university philosophy courses, I think, is how few people will ever end up reading any of the great philosopher's works in the original (nevermind even in the original language!). It's almost always condensed versions by another author of the "main ideas".
I had this experience when I picked up a copy of John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding and read the thing in the original. I was completely shaken by the beauty of it.
It saddens me because 90% of the beauty is lost in favor of "just getting to the main idea". You lose so, so much. It would be like reciting Homer without an understanding of meter. All beauty would be lost.
Yes, Hume is one of my favourite writers. I'd recommend his Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding and Concerning the Principles of Morals, and his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.
“Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return? ... I am confounded with all these questions, and begin to fancy myself in the most deplorable condition imaginable, environed with the deepest darkness, and utterly deprived of the use of every member and faculty.
Most fortunately it happens, that since Reason is incapable of dispelling these clouds, Nature herself suffices to that purpose, and cures me of this philosophical melancholy and delirium, either by relaxing this bent of mind, or by some avocation, and lively impression of my senses, which obliterate all these chimeras. I dine, I play a game of backgammon, I converse, and am merry with my friends. And when, after three or four hours' amusement, I would return to these speculations, they appear so cold, and strained, and ridiculous, that I cannot find in my heart to enter into them any farther.”